When Barack Obama was president elect and during the early days of his presidency when he chose Rahm Emanuel as his chief of staff, Tim Geithner, Larry Summers and Peter Orzag as members of his team, it confirmed for me that Obama was a DINO, a corporatist, and a panel moderator, not a leader.

Unfortunately, given his utterances post-mid term election, it appears that President Obama is ready to continue caving to the GOP.

From R. J. Eskow at Our Future: "The President could be on the brink of making a serious mistake, one with grave implications for his political future and even graver implications for aging Americans. If he responds to this election by adopting the Deficit Commission's recommendation to cut Social Security, President Obama will be snatching catastrophe from the jaws of defeat.

"The President and some other Democrats seem to have an almost uncontrollable impulse to be on both sides of an issue at once. It's as if they want to make amends for taking a clear stand - in this case, on the need for short-term spending - by undermining it with an opposing statement. Do they think they work for MSNBC, where you aren't allowed to support a political position without getting permission first?

"...who says you can't increase Social Security revenue? Why, the elite, that's who. The program has a $2.6 trillion surplus, and the public overwhelmingly prefers an increase in the payroll tax cap to any cuts in benefits, which would solve the problem for all eternity (at least as actuaries measure eternity). Just as Peter Orszag did last week, the Post doesn't find any faults with this approach. Instead they - like Orszag, and Alice Rivlin, and Alan Simpson, and so many others - merely pretend it doesn't exist. In Washington, any option the elite doesn't like simply vanishes.

"The President didn't mention lifting the payroll tax cap last night, either, although he campaigned on it.

"Last night's appearance [on 60 Minutes] raised the troubling possibility that the White House will respond to this month's election by falling even more in line with the Washington elite's way of thinking...."

John Aravosis at Americablog captures the reality of this disappointing, caving to the GOP DINO president.

"Obama on 60 Minutes:

Obama also expressed impatience with his liberal supporters for not understanding the deep divisions in the country – and that overcoming them was not simply a matter of a better message.

“I will say that when it comes to some of-- my supporters— part of it, I think, is-- the belief that if I just communicated things better, that I’d be able to persuade-- that half of the country that voted for John McCain that we were right and they were wrong.

“One of the things that I think is important for people to remember is that-- you know, this country-- doesn’t just agree with the New York Times editorial page. And, I can make some really good arguments-- defending the Democratic position. And there are going to be some people who just don’t agree with me. And that’s okay.”

"Huh? Who asked you to explain anything to John McCain voters? Who cares what John McCain voters think? Did someone tell the President that we're disappointed with him because he hasn't gotten McCain voters on board? Hell, he's the only one whose mission in life is wooing people who are unwooable.  The majority of the country voted for Obama, they're the only ones he should be worried about convincing.

"Second, when has this President defended the Democratic position on anything? He gives some speeches, occasionally, but launch an all-out "defense" of Democratic positions? Seriously? He thinks he's been doing that?  He honestly thinks he's fought as hard as he could for his promises?  Seriously?  Did I miss the part where the President asked for the full $1.5 to $2 trillion stimulus that the top economists told him we needed?  And even if the President believed he couldn't get the full stimulus, did I miss the part where he asked for the larger amount anyway, so he could blame the GOP for today's economic woes?  That certainly wasn't one of those moments in which the President now laments he was being too partisan.

"No one is asking President Obama to "make some really good arguments," like this is law school.  We're asking him to fight for something, anything at this point.

"Things are not going to get better until the President understands the problem.  And he clearly doesn't."