Why 2012 is much more important than 2008 for Obama
Thought I'd kick off with something topical.
So the standard narrative of the 2012 US presidential election has been that it's not as exciting or inspiring as the 2008 election when Barack Obama swept in on a wave of optimism. The realities of governing in an economy struggling to recover from the 2008 financial crisis (and subsequent devastating global recession) as well as relentless and unprecedented opposition from the Republican party have brought Obama back down to earth.
Combined with, in Mitt Romney, an opponent who seems like he was cast as a president in a 1975 film but then the script writer never turned up, the 2012 election has seemed much more generic and "political" with both sides attacking each other relentlessly and the discussion focusing for days on candidate screw ups rather than "big issues". First Romney dismissed 47% of Americans as freeloaders then Obama turned up to the first debate looking like I did when was 14 and tried to bluff my way through a report on a book which I clearly hadn't read.
Never mind the fact that the 2008 campaign was plenty negative enough (most of Obama's TV adverts were negative and, as it was the best funded campaign in history up to that point, actually ran more negative adverts than any previous US campaign) but the stakes of the 2012 election are far, far, far higher than they were in 2008 when you consider what happens if Obama loses.
Think about the consequences of an Obama defeat in 2008. For the purposes of this comparison I'm going to ignore the inevitably disastrous fallout of America rejecting the first black major party nominee for president as well as any fallout from whatever tactics would have been used to achieve this given that the economic and political science fundementals clearly predicted a Republican defeat.
If we focus on the major policy consequences then they may not actually be so different. The Democrats would still have had big majorities in both the House of Representatives and the Senate and these would likely have been increased (or at least held) in the 2010 midterms given that the state of the economy would have doomed President McCain's party to further losses just as it did for President Obama. The stimulus package that Obama passed in 2009 represented the consensus approach of most mainstream economists and something similar would probably have been passed with McCain's signature. The healthcare bill that Obama ultimately signed into law is based originally on the plan that Republicans proposed as an alternative to Bill Clinton's healthcare plan in 1994 and which Mitt Romney famously passed as Governor of Massachusetts. It's not hard to believe that Republicans in Congress would have been much more willing to pass a bill that would have been signed by McCain since denying Obama any policy victories was the principle reason for their opposition to the bill in the first place.
McCain also indicated that he would have favoured a cap-and-trade scheme to combat global warming and comprehensive immigration reform, both things which Obama would like to have passed but which were blocked by Republicans.
Obama obviously passed a stimulus package, healthcare reform as well as financial reform and much more. In terms of achieving policy priorities he has been an astonishingly successful president, particularly given that his agenda was thrown aside by the need to respond to the 2008 financial crisis and the unprecedented opposition of the Republican party. If the economy had recovered fully then he'd be looking at a landslide victory. But it hasn't.
This is where we get to the consequences for the 2012 election because losing means that not only does Obama no longer get to be president but that everything he's done up until now will be undone by his successor and Obama's entire approach will be discredited in the eyes of history if he's viewed as a failed president.
Jimmy Carter tried to get people to take energy conservation seriously but after he was defeated, anything that smacked of trying to curb energy and fuel consumption was discredited. George H.W. Bush won the Gulf War and chose to raise taxes to deal with ballooning government spending deficits but when he lost re-election, his party swore to never consider raising taxes again.
All of this would be somewhat mitigated if the economy was likely to remain poor and Mitt Romney was to be defeated in 2016 but the next four years are likely to be a "recovery presidency".
Both Carter and Bush were followed by presidents who benefitted from an economic recovery that occured on their watch (Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton respectively). Carter is tolerated by his party and Bush is grudgingly accepted by his. In contrast, Reagan and Clinton are beloved by their own parties and respected by their opponents because their tenures are seen as successful because they presided over a period of economic prosperity.
Whoever wins the 2012 election will preside over a growing economy and their policies, regardless of the actual effect they have, will be seen as responsible. The party that wins in 2012 will be credited with economic recovery and the implications of this are enormous. Presiding over the recovery from the Great Depression kept the Democrats in power for 20 years while Reagan presiding over the recovery of the 1980s has cemented in place a political consensus very favourable to Republicans and kept the debate largely on their terms.
If Obama wins in 2012 and the economy recovers then he becomes like Reagan, a president who dragged the country out of the mess and put it on the road to prosperity and his party will be rewarded for years, if not decades, to come. His presidency is a success even if he achieves very little over the next four years beyond not screwing anything up too badly because his approach will become the new-normal.
If he loses then not only are his achievements erased but Mitt Romney becomes Reagan instead because he gets the "recovery presidency". His approach will be vindicated and history will view everything about him with rosy tinted glasses because he presided over economic prosperity. His party will be rewarded for a long time to come and his approach becomes the new-normal instead.
The outcome of an Obama loss in 2008 would have been disappointing for the Democrats but an Obama loss in 2012 would be disastrous. The stakes for the 2012 US election are effectively to be the dominant political force in America for a generation.
