President Barack Obama’s signature on the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act is the clearest signal yet that America has entered a new civic era, very different from the idealist era of the past four decades. As has been the case with all previous realignments or makeovers in our history, this new era will be marked by a far different conception of the role of government and of the way in which public policy is made and judged.
The latest survey results from the Millennial Strategy Program of communication research and consultation firm, Frank N. Magid Associates, demonstrate that the American public fully embraces this new era even as many in the country’s political establishment continue to behave as though the 2008 election never happened.
Conservatives in the media, and virtually everyone on the Republican side of the congressional aisle, amazingly still seem to believe that the country remains "center-right" and is willing to accept an answer to its economic distress that is based on a continuation of the financial and fiscal policies of the past four decades. Many of their counterparts in the liberal media and blogosphere, and some congressional Democrats, are upset that President Obama even deigns to talk to Republicans and are unrealistically disappointed that that the entire Democratic legislative wish list of recent decades has not been fully enacted within the first month of the new Administration. But what both sides fail to fully comprehend is the degree to which public attitudes have shifted. From the perspective of public opinion, America is now a very different country than it was in the 1980s, 1990s, and even what it was before the financial meltdown of last September.
Here are some highlights from the latest results from Magid’s February 2009 survey that clearly document this change and describe the new contours of the public opinion bedrock on which governmental policy will be debated, enacted, and gauged in the coming decades.
* Governmental activism has replaced a laissez faire approach to societal and economic concerns. By a greater than 2:1 majority, Americans now say they prefer a government that actively tries to solve the problems facing society and the economy rather than one that stays out of society and the economy to the greatest extent possible. (58% vs. 26%). Overwhelming support for an activist approach crosses all demographic and political lines; only Republicans, conservatives, and 2008 McCain voters have any lingering doubts about the matter. In the 1980s and 1990s many, if not most, Americans believed, along with Ronald Reagan, that government was the problem, and not the solution to problems. In 2009, the American people have turned Mr. Reagan's aphorism on its head even as Republicans in Congress and the media continue to preach that very old time religion.
* Economic equality is a major goal and standard by which to gauge government policy. A majority of the American public now believes that the best policy is to ensure that everyone has at least a basic standard of living and level of income, even if that increases government spending, instead of an approach that lets each person get along economically on their own, even if that means some have more than others (53% vs. 30%). Support for policies that promote economic equality is widespread demographically and politically. Only Republicans and conservatives are opposed. By contrast, in Pew surveys taken in the mid-1990s, only about four in ten Americans endorsed a governmental guarantee of a basic standard of living.
* Americans favor a foreign policy based on multilateralism. By almost 2:1, Americans agree that the best way to protect our national security is through building strong alliances with other nations rather than by relying primarily on our own military strength (56% vs. 29%). Once again, Republicans and conservatives stand in opposition to all other major demographic and political groups on this matter. And, once again, the American public has clearly moved in a new direction in recent years. Since early 2002, support for relying on military strength for the country's security has fallen by about 15 percentage points while the preference for depending on alliances with other countries has also increased by about the same amount.
* Pragmatism has replaced ideological purity as the preferred standard for gauging public policy. Half of Americans (49%) say that the best way to judge the correctness of government policies is how well they work. Only a third (31%) believe that the standard should be whether the policies seem to be morally right or wrong. As in other areas, it is only Republicans and conservatives who are out of step with the rest of the public. Clearly, most of the American people, if not many of those inside the Beltway, are ready to say farewell to the ideological gridlock that has characterized U.S. politics for the past 40 years.
These results reflect an almost total shift in the bedrock beliefs of the American people about the purpose of government and the standards for evaluating public policy. Under the heavy influence of the Millennial Generation’s (those born between 1982 and 2003) preference for liberal interventionism in economic matters, activist multilateralism in foreign affairs, and tolerant non-meddling on social issues, the United States has moved squarely into a new civic era.
President Barack Obama intuitively and clearly understands the magnitude of this major change in public opinion. The American people have adopted new attitudes for a new era. It's now time for the Washington political elites to do the same.
Wednesday, February 18, 2009
Friday, February 6, 2009
Its No Time for Politics as Usual
The U.S. Senate’s “Dr. No,” Republican Judd Gregg of New Hampshire, best captured the need for political leadership in this time of crisis in accepting his nomination by President Barack Obama to be U.S. Secretary of Commerce: "Now is not the time for partisanship. Now is not the time to stand in our ideological corners and shout at each other. Now is the time to govern and govern well."
Unfortunately, many in Congress, including much of the leadership of both parties, still don't understand that the United States has entered a new civic political era, demanding new rules of behavior in response to our dire economic circumstances. Even as President Obama expresses the "fierce urgency of now," pointing out that if government does not act soon and vigorously it "will turn a crisis into a catastrophe," Congress still seems unable to put aside the ideological arguments and constant efforts to win partisan advantage that characterized American politics in the era the country has just left.
