August Surprise?

Ponder this question for a moment, if you will: How does the average independent voter define the economy?  In macro terms, or micro?  Is it All Of Us in the same boat together, rowing frantically to escape the giant whirlpool of debt Barry Jones has stirred up at World's End, or is it his/her own bank account and mortgage and credit card statements, particularly if s/he is drowning in the latter two?

We know which way the White House is betting:

Main Street may be about to get its own gigantic bailout. Rumors are running wild from Washington to Wall Street that the Obama administration is about to order government-controlled lenders Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to forgive a portion of the mortgage debt of millions of Americans who owe more than what their homes are worth. An estimated fifteen million U.S. mortgages – one in five – are underwater with negative equity of some $800 billion. Recall that on Christmas Eve 2009, the Treasury Department waived a $400 billion limit on financial assistance to Fannie and Freddie, pledging unlimited help. The actual vehicle for the bailout could be the Bush-era Home Affordable Refinance Program, or HARP, a sister program to Obama’s loan modification effort. HARP was just extended through June 30, 2011.

The move, if it happens, would be a stunning political and economic bombshell less than a hundred days before a midterm election in which Democrats are currently expected to suffer massive, if not historic losses. The key date to watch is August 17 when the Treasury Department holds a much-hyped meeting on the future of Fannie and Freddie.

Call it the Democrat Majority Bailout Act of 2010:

Democrats are in real danger of losing the House and almost losing the Senate. The mortgage Hail Mary would be a last-gasp effort to prevent this from happening and to save the Obama agenda. The political calculation is that the number of grateful Americans would be greater than those offended that they — and their children and their grandchildren — would be paying for someone else’s mortgage woes.

A nakedly short-term political gimmick at the cost of hundreds of billions of dollars more thumbtacked onto the fourteen-figure national debt to keep the Dems in power so they can continue right on pouring trillions more down the same black hole.  A blatant bribe to the electorate in exchange for the votes they bamboozled them into casting in their favor the last time.  Surely this will be seen for what it is, and further fuel the flames of anti-Donk electoral rebellion.

Right?

One would certainly like to think so.

On the other hand, if you're in mortgage purgatory and The One waves his magic wand and makes YOUR debt go away, how much are you going to care that he did so by mugging those of your countrymen that still pay taxes?  How likely are you to realize that YOUR debt hasn't really gone away, but just been moved a step or two away from you in the ultimate scheme of things?  I'm guessing not so much.

Will that make you more disposed toward putting the tar & feathers away and giving your "conservative" Democrat rep another two years to keep voting for all the crap that pissed you off against him/her in the first place?

If you understand the underlying ideological reason for that, you'll pocket the debt relief and still consign Congressman Bunghole to the outer darkness anyway.  If your anger derived solely or predominantly from how the Obama Recession has affected YOU, that may just flip your weathervane back in the wrong direction.

This scheme is aimed at swing voters, folks.  And they don't bear that adjective for nothing.