Political Update
Welcome back to the Political Update… It has been on hiatus for the past four months. After the excitement of the 2008 elections and the stimulation surrounding the inaugural, it took a few months off – not to recover – but to refocus. The political happenings of 2009 are very different than the past years. The center has shifted and the players are either new or wearing different uniforms. Rather than gurgle about the new team, or babble about the significance of insignificant things, I decided to sit back, allow the newness to begin to wear off, and restart when I felt more comfortable with the new scene.
That is not to say that nothing of significance has happened since February. Quite to the contrary, there has been a whirlwind of activity from Day One of the Obama Administration – too much to recount here.
Suffice to say that I have liked much of what I have seen. I like President Barrack Obama as a person and very much as a public servant and leader. I like all of the Obama family who have put glamour and fun into the everyday routine of the White House.
As an old pol who has seen a lot of political operations in Washington, I was impressed by the way the Obama Administration went about its political business.. Without getting too much in the way of policy and governing, the President and his team were getting their political work done quite well. Then Summer happened and the weight of the contentious issues came into play. These past months have been a real test for the Obama political team. I still believe they will work out their problems.
Their political game is a strong one. They start with leftovers from the campaign which are bountiful – a mailing list of supporters of more than thirteen million, a finance organization which set records for raising campaign money, the finest command of the new media and the organizing tools that it presents, and a President who has strong personal support, mass appeal and amazing presentation skills.
Despite their weakened numbers, the Republicans have not capitulated. They are focusing on issues and pseudo issues with emotional value to upset the Democratic bandwagon and cripple the new president. They have had some success; made a lot of noise; and slowed the Obama agenda.
After the fiery conflicts of the summer, we have settled in to a classic legislative battle over the President’s #1 priority, health care reform. The preliminaries are over. The committees have reported their bills to the table. Now the leaders are preparing to to make a stew out of the potsful of ingredients that they have been delivered. Speaker Nancy Pelosi will find it easy. The two bills that are before her are relatively similar and going in the same direction. Majority Leader Harry Reid has a more difficult task. He has three pieces of legislation that are dissimilar, and lacking in elements that the House Caucus seem to be extremely interested in…
By now you have been overexposed to the issues of the health care dispute. You know a single payer plan from a Cadillac plan… Forget it, in the next five or six weeks, fifty or so Congressmen and Senators will make new plans with new terms and end up with a new and exciting plan and it will move to the President for signature.
An Embarrassment of Honors
A Committee of five persons elected by the Norwegian Parliament (Storting) decided this past week that the Nobel Peace Prize for 2009 should be awarded to President Barack Obama. Their decision to honor the President is a great honor for him, but since it seems so premature – an honor for what they expect from him, not for what he has done – that it has become a mixed blessing for him.
The President needs to perform. He is long on rhetoric (and it is really good rhetoric) but short on performances. He is involved in big, complex problems and seems to be making progress. The Nobel Committee did not do him a favor by calling attention to this situation in the way they did.
The Big Issues of 2009
President Obama has a plateful of big issues – more than one would think were smart to juggle at one time. But Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel believes that a crisis, like the one we are experiencing should not be wasted. They provide excellent opportunities to make big gains… like when the linebackers and safeties are crowding the line of scrimmage is the best time to launch the long pass.
Here are the big items on his issue plate:
Health Care Reform – The top – and currently the most controversial – proposal from the Obama White House…
You know more about health care reform than you want to know. You have seen it everywhere you look. Of course, determining facts from factoids is difficult. The information being channeled to you is quite contradictory.
A few things we all agree to:
- Health care costs are a problem for most Americans – and it is getting progressively worse. We need some relief.
- Those of us who have insurance like what we have. We do not want to change.
- We are worried that our personal choices or control of care will be diminished by any new program.
- We would like to see some form of universal coverage, but not at the risk of lessening our own care.
- We do not want our insurance company to change coverage when we need them.
- We do not want any increase in taxes to pay for the new program.
This is a tough prescription, but it is the formula that the lawmakers are trying to achieve. I believe they will do it. Health care reform will pass and satisfy these requirements.
Climate Change – Saving the planet from carbon dioxide saturation and rising world temperature.
