Crunch time

tauringhuang.

Jul 30th 2009
From The Economist print edition

The next few weeks could determine the fate of Barack Obama’s presidency

IF THE opinion polls are to be believed, Barack Obama is now, six months into his presidency, no more popular than George Bush or Richard Nixon were at the same stage in theirs. His ratings are sagging particularly badly with electorally vital independent voters: two-thirds of them think he wants to spend too much of their money. Two of the most specific pledges he made to the electorate—to reform health care and to produce a cap-and-trade system to curb greenhouse-gas emissions—are in trouble. And an impression is being formed in Washington of a presidency that is far too ready to hand over the direction of domestic policy to Congress; that is drifting either deliberately or lethargically leftwards; and that is more comfortable with lofty visions than details. On the campaign trail Mr Obama showed an impressive ability to change gears. He needs to do so again this summer.

His cause is by no means hopeless. Just as his initial Messianic polling numbers were misleadingly optimistic, his problems should now be put into context. Most obviously, nearly 200 days into office, he has avoided making any horrific mistakes, especially in the fraught business of economic policy. On the hardly insignificant matter of restoring America’s reputation in the world he has delivered a degree of what he promised (though even there the tough times are still ahead of him, as our next leader makes clear). He has had to cope with the worst recession for half a century. He has been curiously ill-served by a press short of useful criticism, with liberal America prepared only to debate what sort of water he walks on best, while conservative radio hosts argue over when exactly he became a communist. And of course, government is darned hard: even when you make the right decision—to close Guantánamo, for instance—it can take years to put into effect.

So Mr Obama’s underperformance is relative and partial; but it is serious, especially in domestic policy. And if his schemes at home come to naught, then his credibility abroad will wither. That is why the next few weeks are crucial.

Taking too much care of Hillarycare
In foreign policy an American president enjoys the most freedom of operation. At home the man in the Oval Office is mightily constrained by Congress. It is the artful combination of arm-twisting, compromise, rhetoric and gritty attention to detail that make the difference between an FDR and a Jimmy Carter. Back in his honeymoon days Mr Obama was constantly compared to Roosevelt. No longer.

The suspicion is that the president has taken the experience of Bill Clinton too much to heart. The previous Democratic presidency got off to a rocky start for many reasons, but his failed attempt to impose health-care reform on Congress in 1993-94 bulks largest. Putting Hillary Clinton in charge of an unwieldy, secretive task-force that attempted to present powerful senators with a masterplan backfired. Congress promptly shot it down—and Mr Clinton lost both the House and the Senate to the Republicans in 1994.

A president plainly should not ignore Congress. But Mr Obama has veered to the opposite extreme. Although he has a White House stuffed full of first-rate policy wonks, he has repeatedly subcontracted the big decisions—the $787 billion stimulus bill, cap-and-trade, health reform—to the Democratic leadership in Congress. At times Mr Obama’s role has seemed limited to deploying his teleprompter-driven oratory to sell whatever Congress proposes to the public, even before it is clear what exactly those proposals amount to.

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Nobody voted for President Pelosi
Worse, the plans have usually ended up running away from tough decisions. With the stimulus bill the flaws were forgivable: there was an urgent need to give the economy a boost. But the House of Representatives has produced a cap-and-trade bill that is protectionist, riddled with exemptions and which gives away the permits that are supposed to force carbon-emitters to change their ways. There is a growing danger that this bill will not be passed through the Senate and reconciled with the House version in time for the Copenhagen summit on climate change in December.

With health care, Mr Obama’s preference for vague statements of principle rather than detailed specification has led to a House proposal that loads taxes onto the rich, sets up a state-run insurance scheme that many fear will put private-sector providers out of business and fails to contain, let alone reverse, the escalating costs of treatment while adding an expensive requirement that everyone have health insurance, with large subsidies where needed (see article). Barely any Republicans could support this proposal as it stands. Frantic efforts to save the reform effort are under way in the Senate, but it is distinctly odd to note that the president’s signature policy is now being devised for him by a gang of six senators. Financial regulation is also stuck (see article).

A policy of ramming bills through Congress on a party-line basis might suit Nancy Pelosi, the Democrats’ leftish leader in the House. But, from Mr Obama’s point of view, it is bad politics in two different ways. It is shifting the presidency to the left, annoying centrist voters who worry about the swelling government debt. And it may not even get the bills through. Conservative Democrats, many of whom represent right-leaning states and districts recently captured from the Republicans (see article), are nervous about backing bills without bipartisan support. Over 40 of them broke ranks in the House over the climate-change bill. Now there is the likelihood that health reform, like the climate-change bill, will be deferred until the autumn, when fears about the deficit will have grown and the two expensive bills could combine to spook voters.

What should Mr Obama do? He must come down from his cloud and start leading. The House Democrats could be usefully reminded that their present 78-seat margin owes everything to the president’s coat-tails; they are endangering his popularity. Mr Obama should also court centrist Republicans. That means getting into the nitty-gritty: Republicans can hardly be expected to save Mr Obama’s presidency unless they get something solid in return. For instance, one way to pay for bringing the uninsured into the health-care system (a noble Democratic priority) is to scrap a distorting tax-deduction that veils the true cost of health insurance, a policy espoused by John McCain last year. A real “post-partisan” president would be trying to bully through this compromise, not talking dreamily about wanting health care for all at no cost to anybody but the rich. And on the subject of detail, precise talk from the president about how he intends to grapple with government debt would reassure a lot of centrist waverers.

None of this is impossible. As The Economist went to press, hopes were rising that the Senate finance committee might soon produce a bipartisan version of the health bill. But then the final version of that bill will have to be reconciled with the much-worse House version. If the result is another lazy deficit-boosting, hard-decision-avoiding scheme (like George Bush’s rotten Medicare bill), what president would want to be remembered for that? Mr Obama remains an inspiring figure. But he needs to get his hands dirty this summer if he is to rescue a presidency that has started to slip.