Mark Schmitt on the value of policy smarts:
New political eras have a kind of Robert’s Rules of Order rhythm to them. First on the agenda: old business. Then on to the new.
And that’s the point at which we find ourselves in the Obama era — we are about to bring the unfinished business to a close and move on to the new stuff. After the low-hanging fruit, such as the Lilly Ledbetter Fair
Pay Act, and the three economic emergencies (banks, cars, and recession), health reform was the great task left incomplete by the previous Democratic administration and its predecessors. The policy structure and political strategy for health reform had also been put in place well before the 2008 election, by think tanks and advocacy coalitions and by the lessons of previous failures. Reform of the student-loan system, which brought an 18-year battle to a surprisingly quiet end, was also enacted in the safe shadow of health reform.
