A Note to Readers

Dear Readers,

I have taken a position as Communications Director on a Congressional race for November and, as a result, will discontinue my commentary writing.

I want to thank all of you for reading these past months. And I'll see you on the other side of November, in a much bluer country.

Everything I have written was my opinion alone.

All the best,
Dylan

McCain’s Burden of Proof

John McCain and Barack Obama have sparred so aggressively over the past few days that those without a calendar in hand might mistake the month of May for the month of October. What began as President Bush accusing Obama of appeasement while in Israel quickly spiraled into a back and forth between the candidates on the value of tough diplomacy. McCain was quick to imply that Obama’s willingness to engage his enemies was, in fact, tantamount to appeasement, and suggested that such judgment was proof of his inability to lead.

To the relief of Democrats everywhere, Obama responded in a way uncharacteristic of past Democratic presidential candidates. Where Al Gore may have sighed and released a statement disagreeing, and where John Kerry may have taken to the podium more than a week later, with a long-winded incomprehensible self-defense, Obama instead reacted quickly, forcefully, and in ear-shot of the national press.

Using language he had otherwise reserved, Obama suggested that John McCain’s vaunted toughness was phony and “extraordinarily naïve.” He swiftly and succinctly tied McCain’s foreign policy philosophy to George Bush, arguing that McCain has failed to distinguish his foreign policy vision from Bush’s in any distinct way.

The content of Obama’s comments was as strong as his tone, which was almost onomatopoetic in its insistence that he too could be strong on foreign policy. “This is what strong countries do,” Obama commanded, “This is what strong presidents do… What is John McCain afraid of?”

What John McCain should be afraid of, and what is becoming unmistakably evident from the first major brawl of the general election, is that Obama is not like other Democrats. The playbook that brought praise to Karl Rove does not have the same impact today as it did four and eight years ago. What’s more is that, in the argument about who would be the better president, the burden of proof clearly lies with McCain.

Having so intensely wed himself to the status quo, both in terms of policy and posture, John McCain is facing an election in which the policies he supports are dramatically opposed by the public he hopes will elect him. In almost every way, McCain has endorsed the policies of the most unpopular president in modern history, and has done so with the expectation that the voters wouldn’t mind. With 81% of the people seeing the country going on the wrong track, John McCain is advocating that we continue full-steam ahead. His only hope is that he can convince Americans that Obama is so horribly unqualified for the job, that they would be better off choosing a man with whom they completely disagree, than the man who offers the vision they seek.

In dust-ups like the one McCain and Obama just experienced, and in the many more to follow, John McCain cannot win such an argument by merely going toe-to-toe. Instead, he has to be crushing, not just painting Obama as weak and inexperienced, but proving beyond all reasonable doubt that this is the case. Having chosen the status quo as his bedrock, the burden of proof lies with him. And when Barack Obama responds, as he did, with grace and strength, with power and an unwavering determination, it will be truly audacious for John McCain to maintain any hope at all.

Realizing the Revolution

Last week marked the third special election in which Republicans lost a House seat long held by their party. First, Dennis Hastert’s seat in Illinois was wrested from the Republicans, an effort largely credited to the Obama organization outfitted to assist on the ground. The Louisiana 6th was next, followed by the Mississippi 1st, two districts so conservative they had been rarely considered in play. The Democratic Party’s success is a frightening omen for the Republican leadership, a relative calm before a fast approaching political storm.

Democrats are poised to build on the gains they made in 2006, with a potential of picking up more than twenty seats in the House, pushing the Republicans even further into the wilderness of the minority. On the Senate side, there is equally good news. Democrats seem all but certain to pick up seats in Colorado, New Mexico, Virginia, and New Hampshire, and are also well positioned to defeat Gordon Smith in Oregon. Republican Senators are also running weakly in Alaska, Texas, Maine, Minnesota, Kentucky, and North Carolina. If the special elections thus far are, as Republican Congressman Tom Davis suggested, “canaries in the coal mines,” Democrats may very well see a gain sufficient to guarantee a 60 seat, filibuster-proof majority.

With such tremendous prospects for the Democratic party, and no sign that the Republicans have a plan to counter the inevitable, January of 2009 may well begin with a Democrat in office more powerful than any president in modern memory.

If Barack Obama is elected in such an environment, some historical precedents come to mind. The first is 1992, in which Bill Clinton ascended to the presidency at a time when Democrats controlled a 40 seat majority in the House and a six seat majority in the Senate. Given that these numbers are so similar to the ones Obama will inherit, there may be reason for pause. After all, Bill Clinton managed to bumble his first two years so badly that, in 1994, Republicans swept into power on the wave of the Gingrich revolution, leaving Clinton neutered, and a number of his campaign promises unrealized.

But 2008 is a far different scenario than 1992; beyond the numbers, the analogy fails to hold. The Democratic Party had been, for forty years, the entrenched majority in Congress. Though they maintained control after the 1992 election, they lost nine House seats. Frustration with Democrats, both in Congress and in the White House, had grown so much so that Bill Clinton was elected by running away from his party. Clinton’s message of change was less about furthering the kind of progressive agenda that Congressional Democrats had envisioned, and more about co-opting Republican policies – from NAFTA to welfare reform. The Clintons’ push for universal health care struck an adversarial tone with Members, shutting out many who had spent careers preparing to play a role. The circumstances in the country were different. The policy goals of the White House were different. And the tactical and strategic decisions were shoddy, arrogant, and misguided.

In 2008, Barack Obama will be riding a different kind of wave into the White House, one in which the country will be universally calling for unified, Democratic control in all branches of government. Rather than running away from Democratic philosophy, Obama has embraced it, pushing forth a progressive agenda that appeals to the Democratic base and Independents alike, without sacrifice. His rise to power evokes other historical precedents in which the analogy is far more accurate.

Like Ronald Reagan and Franklin Roosevelt, Barack Obama’s election will follow what Stephen Skowronek described as “disjunctive” presidencies, those in which the presidents went so wayward, and economic conditions became so unacceptable, that the American people called for and accepted wholesale political revolution. Herbert Hoover’s abysmal handling of the Great Depression paved the way for FDR’s dramatic rise to power and realignment of the political spectrum. Jimmy Carter, presiding over double digit inflation, a botched hostage crisis, and a speaking voice that, in both style and content, warned of midnight in America, was an essential precondition for Reagan’s revolution.

In the House of Representatives, Democrats gained 97 seats when FDR was elected. In the Senate, they gained twelve. It was with that governing majority and that dramatic mandate for change that FDR built his new kind of politics.

His was a lasting legacy for the Democratic Party and the country. If the 2008 Congressional elections continue with the trend they’ve begun, an Obama presidency might well leave a similar mark.