Getting elected president and governing the country have about as much in common as making babies and raising them.
As Barack Obama’s presidency has shown so vividly, the skills needed to win over voters don’t necessarily make an effective executive.
Running for office, Obama could lean on vague but grand promises, offering no pain and all gain. As president, Obama has been buried in an avalanche of details that have contributed to a national crisis of confidence.
As a candidate, Obama could say that his policy on Iraq was simple: Get out. Now, many in his war Cabinet wonder whether it will be necessary to keep a permanent garrison of up to 50,000 troops in the country.
As defense guru Tom Ricks tells us, it’s an open question if Obama will have to disregard George W. Bush’s timeline for withdrawal, let alone his own campaign promises of speedy “redeployment.”
This is an admirable sign of maturity on Obama’s part. But it will also bring heartbreak on the Left and further fracture the president’s crumbling political coalition.
Obama’s retreat from the lofty heights of his campaign rhetoric has been an agonizing rear-guard action. It’s cost him the trust of the people and muted the optimism he once preached.
Obama once said we could have health care for all, and those already with coverage could keep what they have. Now he offers a plan so coercive that the electorate recoils from its grasp. Mandates, taxes, and new bureaucracy took the place of Obama’s promise that we would be enticed, not compelled into a new system.
Candidate Obama once said we could impose trillions of dollars in global warming fees and not disrupt the economy by creating a new market for carbon credits and subsidized green jobs. That was proved an empty promise in service of a false threat.
On other issues — job creation, lobbyist rules, transparency, and d?tente with the Axis of Evil — Obama has had to climb down from the towering promises he once so casually made.
It’s fine to suggest, as it is now fashionable for Democrats, that Obama should not have been so promiscuous on policy.
But he never would have been elected otherwise.
To race to the head of the Democratic class, Obama pitched aside pragmatic progress and compromise. Why have mean old Hillary Clinton telling you no, when Obama was always saying, “Yes, we can?”
Obama’s rapid rise was because of some combination of calculated dishonesty and a naivety rooted in a superhuman self-confidence. We can’t know which of his promises he knew were empty and which ones he believed he could achieve by his own magic touch.
Whatever Obama’s motivations, any politician who seeks to emulate him will now think twice about using the lofty rhetoric of hope and change after seeing the shambles his presidency has become.
It is very hard for mature people to succeed in politics. Just as effective campaigners don’t always make good leaders, strong executive skills don’t often translate into political success.
Rudy Giuliani may have known how to run a city, but his 2008 campaign was a disaster. Many Republicans hoped John McCain would pick FedEx Chief Executive Officer Fred Smith as his running mate, but would he have thrilled the crowds the way Sarah Barracuda did?
It’s a rotten game that rewards facile answers and brings flimflam man John Edwards to the precipice of power but spurns earnest reformers like Bill Bradley.
But while it may be hard to campaign with integrity and realism, it’s not as hard as it is to govern after taking the easy path to power.
As Republicans head to the great health care showdown with Obama, they ought to remember the real reason for the president’s precipitous fall.
It will be a deadly dull six hours of grinding out policy positions. And along the way, those who see themselves sitting in Obama’s chair one day will be sorely tempted to demagogue and suggest that there are easy answers.
But if you promise to never change Medicare, you won’t be able to control the deficits that will soon sink the nation. If you reject every part of what Democrats offer, you can expect them to do the same to you once they blunder their way out of the majority.
Democrats are about to be turned out for the cardinal sin of overpromising and underdelivering. If Republicans follow the same path back to power, they’ll be turned out just as fast.
Chris Stirewalt is the political editor of The Washington Examiner. He can be reached at [email protected].
