Could someone please tell me who ate whose lunch on this week’s tax cut deal – the White House or the GOP?

‘Cause you can’t tell by looking at the chin-strokerati.

Left-listing Eric Alterman wrote this in The Daily Beast:

The GOP Is Eating Obama’s Lunch

Conservative Republicans beat down the liberal Democrats on Thursday night’s tax vote the same way they win everything: by sticking together and refusing to budge, even an inch… on anything. By caving early (and often), Obama managed to distance himself from this particular shellacking and even give some pundits the impression he had won something.

One such pundit was right-listing Charles Krauthammer, who wrote this in his syndicated column:

If Barack Obama wins reelection in 2012, as is now more likely than not, historians will mark his comeback as beginning on Dec. 6, the day of the Great Tax Cut Deal of 2010.

Obama had a bad November. Self-confessedly shellacked in the midterm election, he fled the scene to Asia and various unsuccessful meetings, only to return to a sad-sack lame-duck Congress with ghostly dozens of defeated Democrats wandering the halls.

Now, with his stunning tax deal, Obama is back. Holding no high cards, he nonetheless managed to resurface suddenly not just as a player but as orchestrator, dealmaker and central actor in a high $1 trillion drama.

So did Obama pull off the Swindle of the Century (Krauthammer) or the Dwindle of the Century (Alterman)?

You tell us.