Most Presidents enjoy a brief “honeymoon” when they first take office, lasting for the first couple of months or so, where both the public and the press tend to be kind to them. It’s starting to look like Obama’s honeymoon is almost over. Almost. David Harsanyi is now saying that President Obama owns this economy and is responsible for massively hurting recovery efforts, while the more mainstream Howard Fineman says much of the political and media establishment are thinking our inexperienced young President isn’t up to the job after all.
I frankly think a lot of that is just a wee bit early to declare. I’ve long said that Presidents really don’t have that much control over the economy–because they don’t–and that whatever policies they enact, it really takes at least a year before you can see the results. Still, it looks like the President’s defenders are probably going to have to start working harder, and fairly soon, at least when it comes to domestic policy.
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Normally, I’d agree, but the problem is in our system, Presidents “own” crises. And Obama’s team is making things worse with his silly fortune cookie nonsense about “crises being opportunities”. Sometimes, crises are, well, crises, and need to be confronted to the exclusion of other policy priorities.
The odd thing is they’re trying to use the financial crisis the same way they think Bush used 9/11 to push through tax cuts. But what they should be doing is to nail the crisis – to the exclusion of everything else – and build political credibility with the country as leaders who can Get Things Done. Being a young kid, and from the Senate with a thin resume, Obama doesn’t have a lot of credibility yet, so he should be building it now. The chance to build vast political credibility by nailing it is the “opportunity” in the crisis – not the chance to slam through a bunch of non-sequitor reforms.
Another problem, particularly for the markets, is that Obama’s team talks too much. They talk about doing this or that, and the market reacts, and when the “plan” comes out and is not credible (either by being too big, too small, or depending on too many moving parts), the market tanks.
He’s got plenty of honeymoon left. Honestly, I suspect his personal popularity may well stay high throughout his presidency. Check how he’s covered on network TV or the major newspapers. Sure, you’ll find a few columnists who are willing to give him some mild criticism now and again but there isn’t a great deal to it.
However, his administration is beginning to look like the Gang That Couldn’t Shoot Straight. I think it’s a combination of arrogance, inexperience, and underestimating the scope of the task.
I also blame the Internet. Rather harsh opposition, as Chas Freeman discovered, can mobilize very quickly on the Internet. It restricted the Bush Administration’s range of movement and it’ll have the same impact on the Obama Administration.
foobarista,
i think the standard response to the “to the exclusion of all else” meme is that when it comes to the economy there is no non-sequitur. any legislation has potential economic impact.
Correct me if I am wrong, but the initial Bush tax cuts were pre-9/11. I distinctly remember purchasing a boom stick with the $300 rebate before 9/11.
The tax cuts (ie, the top-rate reduction and cap gains/dividend cuts) were after 9/11. There was a “stimulus check” handout shortly after Bush took office, but that wasn’t a “tax cut”.
We have both an economic situation and an actual crisis. The economy will do what it does, but the banking/finance crisis and its handling is where the President can shine – or screw up royally. That will have an impact in the larger economy. So far, Obama and his team haven’t been shining, and whining about Evil Bush will only work for another couple of months.
One other problem I see with Obama is something McCain may have had as a problem too: inexperience as a political executive. The only “executive” thing Obama’s ever done is lead winning elections; he’s never had to worry about pushing through and implementing a multi-year political program. This is why I wish he’d ran for Governor somewhere first.
Obama is going to implement a new:
White House Council on Women and Girls.
Wow.
That ought extend the honeymoon a while longer.
Click to edit is working quite well.
Thank you.
Enh, it still strikes me that 50 days in is a wee bit early to decide these guys can’t tie their shoelaces properly. A few missteps are going to happen. And there’s going to be criticism no matter what; I actually strain to remember the last President who WASN’T criticized in some way for his initial attempts to fill his cabinet. With Clinton it was that it was filled with Carter-era retreads and his “Arkansas mafia” cronies. With GW Bush it was that it was full of people who worked for his father with some retreads from the Ford era.
Still it does strike me as obvious that the President has so far exhibited all the traits that make Senators generally seem weak as Presidential candidates (or when they become President): most of them lack significant executive experience, and most of them tend to really, really, really like the sound of their own voices, and they really really really like to get into a crunch of negotiations and form a consensus. Which are good things in some contexts, but have some very serious weaknesses in a President. It has some positive benefits too, it’s not a completely bad thing, but it DEFINITELY makes them look weak at times, and also makes their message seem confused–a lot. (For the record, I think we would have had the same thing had McCain won, probably just a little less of it purely because he’s a lot older and seems to better comprehend that you just can’t convince everyone of everything and it’s pointless to try.)
Dean:
Since I predicted that Obama and his team would be unable to govern effectively due to their incompetence, inexperience and outright arrogance, I feel no qualms whatsover for being critical of him and his team (what little there is of it). The first fifty days of his administration have been one laughable example of inexperience, incompetence, arrogance topped off with monumental hypocrisy.
