Shaping the future with today’s choices.

I said yesterday that I thought the president should accept a deal on tax cuts even if he had to live with the Republican position on keeping them for everyone. The actual deal he negotiated was better than I expected; I hope that -- after the inevitable gnashing of teeth -- it makes it through the Congress. I'm probably the only person writing on New Deal 2.0 who thinks that.

The deal reduces tax rates for everyone -- I think that is unwise, but absent a protracted veto fight, the president had no option. It also extends unemployment insurance for 13 months, reduces payroll taxes, extends the Earned Income Tax Credit and the Child Tax Credit, and extends the Estate Tax, but accepts the Republican marginal rate and base positions.

Progressives will go nuts. Katrina vanden Heuvel, writing in the Post today, calls the tax extension for everyone "political self-immolation." She goes on to say that "we're looking at a failed one-term presidency." I haven't yet seen James Galbraith's specific comments on the deal, but in his recent ADA speech he said, "On the topics that I know most about, the administration is beyond being a disappointment. It's beyond inept, unprepared, weak, and ineffective. ...we need to draw a line and decide that we would be better off with an under-funded, fighting progressive minority party than a party marked by obvious duplicity and constant losses on every policy front as a result of the reversals in our own leadership." Both of these outcomes may very well happen.

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My own view is much less dramatic. This is called a deal. Unless you believe in a magic option, the president's choice was this or a veto and then a protracted veto fight -- on losing terrain. An excellent article in the Washington Post today by Scott Wilson makes clear the White House's strategy: "The strategy emerged from hours of post-election meetings among senior administration officials who, after pouring over returns, exit polls and midterm history, have determined that the loss of independent voters who supported Democrats in 2008 cost the party dozens of races this year."

I think the President was correct on this call, on the politics, and on the substance, given his choices. This is an adult decision. He gets himself out of a fight he couldn't win, and he can pick his own fighting ground now. I want it to start with the State of the Union speech. Who knows, against all of my own expectations, the lame duck session may actually have been productive.

Roosevelt Institute Senior Fellow Bo Cutter is formerly a managing partner of Warburg Pincus, a major global private equity firm. Recently, he served as the leader of President Obama’s Office of Management and Budget (OMB) transition team.