FDR, Reagan, and Obama

Last year, Obama said that he wanted to be a transformational president like FDR or Ronald Reagan rather than a caretaker president. At the time it looked likely. His campaign bordered on a religious crusade and he was the most ideological candidate in years. His followers were expecting great things from him. His party won Congress with a wide majority.

So, eight months later, how is the transformational part working out? Not so well.

FDR set a standard during his first 100 days but his real changes came about during his follow-up, the so-called Second New Deal. That's when Social Security passed. The first 100 days were all about stabilizing the economy.

Reagan's first actions were similar. He got tax cuts and budget cuts (technically they were cuts in growth) passed even though the Democrats controlled the House. He continued the deregulation that had started under Carter. He also beefed up the military.

In contrast, Obama's successes so far have been pretty meager. He ran on changing America, not on economic recovery but most of his early actions were economic. He signed a patchwork stimulus bill and a pork-laden spending bill. He took over the banks and two domestic auto makers. None of these were part of his platform nor were they particularly popular. The White House modus operandi has been to push bills through Congress fast and sign them quickly before the opposition has a chance to resist. This has worked against him. Credit card reform and the expansion of SCHIP passed before most people were even aware that they were being debated. Obama's approach garnered him little credit and no new political capitol.

Obama tried the same approach with health care reform, breaking several promises about transparency, but found that it was too big to push through quickly. Currently it is languishing with major portions still being debated.

This doesn't sound like a transformative president to me. What happened?

The first problem is that Obama has no message. Hope and Change are nice vague terms for winning an election but they don't give much of a mandate. Obama did make specific promises - over 500, more than twice the typical candidate's platform. This further watered down his mandate. Were people voting for him because he promised health care reform or because he promised to get the troops out or Iraq?

FDR had a strong message - "Competition is keeping prices too low. We need to reduce the number of businesses so that the remaining ones can charge higher prices. At the same time we will strengthen the unions so that they can demand higher wages."

Reagan had his own strong message, "Competition is good. It keeps prices down. We need more businesses and less burden from government and unions so that the demand for workers raises wages."

Both men expressed their visions in no uncertain terms. If they had problems getting their legislation through Congress, they appealed to the American people to pressure Congress.

Obama probably agrees with FDR but he has only hinted at it. In fact, whatever his personal beliefs are, he only hints at them. When he does make unguarded comments they reflect badly on him. Obama will never pass legislation while expressing his beliefs about bitter people clinging to guns and religion.

Both FDR and Reagan inspired generations of followers. In fact, they defined the current debate about the proper role of government (FDR=more, Reagan=less). During the campaign, Obama was so coy about his beliefs that most Libertarians voted for him thinking that he would be a pragmatic centrist.

In order to be a transformative president, you have to have a clearly defined philosophy. Without that, you are a caretaker administration.

Now, there's nothing wrong with being a caretaker. Most presidents are. That's why only four of them were carved on Mount Rushmore. The country can't handle new transformations every 4-8 years. It's hard enough to be a successful caretaker president. In the last 50 years, only three presidents have managed to serve a full two terms. The others are usually counted as failed presidencies. Even Kennedy who probably would have been reelected couldn't translate his popularity into political results.

So where does that leave Obama? He has two choices. He can define exactly what his vision is and try to win the country over to it, then use that, as Reagan did, to push his favored legislation through Congress. This will be tough. Defining visions are what campaigns are all about and Obama has three years before his next campaign starts in earnest. In the meantime, trying to sell a message without a campaign is nearly impossible. The White House has already tried to mobilize its campaign to sell health care. They failed. There is the additional problem that the country might not like what Obama is selling. The Democrats are have moved to the left but polls show that most of the country is still conservative. Admitting that he is a radical might hurt more than it helps.

The other option is to take the Clinton approach. Move to the center. Steal ideas from the right. The left will hate him for it (as they did Clinton) but it is a proven way to salvage a presidency.