How Do You Measure Presidential Leadership?

September 13, 2013Danny Vinik Leave a comment

You hear all the time that President Obama cannot lead. He doesn’t reach across the aisle. He has a poor relationship with Congress.

That seems to be a widely assumed fact throughout D.C. Many people (including myself) doubt that the President would accomplish anything more even if he was a better leader. But most people seem to assume that this president just isn’t a very good leader.

But is this true? It’s tough to be a good leader when half your followers are committed to undermining your every move. Is there anything the President could’ve done to convince Republicans to work with him? I’m doubtful, but I’m also new to politics and new to D.C. so I have trouble putting President Obama’s leadership skills in context. Did former presidents work better with Congress? Did they show more deference to the institution?

At the National Journal’s policy summit yesterday on America’s fiscal condition, Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-UT) offered a clue when he spoke about a dinner he had with the President:

We had supper in the family dining room – it was the first time in my 37 years that I was ever in the family dining room.

Senator Hatch is the longest-serving Republican in the Senate and during all his time there throughout a number of different administrations, he had never been invited to dine in the family dining room. Based on a bit of googling, the dinner Hatch is referring seems to have taken place on April 10 of this year with a dozen different Senators.

This is one tiny little data point, but it puts things in a bit of context for me. I don’t know how to judge the President’s leadership skills. I don’t think there is a simple metric for doing so. But for those that say the President doesn’t lead, what do they think dining with a dozen Republican senators in the family dining room is? I’m sure they’ll respond that it’s one moment of leadership amidst a sea of disdain towards Congressional Republicans and that it took until Obama’s second term for him to host the dinner. But this a moment of leadership that Hatch never saw from a previous President. I don’t know if any of the other Senators had dined in the family dining room before. I’m sure at least some others had not.

Not surprisingly, the dinner didn’t seem to help the budget negotiations, but it still puts those criticisms of the President in a bit of context for me. I’d love to hear more. In the meantime though, I’m taking the “Obama can’t lead” complaint with a grain of salt.

Boehner Can’t Betray The Tea Party

September 12, 2013Danny Vinik 3 Comments

Salon’s Brian Beutler is out with an article this morning advising House Speaker John Boehner to give up waging repeated fights over the government budget and debt ceiling and instead agree to fund both for a lengthy period of a time. These fights do nothing, but divide the Republican party and hurt its imagine nationally. So, Beutler’s logical advice to the Speaker is to no longer pass stopgap fixes and get them off his plate until at least the midterm elections.

This makes a lot of sense on political grounds for the Republican party. The GOP wouldn’t have to revisit every few months whether they’re going to bankrupt the government or allow it to default, both political losers for the party. As for the country, these nasty fights unnecessarily hold back the economy and crowd out other important Congressional legislation such as immigration and tax reform.

The problem with Beutler’s strategy is that it would probably cost Boehner his speakership. Beutler says that if Boehner is worried about this, he could make a deal with House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi that Democrats will support him if he’s challenged by his conservative base.

Speaker Boehner has no good options.

But this doesn’t actually accomplish much for the Speaker. He keeps his title while losing all of his power.

If the Speaker faces a rebellion from within his ranks and turns to Pelosi for help, it effectively makes her de-facto Speaker. As we’ve seen repeatedly, Tea Party Republicans aren’t going to sit idly by while the Speaker betrays their most deeply held interests: cutting government spending and defunding Obamacare. In reality, the House doesn’t have a chance of accomplishing either of those, but House Republicans don’t live in reality. They will see Boehner’s betrayal not as a practical solution to improve the image of the party, but as a validation of their not-to-secret belief that the Speaker is a RINO. And they won’t accept that.

Whoever rises up to challenge Boehner for his speakership – whether it be the Majority Leader, Eric Cantor, or someone well outside Republican leadership such as Justin Amash – will have the support from Tea Party groups around the country and many members of the Republican caucus. If Democrats come to Boehner’s aid and save his speakership, the Tea Party will not simply give up the fight. The Tea Party doesn’t give up fights, even ones they’ve lost repeatedly (see, Obamacare). They will continue to fight against everything Boehner does, if just to send a message to future speakers that the Tea Party is not to be messed with.

If Boehner hopes to accomplish anything else in this Congress, it will require large Democratic support and it will be up to Pelosi to provide that support. Anything Boehner wants to pass, he’ll have to run by the Minority Leader to see if she can whip the votes for it. That gives Pelosi all the power. That’s great for Democrats, but horrible for Republicans and even worse for Boehner. He’ll have no power in Congress and a Republican base that will never forgive him. That’s not a strategy the Speaker should pursue.

Do Putin or Assad Actually Fear U.S. Strikes?

September 11, 2013Danny Vinik Leave a comment

I’m skeptical. First off, both leaders undoubtedly know that the force authorization was going to die in Congress. They can read the whip counts and it’s pretty clear by now that this isn’t going to pass. Here’s Ezra Klein commenting on the potential compromise of Assad handing over his chemical weapons:

That deal will fall apart if Syria and Russia conclude that the White House’s threats are empty. Obama needs the country’s backing to strike Syria so he can strike a diplomatic bargain to get rid of Assad’s chemical arsenal, thus ending America’s interest in striking Syria.

But Obama can’t get that support by going on prime time and asking Americans to help him bluff Russia.

What exactly do Syria and Russia fear? The only thing I can think of is that they believe the President will authorize the strikes without Congressional approval. I don’t see that happening. Maybe that’s a large enough risk that Putin and Assad are open to negotiations to avoid it. But they certainly shouldn’t fear that Congress will approve of the strikes.

Here’s Klein again this morning on why the White House postponed the vote:

The other is that the White House would very likely lose — if they were going to win, they’d hold the vote and use the authorization as leverage with Russia and Syria.

It’s not like Putin and Assad don’t understand this either! If Obama had the votes, there would be no reason for the White House to delay. It would give the Administration leverage over Assad and allow them to speed up the negotiating process since the President would have the authority to strike at any time.

So, what motivated Syria and Russia to look for a compromise? I’m not sure, but I can’t see how the President’s bluff had anything to do with it.