New at Reason

May 31, 2007

Steve Chapman looks back on the presidency of that well-meaning, never-lucky, never-really-competent heart-on-his sleeve Christian from the deep South. What was his name, again?

Comments

|5.31.07 @ 6:31AM|#

I thought the bird poop thing was a cheap shot, but otherwise a funny and spot-on article about the two worst presidents since FDR.

M|5.31.07 @ 7:24AM|#

Earl Bobby and Rudi are sitting on a park bench when a pigeon flying overhead splatters droppngs on Bobby's lapel. Bobby does nothing. Rudy, puzzled, turns to Bobby and asks, "Don't you have a little piece of paper or something?"

Bobby looks back at Rudi and indignantly replies, "What? Do you expect me to fly after that bird and clean his...?"

|5.31.07 @ 9:15AM|#

I think Chapman missed the most important parallel - both Carter and Bush managed to win the presidency through quirks of history (Watergate, Florida), that temporarily stalled (or perhaps masked) a realignment towards the other party.

|5.31.07 @ 9:32AM|#

Joe, if there is any realignment it is because of Bush and Iraq, not some underlying desire by the majority for national socialism. No matter how much you want that to be so.

|5.31.07 @ 9:34AM|#

"national socialism"

buh bye, James.

|5.31.07 @ 9:43AM|#

You are half-right, James.

The reason the Democrats picked up seats in Congress in the 1996, 1998, and 2000 elections, and the reason they won governships in 2002; and the reason Bush had a slimmer margin of victory in 2004 than any sitting wartime president in American history; and the reason the growing Hispanic population is an increasingly solid Democratic voting block had nothing to do with a desire for national socialism.

The part about this only starting after the Iraq War, on the other hand, not so much.

|5.31.07 @ 9:44AM|#

I guess the parts where his party picked up seats in his first midterm and then he won reelection were just even more clever masking of the realignment.

|5.31.07 @ 10:06AM|#

Yup, 9/11 had a temporary "rally 'round the flag" effect for the incumbent president's party - an effect which proved to be ephemeral.

In other news, the sky is blue.

|5.31.07 @ 10:11AM|#

The nineties gains were more a distaste with Republicans not walking the walk, than any real appreciation of a confiscatory nannying big government. When Democrats forget to hide their intentions it doesn't take long for voters to wise up.

|5.31.07 @ 10:28AM|#

"...get away with actions that harmed our interests."

That gorilla in the corner just keeps getting bigger, and the bigger it gets the less it is seen. Instead of chickens in every pot, perhaps a Fornixscope on every head would be more.......

|5.31.07 @ 10:29AM|#

The results of an election produce an avalanche of "permanent realignment!" wishful thinking from the winners.

In other news, grass is green.

|5.31.07 @ 11:05AM|#

Predicting future election results is a mug's game, but if there was a realignment taking place over the past 10 years, it is really strange that the incumbent vp of the strengthening party in the 2000 election, in a time of extreme prosperity and peace, didn't win by a large enough margin to render Florida irrelevant. It wasn't as if the opposing candidate was some sort of dynamo on the campaign trail.

stephen the goldberger|5.31.07 @ 11:23AM|#

bush and carter both blew and assembled humble southern christian personalities but other than that, they are/were completely different.

|5.31.07 @ 12:15PM|#

I still prefer the Bush = LBJ meme.

|5.31.07 @ 2:06PM|#

"The results of an election produce an avalanche of "permanent realignment!" wishful thinking from the winners."

I listed the results of five elections, Josh.

Assuming alignments from the results of one election is, indeed, indefensible.

Will Allen,

Since there is a sample size of one, it's not uncommon for a presidential election to go against the majority party based on quirks of history (Carter in 76, Ike in 52, arguably Clinton in 92) or personality (Bush in 00, Ike in 56, arguably Clinton in 92). There is also the third-party factor - Nixon in 68, Bush in 00, arguably Clinton in 92.

"It wasn't as if the opposing candidate was some sort of dynamo on the campaign trail." He had the best campaign machine in recent memory, and everybody wanted to have a beer with him.

|5.31.07 @ 3:21PM|#

That depends on whose memory you are using, Joe.

|5.31.07 @ 3:40PM|#

joe, I think you're doing a little cherry-picking of your data. A few thoughts:

The Dems have had to fight like hell to get back to a level in Congress that is materially less than what they had for a generation after WWII.

While the Dems have a nice trend going their way in the House, in the Senate I don't think you can really point to one. The Repubs gained four net seats in 2004, after all.

The Dems are having a nice run, but it has been more in the nature of catching up than establishing anything that isn't easily reversed.

Most worrying for the Dems is the way their current policy on Iraq mirrors their policy on Vietnam back in the day, which presaged a generation of setbacks for them. I would be worried, if I were a Dem strategist, that the Dems are setting themselves up for a fall if things really go bad in Iraq, just like they did after things really went bad in Vietnam.

Note: I'm a big fan of having the party in power switch out periodically. Turning over leadership refreshes the talent and nullifies corruption.

|5.31.07 @ 4:18PM|#

"The Dems have had to fight like hell to get back to a level in Congress that is materially less than what they had for a generation after WWII."

Yes, they once had a majority, then lost it, and are now fighting to get back that majority. There was a realignment to the Republicans in between.

"While the Dems have a nice trend going their way in the House, in the Senate I don't think you can really point to one. The Repubs gained four net seats in 2004, after all."

9/11 changed everything, for a little while. Also, with only 1/3 - and not an evenly distributed third at that - of seats up every election, there can be individual outcomes that run counter to trends. A single election can put many more vulnerable Democratic seats up than Republican. If anything, the Democrats' gains in 2006 in the Senate appear more sudden than they actually were, as the 2004 races happened to line up in a manner that benefited the Republicans. I recall reading that the 2004 and 2006 elections were BOTH supposed to be Repbulican-friendly, while the 2008 elections were held out as favoring the Democrats, in the Senate.

"The Dems are having a nice run, but it has been more in the nature of catching up than establishing anything that isn't easily reversed." I agree. In "The Coming Democratic Majority," the authors theorize that realignments happen differently these days. Where the public would realign from one party to the other in a single step, now there are distinct "de-alignment" and "re-alignment" phases. 1968 saw the de-alignment of the public away from the New Deal coalition, but it took until 1980 for there to be a real Republican realignment. The authors theorize the Clinton presidency saw a de-alignment from the Reagan coalition, but that the realignment towards the Democrats hadn't happened yet.

"Most worrying for the Dems is the way their current policy on Iraq mirrors their policy on Vietnam back in the day..."

Your saying so does't make this a reality. During Vietnam, Mike Gravel was elected to the United States Senate. During Vietnam, war opponents were openly siding with the North Vietnamese and VC. During Vietnam, there was a great deal of open hosility towards military personnel from those who opposed the war. As much as your team wishes to cast today's war opponents in the same light, Jim Webb is no Mike Gravel, Votevets is not SDS, and anti-military sentiment is nonexistent on either side of the aisle.