Jeff Smith: Should Obama have led the supercommittee?

He should have played a more active last fall by working with Sens. Durbin and Coburn – both friends of his – to build some modicum of bipartisan consensus around the recommendations of the Simpson-Bowles commission that he created.

It’s not inconceivable to think that something could’ve passed during the 2010 lame duck session, when “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” was repealed with the support of several Republicans. By the time the supercommittee got down to work, it was probably too late; opinion had congealed on both sides.

(Cross-posted, with author’s permission, from Politico’s Arena)