Michael Barone: Voters seem unusually willing this year to entertain candidates lacking in Washington experience
[Mr. Barone is a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute and senior writer at U.S. News & World Report. He is principal coauthor of "The Almanac of American Politics" (National Journal Group, 2005).]
The Iowa caucuses have just passed and we await, with just two weekday prime-time news nights in between, the New Hampshire primary. The biggest surprise of the campaign so far is the success of candidates with minimal credentials and little if any experience in national governance....
An unusual preference, but not unprecedented. In 1992 voters elected a 46-year-old Arkansas governor as president, and in the spring of that year, if the polls are to be believed, they were ready to elect a Texas billionaire whose governmental experience included serving as a junior naval officer and running a firm that provided computer services to local welfare departments. In 1976 voters elected a one-term former governor of Georgia who'd served as a state senator and a naval officer.
The metrically minded will see a common thread. Every 16 years--in 1976, 1992 and now in 2008--American voters have seemed less interested in experience and credentials and more interested in a new face unconnected to the current political establishment. What can explain this 16-year itch?
The first explanation is that voters are responding to public policy failures. The insiders have screwed up; let's take a chance on an outsider. This fits 1976 very well. The foreign and defense policy experts of the Kennedy, Johnson and Nixon administrations gave us Vietnam. Richard Nixon gave us Watergate, and his successor Gerald Ford pardoned him. Nixon also gave us a juiced-up economy in time for the 1972 campaign, which resulted in inflation and stagnant economic growth--stagflation--in the ensuing years.
But public policy failure doesn't fit 1992 or 2008 as closely. Yes, Ross Perot and Bill Clinton campaigned against "the worst economic recession" since the 1930s. But in fact the economy was growing throughout 1992, and the recession of 1990-91 was one of the mildest ever recorded. During the preceding four years the Soviet Union collapsed, and the U.S. and its allies won a crushing victory in the Gulf War.
Perhaps voters were upset about the tax increase that the Democratic Congress and George H.W. Bush, despite his "read my lips" pledge, colluded in. But the result was the election of a Democratic president and Congress who predictably raised taxes again.
Similarly, "it's the economy, stupid," doesn't really explain the apparent hunger for an outsider this year. The economy has been growing smartly for five years and, despite the subprime mortgage mess, apparently continues to do so. Inflation is low.
Polling suggests that voters' assessments of the economy are rooted more in partisan loyalties than in observation of economic conditions. Republicans complained about the robust economy when Mr. Clinton was president. Democrats have complained about the robust economy most of the time George W. Bush has been in office.
A year ago one could have said that voters were discontented with the deteriorating situation in Iraq. Mr. Bush's experts--the "vulcans," as James Mann called them in his book on their backgrounds--had failed to produce victory. But Mr. Bush got rid of many of the chief vulcans and ordered the surge strategy which has now had undeniable success. Democrats, you may notice, have stopped talking about Iraq, and Republicans don't have much to say about it either. So the public policy failure explanation of the 16-year itch is less than wholly satisfying.
The second explanation that occurs to me is that voters get tired of the predictable results of their own collective decisions. The discontented voters in 1976 had, after all, elected Richard Nixon to two terms, the second by an overwhelming margin, and had elected Democratic Congresses to serve with him. They knew something about Nixon's weaknesses as well as his strengths, and got what they might have expected. Even so, they were disgusted enough with the results that they elected a president who would not have been a plausible candidate in most election years....
Read entire article at WSJ
The Iowa caucuses have just passed and we await, with just two weekday prime-time news nights in between, the New Hampshire primary. The biggest surprise of the campaign so far is the success of candidates with minimal credentials and little if any experience in national governance....
An unusual preference, but not unprecedented. In 1992 voters elected a 46-year-old Arkansas governor as president, and in the spring of that year, if the polls are to be believed, they were ready to elect a Texas billionaire whose governmental experience included serving as a junior naval officer and running a firm that provided computer services to local welfare departments. In 1976 voters elected a one-term former governor of Georgia who'd served as a state senator and a naval officer.
The metrically minded will see a common thread. Every 16 years--in 1976, 1992 and now in 2008--American voters have seemed less interested in experience and credentials and more interested in a new face unconnected to the current political establishment. What can explain this 16-year itch?
The first explanation is that voters are responding to public policy failures. The insiders have screwed up; let's take a chance on an outsider. This fits 1976 very well. The foreign and defense policy experts of the Kennedy, Johnson and Nixon administrations gave us Vietnam. Richard Nixon gave us Watergate, and his successor Gerald Ford pardoned him. Nixon also gave us a juiced-up economy in time for the 1972 campaign, which resulted in inflation and stagnant economic growth--stagflation--in the ensuing years.
But public policy failure doesn't fit 1992 or 2008 as closely. Yes, Ross Perot and Bill Clinton campaigned against "the worst economic recession" since the 1930s. But in fact the economy was growing throughout 1992, and the recession of 1990-91 was one of the mildest ever recorded. During the preceding four years the Soviet Union collapsed, and the U.S. and its allies won a crushing victory in the Gulf War.
Perhaps voters were upset about the tax increase that the Democratic Congress and George H.W. Bush, despite his "read my lips" pledge, colluded in. But the result was the election of a Democratic president and Congress who predictably raised taxes again.
Similarly, "it's the economy, stupid," doesn't really explain the apparent hunger for an outsider this year. The economy has been growing smartly for five years and, despite the subprime mortgage mess, apparently continues to do so. Inflation is low.
Polling suggests that voters' assessments of the economy are rooted more in partisan loyalties than in observation of economic conditions. Republicans complained about the robust economy when Mr. Clinton was president. Democrats have complained about the robust economy most of the time George W. Bush has been in office.
A year ago one could have said that voters were discontented with the deteriorating situation in Iraq. Mr. Bush's experts--the "vulcans," as James Mann called them in his book on their backgrounds--had failed to produce victory. But Mr. Bush got rid of many of the chief vulcans and ordered the surge strategy which has now had undeniable success. Democrats, you may notice, have stopped talking about Iraq, and Republicans don't have much to say about it either. So the public policy failure explanation of the 16-year itch is less than wholly satisfying.
The second explanation that occurs to me is that voters get tired of the predictable results of their own collective decisions. The discontented voters in 1976 had, after all, elected Richard Nixon to two terms, the second by an overwhelming margin, and had elected Democratic Congresses to serve with him. They knew something about Nixon's weaknesses as well as his strengths, and got what they might have expected. Even so, they were disgusted enough with the results that they elected a president who would not have been a plausible candidate in most election years....