How Ryan set up Obama's comeback

The Republican plan to cut taxes and slash government health care spending gives the president prime opportunities for political victory

“Whatever you do, don’t serve to his backhand.”
 
“Don’t be nervous. I have the new Ryan serve. It’s bold!”
 
“Trust me on this. Don’t serve to his backhand.”
 
Thomp. Wham.
 
Here’s a basic fact of American politics: The American people like Medicare. They are not so enthusiastic about tax cuts for the rich.
 
Those of us on the political right have different preferences. We believe that low rates for high earners accelerate economic growth. We believe that the cost of Medicare must be restrained. And I think we have a lot of good arguments on our side.

But we must never deceive ourselves: We are arguing for policies with a lot of political negatives attached to them. Which means we have to take some basic political precautions.
 
In the current Republican mood, however, precautions are for girlie-men. Republicans have succumbed to a strange mood of simultaneous euphoria and paranoia. Republicans have convinced themselves both that: (1) American freedom stands in imminent danger of disappearing into totalitarian night; and (2) that the vast majority of the great and good American people are yearning for a mighty rollback of Big Government, even at considerable personal sacrifice.
 
And so Republicans have united around Rep. Paul Ryan’s (R-Wis.) proposal that for the first time in modern conservative history explicitly joins a big tax cut for the rich to big cuts in health care spending for virtually everybody else. If this were a tennis game, the Republicans would be placing the ball in exactly the spot on the court where it must never, ever go.