2008 Presidential Election Coverage
Podcast
Listen to the acclaimed presidential historian Robert Dallek comment on the 2008 election. This month Dr. Dallek elaborate on this month’s blog about why candidates try not to be too specific about their future policies while on the campaign trail.
2008 Election Blog
Commentary by Robert Dallek, Ph.D.
August 2008
Early Advertising
As a rule, American presidential campaigns have begun in September after Labor Day. The conventions have always met in the summer and have seen outpourings of partisan pronouncements on their party and candidates’ virtues. The direct appeals by the nominees, however – in speeches and, more recently, in debates and TV ads – have almost always waited until the eight weeks between September and November.
This year is different. Driven by the unpopularity of the incumbent Bush administration, the constant news coverage, the mounting sense of distress over the economy, and the country’s continuing problems with Iraq, the fight for the White House is already at a high pitch. It will become even more intense beginning in September, but the daily back and forth between the two campaigns and TV ads trumpeting the virtues and defects of Senators Barack Obama and John McCain are already filling the airwaves and print media. The arguments coming from both sides have been less a substantive attack on their opponent’s policy statements than complaints about their shifting positions on compelling national issues such as the economy, universal health care, the environment, or the war.
Shifting Sands
The fact that both candidates are shifting ground, however, is hardly surprising. This is what aspirants for the White House in the last hundred years have always done. No candidate knew just what he would do if he became president. How could he? The problems a year or even six months before someone entered office had usually altered somewhat, if not dramatically, by the time he was inaugurated.
Moreover, being bound to specific policies has never been a good idea; it compels a candidate to demonstrate the impossible – exactly how his proposal will resolve a difficult economic, social, or foreign policy problem. Can either Obama or McCain tell you today precisely how they will end the housing crisis, or close out the conflict in Iraq, or assure everyone medical insurance, or improve the country’s schools? Obviously not. And so the premium is on remaining flexible or keeping options open and not saddling yourself with a policy commitment that could undermine your voter appeal.
In 1932, in the midst of the worst economic collapse in the nation’s history, Franklin Roosevelt understood that the country was desperate for strong leadership and change. President Herbert Hoover attacked Roosevelt for being a chameleon on plaid – a political opportunist who had no fixed answers for overcoming the depression. But the complaint, however true, could not convince voters that a second Hoover term would be a better choice than a fresh start under a different party and new president – however vague he might be about his “New Deal.”
A Special Election
The current campaign has a similar feel to it: a deeply unpopular administration supporting a candidate who is simultaneously trying to promise a new course and not alienate party supporters who remain loyal to the incumbent. John McCain has tried to shift the focus from his ties to the Bush White House while at the same time he tries to portray Barack Obama as too inexperienced, especially on foreign policy and national security issues.
By contrast, Obama is trying to identify McCain as closely as possible with the Bush White House and trim sail on a variety of domestic and foreign policy problems so as not to antagonize specific groups of voters. And because change has been and remains so central to Obama’s appeal, he has not hesitated to shift ground as a way to demonstrate his flexibility on a variety of issues that are central voter concerns.
It is still too soon to make any confident predictions about the outcome of the election, but if the vote were held today, my guess is that Obama would win and that the Democrats would capture larger majorities in both houses of Congress than they now enjoy.
2008 feels like one of those special years in American presidential and national politics. The Republican Party and conservatives in particular have dominated the political scene since 1968. But the country’s recent problems are creating the impression that this period of control has run its course and that voters will now turn to liberal/progressive leaders for answers to current challenges.
It seems like part of a familiar American political pattern in which one party and its ideology wears out its welcome and takes a back seat to the other party and its different ideas for solving social problems. It’s all part of what the great American historian Arthur Schlesinger Jr. called, “The Cycles of American History.”
Critical Thinking Questions
- Synthesize Why have the presidential candidates begun appealing to voters so much earlier than is traditional in this presidential election?
- Make Inferences What problems might a candidate for president face if he or she were too vague on the campaign trail?
- Form and Support Opinions Who has been more successful at expressing sound policy ideas while not sounding as if they are making empty promises, McCain or Obama?