I can also blame the people who voted for him for ignoring the warnings of people like me that Obama was a babe in the woods with far less experience in actual governing even than the widely ridiculed Sarah Palin (who would be doing a MUCH better job in my opinion).
The scope of Obama’s complete incompetence is breathtaking. I’ve never seen anything like it, even Carter realized he had to vet his nominees and had to fill his critical administration positions if he wanted to govern. Obama seems to think the government operates on remote control and he can go pose for magazine covers and promote silly things like the “council on women and girls” while the country teeters on the brink of an economic crisis and he can’t be bothered to fill the critical treasury positions that are needed to face the crisis.
The markets are reacting swifly and accurately to the situation. Yes, in normal times, with normally competent Presidents you would not see a major impact on the market, especially this quickly.
But complete and total ignorance (“profit to earning ratios” imagine if PALIN had said that) coupled with an unawareness of his own incompetence WILL drive the market to, well, exactly what it’s been doing.
I have no desire to “give Obama a chance.” I predicted this. I warned you Obama voters that he was naive, ignorant and arrogant and that he would find it FAR more difficult to actually govern than he expected.
But I have to admit, the scope of the man’s complete incompetence in office thus far has surprised even me.
He is an utter disaster so far. In every way except in the promotion of a hard-left political agenda.
Which is all the press and the Democrat party wanted from him, so as you can see from the reaction of the Democrat party, they could not care less about the economy, national security, or maintaining actual positive relationships with our longest and most supportive ally.
I have to hope that someone explains to Obama that photo opportunities and platitudes do not govern a country. But so far nobody seems willing to do so.
I warned you.
Oh, and remember that Hillary ad about the phone ringing at 3:00 a.m.
Even she over-estimated Obama by indicating that the phone would at least be answered. Right now the vast majority of people who should be answering phones for Obama have not yet been nominated, much less confirmed.
As I said, as much as I expected Obama to struggle with actual governing, even I have been surprised by how monumentally incompetent he has proven to be so far.
I think you guys are missing the point.
There is a difference between “politician” and “statesman.” As far as I can tell Obama never claimed to be anything but a politician. Although he is my president, I am not his constituency and he does not care what I think unless it interferes with his political career. His view is through a political lens, and the porkulus bill (until MSM began to challenge it) was a just a way to inject money from the government into the economy, period. From this perspective, anything that puts money into the economy is “stimulus.” When MSM began to echo those crazy right-wingers, the problems were sourced as from Bush because that’s a politically safe way to handle it.
Obama IS being successful in a political sense because he is changing the landscape of government to a more socialistic state.
Longer than it needs to be story, my youngest (6th grade) had a field trip this a.m. Last night he told me he was supposed to be at school at 7:15. About 10:15 last night he wanted to call someone to make sure he had the time right & I told him his class mates were probably in bed, calling would be a bad idea. This a.m. at 7:07 we got a call asking where Lance was (pardon the grammar). I commented to the wife that Lance should have made sure he knew the time, and she came back with “he should have been ready, he didn’t even have his shoes on.” That’s a long-standing issue with her, getting ready, and she saw this as another fine example, while I think the issue was knowing what tme to be ready. Obama has a long standing issue rooted deeply in race and/or class conflict (politics), with the rich riding roughshod over the poor. In that perspective, the financial crisis is a fine example, and needs a political solution.
He’s doing fine in moving the nation towards a more politically divided nation, with hard core supporters entrenched no matter what happens because the rich are bad people and any objections are obvioulsy class/race discrimination. He’s doing fine in getting more entrenched and bigger government.
P Mike: I had said that his only accomplishments so far were political accomplishments in moving the nation to the far left. That is a significant thing to be sure, but your post simply reinforces my point. My point is that whatever competence Obama has as a politcian, he has demonstratied historically unprecedented incompetence in actually GOVERNING. Yes, I agree with you that he’s not really INTERESTED in GOVERNING. I think that’s the problem. He sees the process of actually RUNNING THE COUNTRY as some sort of irritation and obstruction to his only TRUE goal, which is to reshape the country to punish the rich and “spread the wealth” around. And since that goal is all the media and the Democrats really care about, his rank incompetence in actually governing is getting virtually no attention from the press.
If there is any actual value in creating a functioning governmental heirarchy with all the right jobs filled with capable individuals who answer phones, make policy decisions, interact with foreign governments, drive policy down through the ranks of government and generally keep the wheels of government moving, if there IS any value to that, then we will soon see what happens when we have a President who disdains such “trivialities” and focuses all his energies on CAMPAIGNING all the time.
I guess time will tell if it matters whether or not an administration bothers to actually create a functioning government. Maybe it won’t. My guess is that we are in the process of finding out exactly how important it is for an administration to actually, you know, ADMINISTRATE.
We will see.
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