Obama may well be our Nixon...

President Obama is a very moderate, centrist Democrat. His health care bill (the Affordable Care Act) is actually well to the right of many previous Republican plans, and almost a carbon copy of a plan put out by the Heritage Foundation under H.W. Bush in 1989. Running with this theme, Bruce Bartlett brings us this:

Although Republicans routinely accuse him of being a socialist, an honest examination of his presidency must conclude that he has in fact been moderately conservative to exactly the same degree that Nixon was moderately liberal.

Here are a few examples of Obama's effective conservatism:

• His stimulus bill was half the size that his advisers thought necessary;
• He continued Bush’s war and national security policies without change and even retained Bush’s defense secretary;
• He put forward a health plan almost identical to those that had been supported by Republicans such as Mitt Romney in the recent past, pointedly rejecting the single-payer option favored by liberals;
• He caved to conservative demands that the Bush tax cuts be extended without getting any quid pro quo whatsoever;
• And in the past few weeks he has supported deficit reductions that go far beyond those offered by Republicans.

Bartlett, by the way was an Economic adviser for Reagan, he is not exactly a liberal guy.

h/t to Paul Krugman.