He did.

President Obama listened to Republican gripes about his stimulus package during a meeting with congressional leaders Friday morning - but he also left no doubt about who's in charge of these negotiations. "I won," Obama noted matter-of-factly, according to sources familiar with the conversation.

Notice that President Obama didn't talk about having a mandate and sticking the Republicans' faces in it? He didn't say,"My way or the highway?" He has made the tent big enough for those who want to help save this country from self-destruction, so mark those who try to stand in the way. They really don't love America. (I've been wanting to say that for eight years....)

Mandate to tax the super rich?

David Sirota At Blog for Our Future:

I went on to make the point that I've often made in the past - the point that conservatives simply want everyone to forget: Namely, that President Clinton faced down a recession in 1993 by raising taxes on the wealthy in order to finance an economic stimulus package, and the economy subsequently boomed.

That simple, undeniable bit of history undermines the entire structure of conservatives claim that raising taxes on the super-rich will hurt the economy. And as you'll see from Norquist's response, they simply cannot deal with that truth. Indeed, Norquist actually goes all the way back to the 1920s as his example that raising taxes on the wealthy impedes economic growth - somehow ignoring the history from 15 years ago. He then goes on to claim with a straight face that Franklin Roosevelt created the Great Depression (this, along with the "center-right nation" propaganda, seems to be the right's new talking point).

The question now is whether the Obama administration buys into Norquist's fact-free nonsense, or whether it musters the same courage President Clinton mustered in prudently raising taxes on the super-rich to responsibly finance an economic stimulus package. Sure, temporary deficits are acceptable right now - there's no arguing that. But doing what's necessary to minimize those deficits is also important.

In terms of policy, if, as Congressional Quarterly reports, Obama wants to enforce budget discipline on a necessarily large economic stimulus package, it will require generating additional revenue from the wealthy. In terms of raw politics, if Clinton's 43 percent of the vote gave him enough political capital to come into office during an economic downturn and do that, I'd say Obama and his 53 percent gives him enough political capital to do the same today. And I would argue that if Obama backs off his promise to raise taxes on the wealthy, he will effectively validate the false conservative frame that claims tax increases on the wealthy endangers an economy.

While I certainly agree with the CNBC reporter that the 2008 is different than the 1990s, it isn't different when it comes to taxes - we have very recent history that proves raising taxes on the wealthy in order to raise revenues for economic stimulus, if done prudently, helps an economy recover. That is the argument that nobody during this debate was able to undermine - and it is the argument conservatives fear most, because they know it is accurate.

If George Bush claimed a mandate which he intended to 'spend', Obama clearly has one to implement his progressive agenda:

A mandate for progressive change exists. In a memo released today, the Center for American Progress Action Fund writes, “Obama ran on the most progressive platform of any presidential candidate in at least 15 years, including a promise of universal health care coverage, a dramatic transformation to a low-carbon economy, and a historic investment in education.”

And:

President Bush was re-elected in 2004 with 286 electoral votes, the smallest popular-vote margin since 1976 (excluding the 2000 election) and the lowest electoral vote count for an incumbent president's re-election since 1916. Nevertheless, many in the media were quick to echo Vice President Dick Cheney's assertion that "the nation" gave Bush "a mandate." It remains to be seen whether the media will apply the same standard in assessing the results of the 2008 election.

It's not center right, nor center center nor center left...

It's a liberal mandate.

David Neiwert of Orcinus:

I keep hearing from a lot of conservatives that McCain lost because he wasn't conservative enough -- that is, he was essentially a center-right candidate. And I think that's the consensus about where he sat on the political spectrum.

So if America is a "center-right country," then why didn't they elect the center-right candidate?

It's all bullshit, of course. As a CAF/Media Matters study found last year: "Media perceptions and past Republican electoral successes notwithstanding, Americans are progressive across a wide range of controversial issues, and they're growing more progressive all the time." In fact, as CAF's Robert Borosage points out, "Voters didn't just elect Democrats, they elected progressives." This is a liberal mandate.

Yet it's probably true that the election doesn't necessarily reflect an all-out embrace of all things liberal. Obama largely succeeded by making clear that he has a moderate temperament on a number of issues, and more importantly, in his style of governance. So a certain caution is probably wise.

No, this election was about one thing primarily: a sweeping repudiation of movement conservatism.

The breadth and depth of Democrats' victory was a loud shout from the American public: We have had enough of this crap.

Specifically, we've had enough of two things: conservative governance, and conservative politics.

Obama can't have a mandate

Apparently only Bush can have one.

Jonathan Turley:

Novatics: 3.5 Million Vote Margin for Bush is a Mandate But An Over 7 Million Vote Margin for Obama is No Mandate

Robert Novak has long been dismissed by rational people as a mean-spirited hack. However, he has really out done himself. Novak quickly dismissed the 7 million vote margin of Barack Obama as not a mandate while, in 2004, he said it was obvious that a 3.5 million margin for President Bush was such a mandate. Novak mathematics — or Novatics — appears to demand three times the margin of a Republican for a Democrat to declare a mandate.

Mandate:

1. a command or authorization to act in a particular way on a public issue given by the electorate to its representative: The president had a clear mandate to end the war.
[snip]
Origin:
1540–50; < class="ital-inline">mandātum, n. use of neut. of mandātus, ptp. of mandāre to commission, lit., to give into (someone's) hand.

Paul Krugman on Obama's mandate:

A magnificent victory for Barack Obama. And bear in mind that the campaign, in its final stages, was really about different philosophies of governing. This wasn’t like the 2004 campaign, which was essentially fought over fake issues — Bush running on national security and social issues, then claiming that he had a mandate to privatize Social Security. In this election, Obama proudly stood up for progressive values and the superiority of progressive policies; John McCain, in return, denounced him as a socialist, a redistributor. And the American people rendered their verdict.

Now the work begins.

It looks like everyone who voted for Obama has an item to put on the mandate list.

San Francisco Chronicle:

President-elect Barack Obama's resounding election triumph was greeted Wednesday from nearly every quarter in Washington as a mandate for change. What was most striking after a resounding victory that also added at least five Democrats to the Senate and 23 to the House, was how gingerly Democratic leaders treated their new mandate.

It is "not a mandate for any political party or any ideology," said Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., "but a mandate to get over those things that divide us and focus on getting things done."

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-San Francisco, warned that Obama comes to office with "more expectations than any president I can ever remember in my lifetime," and quickly sought to dampen them, citing the constraints of two wars and a sinking economy.

Even Democratic Party Chairman Howard Dean said, "I don't think it's a mandate for the New Deal. ... I think it's a mandate that the political class in this country has an obligation to young people in this country to stop fighting over stuff that might have been a big issue 25 years ago but it isn't anymore."

Advocates on the left quickly pushed back.

Obama is going to have everyone hanging on his coat and yelling to get his attention. Take a deep breath and center yourself, Mr. President-elect. It's going to get louder from now on out...