Listening skills. or, "Can you hear em now?"

Professor Ilya Somin on the Volokh blog thinks American voters are unsophisticated and Congress should still ram through an unpopular "reform" bill:

I either overestimated Obama’s political skills or underestimated the structural obstacles he would have to overcome; probably it was some combination of both errors. His window of opportunity for major left-liberal policy changes is closing faster than I expected. Probably faster than Obama himself expected too.

At the same time, I don’t think I was totally wrong. Obama has already secured an enormous increase in government spending with last year’s $800 billion “stimulus” bill, putting in place policies that will greatly expand federal expenditures for years to come.

Despite Scott Brown’s victory, the Democrats still have several options for pushing the health care bill through Congress.* For example, they can get the House to pass the version already enacted by the Senate, thereby cutting Brown out of the process.

Meanwhile, several other important expansions of government are making their way through Congress, and have attracted much less popular opposition than the health care bill. One example is the Consumer Financial Protection Agency, which would vastly expand federal regulation of financial products.

Some of these are highly technical in nature, and could pass in part because most voters won’t notice or understand them.

*I dunno Ilya** ... I 'spect they's just might be a bit smartter than ya give em credit for! Counting to 5, and counting other people's money, is for the professors; doesn't mean regular voters can't tally the totals...

Personally, I think these advisor/consultant/professor types need to work more on listening skills. Because whether out of ignorance or arrogance, anybody counseling that the politicians ignore the message the American people are sending fails this basic lesson.

** If Hollywood ever remakes Carol & Ted & Bob & Alice, I'm gonna suggest they call the new bedfellows Oprah & Ezra & Ilya & Uma. No particular reason, I just like how it sounds ...