So the standard narrative of the 2012 US presidential election has been that it's not as exciting or inspiring as the 2008 election when Barack Obama swept in on a wave of optimism. The realities of governing in an economy struggling to recover from the 2008 financial crisis (and subsequent devastating global recession) as well as relentless and unprecedented opposition from the Republican party have brought Obama back down to earth.
Combined with, in Mitt Romney, an opponent who seems like he was cast as a president in a 1975 film but then the script writer never turned up, the 2012 election has seemed much more generic and "political" with both sides attacking each other relentlessly and the discussion focusing for days on candidate screw ups rather than "big issues". First Romney dismissed 47% of Americans as freeloaders then Obama turned up to the first debate looking like I did when was 14 and tried to bluff my way through a report on a book which I clearly hadn't read.
Never mind the fact that the 2008 campaign was plenty negative enough (most of Obama's TV adverts were negative and, as it was the best funded campaign in history up to that point, actually ran more negative adverts than any previous US campaign) but the stakes of the 2012 election are far, far, far higher than they were in 2008 when you consider what happens if Obama loses.
Think about the consequences of an Obama defeat in 2008. For the purposes of this comparison I'm going to ignore the inevitably disastrous fallout of America rejecting the first black major party nominee for president as well as any fallout from whatever tactics would have been used to achieve this given that the economic and political science fundementals clearly predicted a Republican defeat.
If we focus on the major policy consequences then they may not actually be so different. The Democrats would still have had big majorities in both the House of Representatives and the Senate and these would likely have been increased (or at least held) in the 2010 midterms given that the state of the economy would have doomed President McCain's party to further losses just as it did for President Obama. The stimulus package that Obama passed in 2009 represented the consensus approach of most mainstream economists and something similar would probably have been passed with McCain's signature. The healthcare bill that Obama ultimately signed into law is based originally on the plan that Republicans proposed as an alternative to Bill Clinton's healthcare plan in 1994 and which Mitt Romney famously passed as Governor of Massachusetts. It's not hard to believe that Republicans in Congress would have been much more willing to pass a bill that would have been signed by McCain since denying Obama any policy victories was the principle reason for their opposition to the bill in the first place.
McCain also indicated that he would have favoured a cap-and-trade scheme to combat global warming and comprehensive immigration reform, both things which Obama would like to have passed but which were blocked by Republicans.
Obama obviously passed a stimulus package, healthcare reform as well as financial reform and much more. In terms of achieving policy priorities he has been an astonishingly successful president, particularly given that his agenda was thrown aside by the need to respond to the 2008 financial crisis and the unprecedented opposition of the Republican party. If the economy had recovered fully then he'd be looking at a landslide victory. But it hasn't.
This is where we get to the consequences for the 2012 election because losing means that not only does Obama no longer get to be president but that everything he's done up until now will be undone by his successor and Obama's entire approach will be discredited in the eyes of history if he's viewed as a failed president.
Jimmy Carter tried to get people to take energy conservation seriously but after he was defeated, anything that smacked of trying to curb energy and fuel consumption was discredited. George H.W. Bush won the Gulf War and chose to raise taxes to deal with ballooning government spending deficits but when he lost re-election, his party swore to never consider raising taxes again.
All of this would be somewhat mitigated if the economy was likely to remain poor and Mitt Romney was to be defeated in 2016 but the next four years are likely to be a "recovery presidency".
Both Carter and Bush were followed by presidents who benefitted from an economic recovery that occured on their watch (Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton respectively). Carter is tolerated by his party and Bush is grudgingly accepted by his. In contrast, Reagan and Clinton are beloved by their own parties and respected by their opponents because their tenures are seen as successful because they presided over a period of economic prosperity.
Whoever wins the 2012 election will preside over a growing economy and their policies, regardless of the actual effect they have, will be seen as responsible. The party that wins in 2012 will be credited with economic recovery and the implications of this are enormous. Presiding over the recovery from the Great Depression kept the Democrats in power for 20 years while Reagan presiding over the recovery of the 1980s has cemented in place a political consensus very favourable to Republicans and kept the debate largely on their terms.
If Obama wins in 2012 and the economy recovers then he becomes like Reagan, a president who dragged the country out of the mess and put it on the road to prosperity and his party will be rewarded for years, if not decades, to come. His presidency is a success even if he achieves very little over the next four years beyond not screwing anything up too badly because his approach will become the new-normal.
If he loses then not only are his achievements erased but Mitt Romney becomes Reagan instead because he gets the "recovery presidency". His approach will be vindicated and history will view everything about him with rosy tinted glasses because he presided over economic prosperity. His party will be rewarded for a long time to come and his approach becomes the new-normal instead.
The outcome of an Obama loss in 2008 would have been disappointing for the Democrats but an Obama loss in 2012 would be disastrous. The stakes for the 2012 US election are effectively to be the dominant political force in America for a generation.
Labels: Obama, US elections
posted by Adam Drummond @ 10:58 PM
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