It’s been a busy week.
Former Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle will not be the new Health and Human Services Secretary. It was another tax issue (relating to a chauffeur), following Timothy Geithner’s ‘little mishap’. If articles like this one are to be believed, the latter got off rather lightly in his confirmation.
Two points. First, it is a considerable loss for the Obama team. They trusted Daschle. So did Congress. He has kudos in Washington, knows the issues (he recently wrote an acclaimed book on healthcare policy), and it was thought he was – from a practical point of view – one of the best possible people to lead the fight on health reform. Uniquely among Obama’s Cabinet, he was to be ‘Health Czar’ too. In each key policy area, Obama has appointed a ‘Czar’ to coordinate policy, in practice increasing the extent to which policy is directed by the White House. Daschle was unique in that he was to be both the HHS Secretary and the Health Czar. This all sounds very abstract, but, to illustrate, he would have been the only Cabinet member to have an office in the West Wing. Obama trusted him and has lost a valuable leader.
Second, Daschle messed up, but he would have been confirmed. The leader of the Senatorial committee responsible for his confirmation said he had full confidence in Daschle the night before he withdrew. Despite the mishap, it looked as if he were destined for the same outcome as Geithner – a little bad press, a slightly bumpy ride, and then confirmation. The story goes, Daschle woke up and read this New York Times editorial, then called Obama and said he felt he shouldn’t go on with the nomination process.
Ordinarily in these situations one looks for evidence that the resignation was in fact forced. I actually don’t think it was here. I think Daschle simply thought, especially after Nancy Killefer (WH Performance Director-designate) had withdrawn for tax reasons, that his presence would cause problematic distraction. He might have been wrong – the public forgets about this sort of thing after a short while.
(A little frivolity for the weekend: this brilliantly ironic campaign ad for Tom Daschle’s 1986 campaign)
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Meanwhile, Obama is out and about selling the stimulus package. There’s been some interesting chatter from a few sources – Peggy Noonan and Lawrence Linsey (former Director of President Bush’s National Economic Council) to name but two. Their argument: the President is on TV too much. They make slightly nuanced arguments. Noonan’s view is the office of the President is denigrated if you’re always on TV – it reduces the intrigue. What she seems to say is something like the Presidency is special and important enough for it not to benefit from constant exposure. Linsey (speaking to the quite brilliant Jon Stewart on The Daily Show) says something different: if you’re on TV all the time, you can’t be making good decisions.
Linsey’s argument is less good than Noonan’s, but both are a little off the mark. I think the real argument is this: the ‘bully pulpit’ becomes less consequential if you’re always yelling from it.
But Obama is right to be yelling now. This issue is singular in that this stimulus package will probably be the biggest piece of legislation of his first term. It needs to be gotten right, and the Senate bill that the President is now touting seems much preferable to that passed in the House. Obama believes that this situation demands bold leadership, and his strength in the campaign and since was and has been his ability to connect, to persuade the people that he’s right. And so he goes on television, and argues. His team blitzes the airwaves. He’ll be hitting the campaign trail again this week, with a couple of town hall meetings in Florida and Indiana.
I think part of the reason he’s doing it is because he’s got the tougher argument. It’s very easy, in this age of the soundbite press, for a conservative Republican to go on talk radio or cable news and say ‘this thing won’t work’, or ‘it wastes your tax dollars’, or ‘it’s a spending bill, not a stimulus’ (the response: that’s precisely what a stimulus is, you numpties). Obama’s case is harder to make, more complicated, and so he must go on the attack and make it. The whole issue is certainly more nuanced than much of the Republican commentary has made out, and so he must say so.
His charm offensive started on Thursday, with a host of interviews during the day and, most notably, this speech at the House Democrats annual retreat. I urge you to watch the video — it starts slow, but it gets there. This is why they elected Obama. This sort of performance is something we really didn’t see with Bush, at least not in the last four years (which is why his final press conference seemed so out of place). This speech was Obama at his best: impassioned, persuasive, willing to hit back hard against his detractors. It was largely positive: we need to do this to save our economy. But he was occasionally cutting, mocking the Republican talking points in an attempt to bring the public round.
It might yet work. The vote in the Senate will be at the start of this week, and then it’s back to the House for a little more wrangling. With three GOP Senators willing to support the new bill in the Senate, it could well pass as it stands.
