In a few hours, a tearful George Bush will wave the White House goodbye, as he's whisked to Texas from the presidential helipad. America will be plunged into an unprecedented crisis: how to deploy it's most malapropped president onto the lecture circuit. While it ponders that conundrum, Barack Obama will carve out the legacy of the 44th President. A preview:
Tone: Obama's tone will generally be much (much) more palatable than Bush's. The ugly stuff will be concealed, rather than trumpeted proudly.
Style: Just as the Obama campaing reprised themes from Bush/Cheney2000, there'll be similarities in style between the two. Don't expect Clinton-style micromanagement. Like bush, Obama will be a coordinator of people who do the actual work. He'll rule with decreasing authority over the camps, and focus his energies on projecting outward to the people (American and otherwise). He won't take month-long holidays.
the first 100 days: Barring a surprise crisis, we'll still be in honeymoon territory. There'll be softening of the approval rating, but nothing worrisome. The time will have been spent basking in goodwill.
The bubble: Obama kicks off with a staggering 86% approval rating. In constrast, Bush leaves with (according to CBS) a 22% rating. This is remarkable. After the biggest economic collapse in a lifetime, the failure of wars of aggression against two of the world's militarily most denuded countries, and the largest fiscal deficit in the history of the dollar, you need to select only five Americans to hear the opinion that Bush is doing a good (not just OK) job. The comaprison with the Bush's is interesting. W holds the record for the highest ever approval rating (92%) as well as lowest (19%). By implication he has endured the greatest bubble pop, with 73% of Americans going 180 on him. Obama's initial rating is unprecedented. This means that he'll lose points during the first year. A twenty point drop will bring him into the mid 60's, which is an attractive rating anywhere in the world. When he breaches 50-something, he has cause for concern, as no full-term president other than Regan and Johnson has managed a V-shaped rating curve. And Johnon had victory in the World War II to help him.
Ratings are driven by public ennui, and his biggest worry is that the American public will tire of their gut-curdling ride on the credit-coaster. 50-something approval points signals a bursting of the Obama-bubble, and a retreat to normalcy. I think we'll see this in the first year. After that, we won't see a sharp V, unless there's war or a significant terrorist attack.
The Economy: Obama's differences with Bush over the economy mirror the two's difference over the war in Iraq: the central pivot is not an in-princile difference, as much as the hindsighted confidence that Obama could have handled it better. Obama supporters will, no doubt, counter that he "opposed the war from the start", without considering his support for the no-fly regime, itself a unilateral act of aggression. Digressions aside, the convergence of opinion was elegantly demonstrated in the week of the first presidential debate, when Obama joined Bush in battling populist Republican resistance to TARP. The Obama team was pleased to point out that even John McCain, whose first interjection was timed forty minutes after the start of the discussion, was less enthused about TARP than his reformist rival. Much had been written long before about the conservatising influence of Obama's Chicago confidantes like Austen Goolsbee, foreshadowing a critique fleshed out following the staff announcements of the Obama shadow treasury (wisely postponed until after the election). Without rehashing too much of what's already been noted, Obama's management of the US economy will be difficult.
Foreign relations: For economic reasons, Mexico and China will overshadow Britain, and Iraq. In about a year David Cameron will be sworn in as the British Prime Minister. Any special relationship won't be based on hope and change. Obama will - very willingly and comfortably - deal direct with Europe, but will find it no more tractable than it was for his predecessor.
Bush. The reason that the rest of the world was happy to see Obama is that they believe him to be less threatening (i.e. more pliable) than Bush. Note that Medvedev waited until after the US polls had closed before announcing his European missile plans. He preferred not having that fight with McCain.
Israel/Palestine: Obama will deliver a speech, widely recognised as groundbreaking in it's recognition of Palestinian rights. it will criticise the tenor (but not the content) of past American involvement, and will invoke (probably explicitly) the two-state imperative. While the speech will promise an energised American engagement, it will stop short of imposing clear conditions on the extention of American diplomatic support and aid to Israel. Importantly, Obama will continue Bush's democracy boycott - failing to recognise the democratically elected Hamas government. This is not to say that Palestinian justice won't advance, but as in Iraq will be driven by internal dynamics. Under Obama, American influence will have a net retarding effect.
Africa: Obama will struggle to match Bush's factorfold increase of aid commitment, although he could (but probably won't) improve the gap between pledges and grants. Trade between the US and Africa will be increasingly marked by protectionist American concerns. Look out for an open resource war between the US and China, fought in Africa. The casualty of this will be African development. I exepect Obama to keep Bush's CENTCOM expansion plans on the backburner, as opposed to the dustbin. He is capable of authorign bombing raids a la the Somali raids during Bush's second term, but will do a better job of making the case.
