You know
conventional wisdom dictates that sequels are rarely as good as the original,
conventional wisdom also dictates that second term presidents always have one
eye on the history books. The re-elected
Barak Obama will have his work cut out if he is to be remembered for his
achievements rather than his promise.
Yet for all of the
relief and pleasure at the Obama victory (or is that the Romney defeat) in this
country, the thought that Obama really should have won this by a larger margin
remains. The very reason that this
election campaign came down to a dog-fight could be summed up in four
words. The first Presidential debate.
I had long thought
that Obama should have been heading for a comfortable victory. Obama’s opponents from the other side of the
pond look more than divided – with the advent of the Tea Party wing they look
more and more like an American version of the Labour Party from circa 1981. As a result, the list of candidates for the
primaries looked rather like a group of zealots and religious fundamentalists
exposing 19th century views.
Even with the election of the most sensible candidate, Romney, Obama
really should have won much more comfortably.
Yet, Romney had
chipped away at Obama’s achilles heel – the economic performance of the USA in the past
four years. What made this election
tighter than it should have been was undoubtedly Obama’s poor performance in
the first Presidential debate – in the aftermath Romney’s polling experienced
what could be called a “Clegg Bounce”.
It is arguable that Obama’s reaction to Storm Sandy certainly helped
Obama recover enough of the ground lost in that debate to see him over the
finish line in the same way that Brown’s visit to Rochdale (and all that…) saw
the momentum steadily swing towards Cameron in the last General Election.
Obama’s victory
already guarantees that certain things will not happen. The USA
will not provoke a trade or economic war with China, or worse. There will also be no disproportionate response
to the antics of Israel or Iran. However Obama’s legacy really depends on how
he deals with the supposed “Fiscal Cliff”.
There are though people looking at the lessons that can be learned &
transplanted here.
Nick Robinson lists
five lessons in his post yesterday. His
first, “Incumbents Can Still Win” obviously resonates with our own government –
though there should be caveats attached.
Since the Second World War, only Ford, Carter and George Bush (senior)
have lost as sitting presidents – two terms are the norm. The much bigger lesson, which is one that has
been the case in British politics since Thatcher and was clearly on show here,
is that opposition parties need to fashion themselves into a credible
alternative government in waiting. Blair
did that, Cameron fell just short of that while Kinnock, Hague & Howard all
failed to do this.
The other lesson
that resonates in British politics is that negative campaigning works. “Labour
Isn’t Working”, “Labour’s Tax
Bombshell” & “You Can’t Trust The
Tories on The NHS” are all slogans that spearheaded negative aspects of
election winning campaigning. Sure the
negative aspects were always a part of the main campaigns, but in the United States
the negative campaign was the main spearhead.
Anyone who doubts that such negative campaigning won’t work here needs
to look at the current Scottish Referendum campaign, where the SNP’s pro
Independence message has become undermined by opposition attacks not on the
main issues but on what are really fringe and just off core issues.
When Obama entered
the White House in 2009, the USA
was at its most precarious economic position since the 1930’s. He hasn’t quite turned things around,
partially down to the various “Checks and balances” inherent in the USA government
machine. Four more years gives the US time to
cement “Obama-care” into the government and should (mid term elections
providing) give Obama the chance to become the reforming president he wants to
be. Unfortunately we have 2 years of
Obama the Tory to get out of the way first.
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