Steve Benen points to a new CNN poll showing that Democrats and independents love the budget deal, while Republicans are more circumspect:
A CNN/Opinion Research Corporation survey released Monday indicates that the budget agreement that prevented a government shutdown is popular, with Americans supporting it by a 58 to 38 percent margin. But there's a partisan divide, with two-thirds of Democrats and a majority of independent voters backing the deal, and Republicans divided.
There are really a few separate issues here. One is whether the budget deal puts the administration on weaker footing to defend Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security; another is whether the deal will harm Obama with the base, and the third is whether the cuts hurt the macroeconomy.
I'd say yes to the first, no to the second, and maybe to the third. Obama compromised because Democrats and independents like compromise even if liberal bloggers don't. The cuts were bad, but a shutdown would have been worse. But there's no reason the administration had to brag about the size of the cuts, which reinforced the kind of bad economic "kitchen table" metaphors that have been leveraged in favor of austerity.
