16 July 2015
All the President’s People
by J R Thomas
Imagine a horse race with only one runner, preening and prancing in front of the crowd. Then imagine another horse race with so many runners there aren’t enough starting stalls, and every neighbourhood donkey, pony and carthorse in the county is jostling around the starter. Welcome to the USA Presidential stakes, a race in two parts, now saddling up.
American Presidents can serve only two terms, a rule introduced after Franklin D Roosevelt won his fourth consecutive election in 1944 but died in office shortly thereafter. Hero though FDR was, the American people felt that the power of the President was so great that any inclination to autocracy must be discouraged. That is probably a relief to Mr Obama, who shows little sign that he has any further interest in running the country, and certainly clears the racecourse for Mrs Clinton.
Here is a lady who thinks her time has truly come, whose whole life has been spent preparing for this opportunity, whose husband’s double-term was just a warm-up act for the main event now appearing at a public meeting near you – near almost everybody, in fact. The energy of the lady is certainly impressive, as is her influence over the Democratic Party machine, which at the moment is struggling to produce an alternative candidate to avoid the Democratic convention in July 2016 in Philadelphia turning into an automatic Clinton coronation. Which is not to say that there are no alternative candidates. The obvious one ought to be Joe Biden, the Vice President to Barrack Obama throughout his two terms. But Biden is keeping his head well down at the moment, which may be very much the right strategy. Early leaders in the presidential races tend to get a lot of knocks and often that damage puts them out of the race. Mrs Clinton is running that risk. She has very little choice but to do so and, given the amount of mud which has been flung at Mrs C and her ability to hose it off without anything much sticking over the last twenty years, it is hard to see what can do her much damage -yet.
Biden has been a quiet success for Obama, keeping clear of the accusations levelled at the President about his lack of drive and the decay of his radical ambition. He has been a loyal number two, making things happen, keeping the Democrat party in Washington and in the country together, and smoothing some potential bumps (especially in the “Obamacare” health care strategy, now delivering).
And Joe looks Presidential, good-looking, grey-haired, kinda folksy, a regular sort of guy (copyright T Blair), good with the party workers in the core industrial constituencies. He has been written off several times before but, if he runs, he could be the man who can pull the party together if they decide they can’t trust Hilary. Trust is the issue that is seriously concerning the party tacticians, especially if the election is close fought. There is no doubt that Mrs Clinton has a trust issue – it is her key weakness in polling surveys – and the recent revelation of the personal email account where so much of her state correspondence was sent, and the destruction thereof, reignited the always smouldering trust bonfire.
There are of course other runners, some just looking, some declared. The Presidency is too big a prize to be left as low hanging fruit for an easy resnaffling by the Clinton family. Least likely, sadly, if only for the entertainment value and intellectual debate, is Bernie Sanders, an independent Senator (though he proclaims himself a socialist and has signed up to the Democrats for the 2016 run) sitting for Vermont, spiritual home of the delightfully mad and cookie in American politics. Bernie is no fool, and has a big following in Vermont. But that won’t take him far in the Presidential stakes.
Lincoln Chaffee and Jim Webb are both ex-Republican Senators. Webb is rumoured to be getting ready to run and Chaffee has declared. Both face the problems of their previous political history and also, always very key to the big race, whether they can raise enough money to run in the primaries for long enough to make a mark. Which ought to leave the betting on Martin O’Malley, who has the possible advantage of age – he is 52 whilst the rest are in their 60’s and 70’s – though that never seems such an issue in US politics as it is in the UK. O’Malley has also a good record of progressive Democratism, latterly as Governor of Maryland. If Biden does not run, this could be the one to beat Clinton – and he is a seasoned operator of the Democrat machine. If Hilary starts to look like a loser, he will be adept at getting the party apparatus on his side.
Things are not so clear cut on the Grand Old Party side of the course, where a cast of thousands (so it feels) are milling around, mostly abusing each other. The legacy of G W Bush and the Obama years (years when Obama’s social agenda – on same sex marriage, on abortion, on race, on opportunity – led the political debate) have left the Republican party without a common belief system and with no obvious leader to unite it. This is the party’s fundamental problem. The Republicans are not that unpopular in the country (their dominance in Washington over much of the last eight years proves that) but they are a strange coalition of Tea Party and conservatives, free marketeers, southern former Democrats and small town mid-westerners. What holds them together is difficult to discern (perhaps little more than dislike of the Obama’s radicalism, more apparent than real though that is) and what ought to unite them (low taxes and foreign policy more than anything) is poisoned by the still furiously-debated Bush presidency.
Oddly, the potential winner might be yet another Bush – Jeb, GW’s younger but subtly different brother. He is already seen as the potential Republican nominee and the money is pouring into his campaign chest. Jeb is an astute political operator, of centrist and moderate opinions, more sociable and more inclined to debate, to listen and to build consensus than his brother. His wife is Mexican from a humble background and both are fluent Spanish speakers. That does no harm at all in a country where the Latino vote is fast growing and very influential in southern states. He was Governor of Florida for two reasonably successful terms. In fact, if his name was not Bush, he might be starting to look like a shoo-in for the nomination…
As it is, the current challenger to him seems to be Marco Rubio, who has an age advantage (though maybe it isn’t) being 44, also with a Florida power-base, son of Cuban immigrants. He hasn’t actually done much, but that could well be an advantage when records and behaviour are put under the microscope.
With the enormous field of candidates and some very interesting personalities and opinions, we will have to have a second stroll around the Republican paddock but we cannot omit at this point the delights of the Donald, Donald Trump, for it is he. Mr Trump has the advantage of very deep pockets of his own (no banker to his interests has suggested otherwise) and also of not having duties in any public forum to restrain him. Whether his hair is an advantage or not may become clear during the contest but like its proprietor it shows no sign of restraint at this point in early campaigning. Mr Trump is certainly catching the headlines at the moment – his attacks on illegal Mexican immigration have been so profound that the other candidates have found common cause in asking him to tone them down. Which he did, but while calling for a wall to be built along the entire border to halt the number of Mexican immigrants crossing. Quite how this would achieve anything more than the existing fence and security patrols is a question that Donald has yet to turn his thoughts to.
We will resume shortly with a look at the other Republican hopefuls – and hope that so many more do not emerge that we will need a third article.