It may be an inconvenient truth, but remedial action is not easily achieved. This is the toughest legislative program to pass. It has all of the normal problems. Industry objects to the remedies. Benefits are long term, hard for the average citizen to assess. It looks like it will cost everybody something. Republicans oppose the bill unanimously… And, in addition, there are serious regional differences. Coal producing states versus the rest of the world.
The House has passed a significant bill based on a cap and trade system to limit carbon dioxide exhaust. Now the Senate is cranking up for the battle. Senator John Kerry just joined Chairman Barbara Boxer to lead the battle. This will be a battle royal. It is a tossup.
Financial Industry Reform – The hangover from the financial meltdown is slowly receding, but the regulatory regimen that allowed the crash is still in place – no real changes, so far.
There is no dearth of ideas or plans on what to do, but there is also substantial opposition to every possible change. The banks are still the banks – where the money is. And they are prepared to spend it all they need to stop the march of reform.
The battle is just to begin. On the House side, Barney Frank is ready to push his committee to pass meaningful reform… wide reaching, from consumer credit protection to ‘too big to fail” restrictions. He will refuse to fail…
Chairman Chris Dodd is possessed. He is up for re-election and running well behind. He has been tarnished by coziness with financial institutions. Now he is about to lead a crusade to reform that very industry. He is a competent legislator and will get a bill that is meaningful out of his committee.
This rosy summary is subject only to the caveat that the public pressure for reform (which is low) may overcome the enormous spending spree by the financial industry to stop it. That may not happen. Something will pass… but the industry may have it full of water.
2009 Elections
In the first post-Obama elections of note, there are two gubernatorial elections that will be decided on November 3. Of course, there will be implications drawn from the results as to the electoral condition of the President.
Both states in play went for Barack Obama in 2008 – New Jersey stayed red by 57-42%, and Virginia voted for the Democrat for the first time in ages by a 53-47% margin.
The issue in New Jersey is the incumbent Democratic Governor Jon Corzine. After a career in banking (including a stint as co-CEO of Goldman Sachs with Henry Paulson), he bought a senate seat from New Jersey. Five years into that six-year term, he decided to be governor and outspent the opposition to claim the chair. His first term has had everything – scandals, romantic entanglements, near death accidents, closure of state government- serious distractions to the role of governor – but little good governance. At the end of the term, he is in a desperate struggle with Chris Christie, a former US Attorney. Christie maintained a huge lead (as much as 12 point at one time), but has lost the momentum and Corzine’s money machine and Christie’s errors are chewing up his vote and it is now a very close race. There is no way any national trends could be determined from this very New Jersey race.
Virginia is a very different story. It too is a very local race, but the dynamics have national consequence. Virginia has been the glamour state for Democrats… electing two relatively liberal Democratic governors in a row, and then carrying the state for Obama after years of Republican dominance. Is it a mirage, or is it real progress for the Democrats. The changing demographics of the Old Dominion have made it practical to believe it is real electoral progress.
The Republicans have fielded their well selected, well trained and experienced candidate, Attorney General Bob McDonnell. The Democrats had a three way primary that was won by the outsider Criegh Deeds, a long time State Senator from rural Virginia. (He beat the money man – former Democratic National Chairman Terry McAuliffe – and the young “comer”, State Senator Brian Moran).
McDonnell is conservative, very, very conservative. He described his social conservatism in a major grad school thesis that has been uncovered in the campaign. It defines a mindset that strikes fear in the hearts of any right minded woman and has ancillary discussions of other touchy social situations. The treatise defines the right end of right wing thinking. The revelations it contained cut deeply into the early momentum that McDonnell had developed. Then, Deeds became a known quantity… and it has been downhill for him every since. The momentum of early September, when the McDonnell treatise was the news has given way to a reverse of the polls…. McDonnell has a double digit lead today… and it is growing.
Deeds does not fit the pattern of the recent successful Democratic gubernatorial candidates. He is not a Mark Warner, nor is he a Tim Kaine. He is not the polished performer that they are, and he is not in the same philosophic mold of these recent winners. McDowell, however, is very much in the ideological pattern of the most recent Republican governors of the state.
I’m glad I am not a Virginian any more.
Robert J. Keefe
TKC International, Inc.
1776 I Street, NW, Suite 900 – Washington, D. C. 20006
Telephone: 202 255-8161 – E mail: rkeefe@tkci.com
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