Patrick aide labels GOP ‘transparently cynical’
President Obama is trying to be measured amid his delicate debt and deficit negotiations with congressional Republicans, yet a top adviser to one of his key 2012 campaign surrogates it less temperate.
In an email sent this afternoon, David O’Brien, executive director of Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick’s political committee, labeled the GOP “transparently cynical.’’
He added: “The president has proposed a balanced plan to reduce the deficit by $4 trillion with a combination of cuts and revenue.
“The Republicans – caught up in their no-tax pledge – will only agree to a $2 trillion plan that cuts programs for seniors and the needy, while protecting tax breaks for oil companies and the wealthy,’’ wrote O’Brien.
In the email, the aide highlighted Patrick’s recent op-ed column in The Washington Post, which leveled much the same criticism.
The governor’s words carry special weight in relation to Obama, since the two are close friends, fellow Chicagoans and Harvard Law School graduates, and Patrick is raising money to campaign aggressively next year on the president’s behalf.
O’Brien was even more pointed than his boss.
“With our fragile economy dependent upon a deficit agreement, the Republicans who created this mess in the first place are playing games with our future. It’s more than transparently cynical. It’s deeply sad,’’ he wrote.
The White House refused comment, but Obama himself tried to court the GOP – a bit more diplomatically – during a news conference this morning.
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