The Democrats' Choice: Manager or Visionary

That's the title of Ezra Klein's article analyzing the difference between Clinton and Obama.  I had posted something like this earlier, but Klein deals with it at greater length and sums it up more precisely. 

After pointing out that there appear to be only subtle differences between Clinton and Obama on key economic issues, Klein says:

"Which gets to the real difference between the two candidates, . . . how they conceive of the president's role . . . .

"Where Obama speaks of trends and values, situating his policies within the broader forces shaping our culture as well as our society, Clinton speaks of individual problems and solitary obstacles, offering her proposals as discrete solutions to identifiable challenges. . . .  'The next president,' she said [in Knoxville, Iowa], 'will be a steward of our economy at a time when the bills from eight years of neglect and mismanagement will be coming due.' 

. . . .

"Obama's advisers, by contrast, are likely to point you toward his speech at the NASDAQ, which highlighted his desire to transform our economy through the application of moral leadership.  There, Obama went before an audience of bankers and stockbrokers and spoke, not of our growth numbers or our credit problems, but of our economic values . . . ."

[long, illustrative quotation from that speech omitted here]

. . . .  Clinton, as steward, promises to better manage our economic policies.  Obama, as moral leader, promises to better our economic politics.

. . . .

. . . [S]he largely accepts the circumstances [of prevailing economic principles and beliefs], or at least her inability to change them through the application of her own charisma.  Obama, by contrast, focuses more on changing the circumstances in which the legislation is made.  The promise of his presidency is less its capacity to change our policies than its capacity to change our politics." 

According to Klein, Obama seeks political transformation and quite overtly models himself on Franklin Roosevelt and Ronald Reagan, both of whom led transformations.  In contrast, Klein says, Hillary's plan is to be a somewhat more liberal Bill Clinton, who, "in a sense, was the progressive steward of the Reagan Revolution."  For example, it was Clinton, not Reagan, who declared, "The era of big government is over." 

I think Klein's piece is brilliantly insightful about this.  I take it a bit further. 

A visionary can potentially rely on others for implementation, but the opposite division of roles absolutely doesn't work.  Only the President can get into the bully pulpit, get national media coverage, and sell a vision.  It can't be done by the Secretary of the Treasury, the National Security Advisor, by an ex-President living in the White House, a Vice President, or a mere Senator from Illinois.  So, with Obama we could possibly get vision and implementation, but with Clinton what we see is what we'll get. 

So what's my choice here? 

I'm so fed up with "voodoo economics" (as it was accurately labeled by George H. W. Bush), which became Reaganomics, and large parts of which became today's conventional wisdom, that the prospect of another transformation is very appealing to me.  But transformation to what?  Visions are inherently general, value-laden and unprogrammatic.  Consider these Reaganisms:  a shining city on the hill, smaller government, a world free of the threat of nuclear weapons, personal responsibility, family values. 

Obama's economic vision is also--well, visionary--in his NASDAQ speech, where he borrowed heavily from the words of FDR in 1932:  We should not sit idly by and let our economic problems consume us.  Every American has a right to live comfortably.  Government must favor no small group at the expense of all its citizens.  Responsible heads of finance and industry, instead of acting each for himself, must work together to achieve the common end.  A renewed trust in the market and a renewed spirit of obligation and cooperation between business and workers.  A new social contract.  (Reportedly, this audience was able to contain its enthusiasm.)  Nothing specific here about NAFTA, WTO, globalization, tax policy, balanced budgets, regulation of financial institutions, Social Security and Medicare reform, health care, education spending, or any other program. 

A visionary creates discomfort because, although greater change is possible, we can't confidently foresee what the new programs will be.  Many Democrats will be more comfortable with the idea of just getting back into power with sufficient majorities to ram through specific programs they have in mind.  I voted for the visionary. 

Comments

[christine]

very nice piece Roger!