To my friends on the left: This one’s for you.

Your grumbling that President Barack Obama again gave away the store to Republicans is unwarranted. The deal to evade the fiscal cliff was no repeat of the debt-ceiling fiasco of 2011, when Obama famously bargained with himself. This time, he suppressed the urge to publicly consider raising the Medicare eligibility age. Meanwhile, he put off the clash over entitlements for another day.

Obama did cave or compromise (pick your term) on his earlier resolve to let Bush tax cuts expire for households earning over $250,000. The final package sets $450,000 as the cutoff.