Obama's war: The Status of Forces agreement signalled the end of American involvement in Iraq. The rest is mopping up. Obama will implement a surge strategy in Afghanistan, creating a temporary semblance of stability under whose cover he can execute a roughly dignified exit from a war which - bizarrely - he's invested in. So much for the inherited conflict. Obama will pursue agressive action in Latin America. Not a full-scale invasion, but a sovereignty-busting attack. The conflict triggered will not be of the scale required to resucsitate the economy (which doesn't preclude something else doing that).
Guantanamo Bay: On Day1 President Obama will issue a decree closing the site. This will signal a continuation of the Clinton-Bush approach to prisoner rights, for while Obama will reach for the theatrics of closing the site, he'll studiously avoid the issue of prisoner rights. This must include legal representation, habeus corpus (I expect Obama to be a more convincing salesperson of the Bush tradition of denyign habeus), full disclosure to human rights bodies, access to relatives, due process in a properly constituted court of law, desisting from arbitrary arrest, and so forth. These Bush-era elements will remain intact. The clue to this is the arithmatic around Guantanamo itself. A
Brookings Institute report shows that two thirds of the Guantanamo detained prisoners aren't there any longer. In addition, we believe (the figures aren't disclosed, for obvious reasons) that Guantanamo inmates constitute a minorirty of America's illegally-held prison population, the rest of whom live in so-called black sites. Because these sites have been outside of public scrutiny, the President will have no cause to close them. Expect at least some of the newly liberated Guantanamo inmates to find new digs in Morocco, Saudi Arabia, Diego Garcia, Afghanistan, and who knows where else. Even those transferred to America can't expect the sort of trial that Americans (like Timothy McVeigh who - unlike the vast majority of Guantanamo detainees - actually
was a terrorist).
Healthcare: When Obama leaves office a remarkable number of Americans will have remarkably enhanced access to medical care. This will be the single biggest acheivement of his presidency.
Black America: Black America will end it's tenure under Obama slightly worse off than it began. It's relative (to White America) exposure to social ills (poverty, prison, substance abuse, violent crime, HIV infection, etc.) will be slightly higher, and it's relative exposure to social benefits (wealth, health, security, employment) will be lower. This won't be Obama's fault; as America enters a period of diminished prosperity (i.e. negative real per capita GDP growth), long-standing social fissures are deepened. No one president can stem that in a single term (although perpetuation is a piece of cake). Neither will this imply the absence of signs of progress. A greater number of Black Americans will be receving a larger amount of healthcare covereage, quality education and (maybe) employment.
2012: Obama will face no Democratic challengers in the primaries. He may be Clinton-weak at his reelection, and will be helped by a lacklustre, ill-prepared republican campaing. The Republican frontrunners will be Jeb Bush, Mitt Romney, Mike Huckabee and Piyush Jindall. It's way early, but I think that Romney's the candidate to watch. The next tier may include Charles Christ, Tom Ridge and rudi Gulliani. Whether the Republicans unseat Obama depends largely on their performance in the 2010 mid-terms, and their mastery of populist politics starting today. The four key tasks are:
- fence-mending with Latino Americans
- Pragmatic economic populism
- candidate selection
- repairing thetechnology gap.
At this stage, they're able to pull it off, although GOP knee-jerks threaten all four.
Unraveling: Obama's juggernaut-of-rivals will give way to a more focussed, coherent, administration. The peripheral elements (like Paul Volker) will give way to the core, so that within two years the administration will look a lot more trim. If this is well managed (gently picking off the elements one-by-one), it will herald an unremarkable transition from a campaign of transformative insurgence to a conservative administration. If it's poorly managed it could spark divisive revenge from the outgunned rivals. Either way, the implementors of Clinton's triangulation will reintroduce centreism as the animating theme of the adminstration. This time, the chastening effect of the economic fallout will double the conservatising impulse.
Success: Obama won't be considered one of the worst. It's unlikely that he'll be remembered as a one of the best (excluding Dem partisans). Remember that Carter presided over a closing of America's inflation problem, but was rewarded by losing his party's nomination for reelection. Presidential success admits a gap between perception and reality. America rarely falls over (a consequence of its long history of developed markets and civil institutions). In order to increase his shot at success, he'll have to be pragmatic about which promises he'll ditch at the outset, and which he'll focus on. I expect him to do this.
