Congressional leaders may have come to a short term budget agreement to avoid another government shutdown next month, but that didn't stop the drum beat from the beltway Villagers, who aren't going to be happy until they get their "grand bargain."

Of course that was on full display, as it is just about every morning, on MSNBC's Morning Joe. After reading part of an op-ed complaining about the agreement by one of their regulars, Pete Peterson crony Steven Rattner, one of their other regular guests, Harold Ford Jr. (D-Wall Street) had this response when asked if Rattner was right, and Congress "squandered an opportunity" to go after our social safety nets:

FORD: Clearly, Simpson-Bowles I think serves as the real model as the goal we should be looking to achieve, but the fact that Ryan and Murray, two people, particularly conservatives didn't believe that Patty Murray, who leans a little left in the eyes of some in the political world, was able to achieve something with the former vice presidential candidate of the Republican party.

I think it bodes well, and I hope the president, as he returns home from the funeral of the great Nelson Mandela will look to this and follow the words of his statement and look to achieve what I hope will be a real long term grand bargain here in the coming months, which I think will be a defining element of his time as president, and certainly the best thing that could happen thus far in the second term of his presidency.

It would be a "defining element" all right, but not in a good way as Ford suggests here. President Obama needs to be listening to the likes of Elizabeth Warren, not Ford and Rattner when it comes to Social Security.