John B. Judis: The only way Obama can pull his presidency back from the brink
[John B. Judis is a senior editor at The New Republic.]
Barack Obama looks like he will succeed where three Democratic presidents, Harry Truman, Jimmy Carter, and Bill Clinton, so famously failed--by passing health care reform. That is an achievement for which posterity will likely reward him. But it may not help him and his party avoid setbacks at the polls...
...Are these signs of voter discontent the result of tactical errors by Obama? Would the numbers look different if he had given his impassioned defense of national health care in February, or if he and Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner had been tougher on the banks earlier this year? Perhaps these tactics would have led to a temporary bounce in Obama's popularity, but they would not have changed its overall trajectory. That's because Obama's fortunes are being driven mainly by one thing: not health care, but the economy.
To understand the lockstep relationship between Obama's popularity and the state of the economy, it helps to look at two previous presidents who, like Obama, confronted a failing economy: Franklin Roosevelt and Ronald Reagan.
When Roosevelt took office in 1933, unemployment was almost 25 percent, but, during his first term, it fell steadily-- to less than 14 percent in November 1936. The economy, in other words, seemed to be healing. Gallup wasn't measuring presidential approval then, but FDR's rising popularity was evident in election results: Democrats picked up congressional seats in 1934 and 1936, despite already enjoying huge majorities; and, in 1936, Roosevelt won in a landslide, carrying the Electoral College by the largest margin ever.
For both Roosevelt and Reagan, what mattered was not the actual state of the economy, but whether things were getting better or worse. The unemployment rate was still incredibly high when FDR won reelection in 1936, and Reagan didn't actually lower unemployment between the time he took office and the time he was reelected--he only managed to get it back to where it had been at the start of his term. But, in both 1936 and 1984, the trajectory of unemployment was downward, and that was the key.
Moreover, history suggests that it is not enough for the economy to be headed in the right direction; it has to be headed in the right direction in tangible ways that voters can see. Economists pronounced the recession of the early 1990s over in March 1991. But, when unemployment continued to rise through 1991 and most of 1992 and real wages stagnated, the public perceived the economy to still be declining--and it punished George H.W. Bush accordingly...
... What Obama and the Democrats have to hope for, then, is not a full recovery, but sufficient improvement in jobs, wages, and public services to convince voters that the economy is on the mend. That's what helped Roosevelt and Reagan keep their majorities--and, in Roosevelt's case, what lay the basis for nearly four decades of Democratic hegemony. With the Republicans in disarray and demographic trends favoring the Democrats, an uptick in the economy for which voters credit Obama could lay the basis for a new Democratic majority. But, to accomplish this, Obama must promote programs that visibly and immediately provide economic relief.
In that respect, even a successful resolution to the current health care debate is unlikely to do Obama much good. Yes, it will ward off the stigma of incompetence and ineffective leadership that haunted Carter and Clinton during their first two years, but it isn't likely to overcome the drag on Obama's popularity of continuing joblessness...
Read entire article at The New Republic
Barack Obama looks like he will succeed where three Democratic presidents, Harry Truman, Jimmy Carter, and Bill Clinton, so famously failed--by passing health care reform. That is an achievement for which posterity will likely reward him. But it may not help him and his party avoid setbacks at the polls...
...Are these signs of voter discontent the result of tactical errors by Obama? Would the numbers look different if he had given his impassioned defense of national health care in February, or if he and Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner had been tougher on the banks earlier this year? Perhaps these tactics would have led to a temporary bounce in Obama's popularity, but they would not have changed its overall trajectory. That's because Obama's fortunes are being driven mainly by one thing: not health care, but the economy.
To understand the lockstep relationship between Obama's popularity and the state of the economy, it helps to look at two previous presidents who, like Obama, confronted a failing economy: Franklin Roosevelt and Ronald Reagan.
When Roosevelt took office in 1933, unemployment was almost 25 percent, but, during his first term, it fell steadily-- to less than 14 percent in November 1936. The economy, in other words, seemed to be healing. Gallup wasn't measuring presidential approval then, but FDR's rising popularity was evident in election results: Democrats picked up congressional seats in 1934 and 1936, despite already enjoying huge majorities; and, in 1936, Roosevelt won in a landslide, carrying the Electoral College by the largest margin ever.
For both Roosevelt and Reagan, what mattered was not the actual state of the economy, but whether things were getting better or worse. The unemployment rate was still incredibly high when FDR won reelection in 1936, and Reagan didn't actually lower unemployment between the time he took office and the time he was reelected--he only managed to get it back to where it had been at the start of his term. But, in both 1936 and 1984, the trajectory of unemployment was downward, and that was the key.
Moreover, history suggests that it is not enough for the economy to be headed in the right direction; it has to be headed in the right direction in tangible ways that voters can see. Economists pronounced the recession of the early 1990s over in March 1991. But, when unemployment continued to rise through 1991 and most of 1992 and real wages stagnated, the public perceived the economy to still be declining--and it punished George H.W. Bush accordingly...
... What Obama and the Democrats have to hope for, then, is not a full recovery, but sufficient improvement in jobs, wages, and public services to convince voters that the economy is on the mend. That's what helped Roosevelt and Reagan keep their majorities--and, in Roosevelt's case, what lay the basis for nearly four decades of Democratic hegemony. With the Republicans in disarray and demographic trends favoring the Democrats, an uptick in the economy for which voters credit Obama could lay the basis for a new Democratic majority. But, to accomplish this, Obama must promote programs that visibly and immediately provide economic relief.
In that respect, even a successful resolution to the current health care debate is unlikely to do Obama much good. Yes, it will ward off the stigma of incompetence and ineffective leadership that haunted Carter and Clinton during their first two years, but it isn't likely to overcome the drag on Obama's popularity of continuing joblessness...