Some in Dem ranks fear president will go too far in accommodating GOP following the midterms

Susan Walsh  /  AP

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of Calif., greets President Barack Obama on Capitol Hill in Washington, prior to the president delivering his State of the Union address on Jan. 27, 2010. Vice President Joe Biden is at left.

By JULIE HIRSCHFELD DAVIS

The Associated Press

WASHINGTON — Hers was the face on the grainy negative TV ads that helped defeat scores of Democrats. His agenda, re-election chances and legacy are on the line.

Rep. Nancy Pelosi of California, chosen after a messy family feud among Democrats to remain as their leader in the new Congress, and President Barack Obama share a keen interest in repairing their injured party after this month's staggering losses.

But Pelosi's mandate is diverging from the president's at a critical time, with potentially damaging consequences for Obama's ability to cut deals with Republicans in the new Congress.

Their partnership is strained after an election in which Pelosi and many Democrats feel the White House failed them. They believe Obama and his team muddled the party's message and didn't act soon enough to provide cover for incumbents who cast tough votes for his marquee initiatives.

Pelosi will lead Democrats "in pulling on the president's shirttails to make sure that he doesn't move from center-right to far-right," said Rep. Lynn Woolsey, D-Calif., a co-chair of the liberal Progressive Caucus in the House. "We think if he'd done less compromising in the last two years, there's a good chance we'd have had a jobs bill that would have created real jobs, and then we wouldn't even be worrying about having lost elections."

In Pelosi, a counterweight to Obama
Behind Democrats' decision to keep Pelosi as their leader after historic losses lies intense concern among liberals who dominate the party's ranks on Capitol Hill: They fear Obama will go too far in accommodating the GOP in the new era of divided government. Pelosi is seen as a counterweight to that political phenomenom.

She's done so before. When Democrats panicked after losing their Senate supermajority last winter, Pelosi rebuffed feelers by then-White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel and others to settle for a smaller health care bill. She derided the approach as "kiddie care" and pushed forward with the sweeping overhaul she painstakingly steered through the House by a razor-thin margin.