Congressional Republicans seem to believe that the economy can only be revitalized by tax cuts while Democrats say that only vast federal spending, some of it on the pet projects of Members, will produce economic recovery. As demonstrated by the recent House vote on final passage of the economic recovery bill, in which virtually all Democrats voted against all Republicans, working across party lines remains an elusive dream. Republican Members of Congress seem intent on following the strategy from their ideological battles with President Bill Clinton a decade ago in which the goal was to enforce party discipline in the hope that the President and his party would fail and Republicans could blame the Democrats in the next election. But with the stakes as high as they are now, the GOP should instead be listening to the author of that earlier strategy, Newt Gingrich, who has publicly made it clear that the country cannot afford for Obama’s economic recovery plan to fail.
Meanwhile, Democrats need to learn some new rules of behavior as well. While NDN's Globalization Initiative Chair Dr. Rob Shapiro has correctly noted that the recovery package now before the Senate contains only the "normal quotient of special interest subsidies on both the spending and tax sides -- think of it as a 'congressional tax,'" -- these clearly aren’t normal times. It may be true that, as Rob says, "they really can’t help themselves." But like others recovering from an addiction, Democrats will have to at least try to change their approach to building legislative consensus in this new era, one step at a time.
The American public clearly sees the distinction between Congress' approach and that of President Obama. A Pollster.com compendium of national surveys indicates that 70 percent of Americans have a favorable opinion of President Obama and 63 percent approve of his performance. By contrast, only 17 percent approve of the job Congress is doing, while 78 percent disapprove. More to the point, in a recent Rasmussen Reports survey, a plurality (42 percent) perceives Obama to be governing in a bipartisan manner. By contrast, only half that number believes the same of both congressional Democrats and Republicans (22 percent each).
Of course, there is a way out. Unlike the social issues that dominated American politics during much of the last four decades, the economic and fiscal issues that are the current focus can be bridged with a non-ideological, post-partisan, and pragmatic approach recognizing that each side may have something to offer. If properly targeted, the tax cuts advocated by Republicans should be useful. If aimed at the right mix of projects, the Democratic spending proposals should help the economy in the short run and provide the conditions for growth in the long run. Keeping people in their homes, as both parties seem to advocate, will help families, neighborhoods, and society.
In short, as Rob Shapiro points out the recovery package can be "a useful first step, and one for which NDN has long argued."
Unlike their legislative representatives, the public has moved on from the cultural wars of the last decade. In a late January Pew survey, more than eight in 10 named the economy (85 percent and jobs (82 percent) as top policy priorities for the federal government, significantly above the numbers saying this about any other issue. In a January Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll, only seven percent cited “social issues” as an area on which government should focus compared to 21 percent who cited such cultural issues a decade ago. Paul Helmke, The Republican former mayor of Fort Wayne, Indiana, summed up the historical nature of the shift, telling Naftali Bendavid of the Wall Street Journal, that in a time of war and financial crisis, "people tend to focus on pragmatic issues rather than what the framers meant in 1789."
Throughout our history, major transformations or civic realignments have occurred at a time of intense national crisis that threatens the viability or even existence of the Republic. One such crisis occurred in the mid-19th century when the nation, led by Abraham Lincoln, overcame secession and a civil war to preserve the Union and end the moral blight of slavery. Another took place in the 1930s as America, spurred by Franklin D. Roosevelt, created the governmental institutions that allowed it to overcome the greatest economic downturn in its history and later to overcome the threats of fascism and communism.
The makeovers stemming from these crises change almost everything about U.S. government and politics -- voting alignments, public policy, and the rules by which politicians are expected to act and are judged by the American people. In the idealist periods before these civic realignments political figures more often than not act as moralists bent on the uncompromising advancement of ideological positions across virtually every policy concern--economic, international, and cultural -- and, more often than not, the public applauds and rewards this behavior. But, after civic realignments, faced with overwhelming and severely threatening crisis, the behavioral expectations and evaluative standards of politicians are altered. The public wants politicians to work across party and institutional lines on a non-ideological basis to produce pragmatic policies that deal with the crisis facing the nation. It's time for the House and Senate to follow the lead of President Obama and the American people and adopt new rules for a new era.
Unfortunately, many in Congress, including much of the leadership of both parties, still don't understand that the United States has entered a new civic political era, demanding new rules of behavior in response to our dire economic circumstances. Even as President Obama expresses the "fierce urgency of now," pointing out that if government does not act soon and vigorously it "will turn a crisis into a catastrophe," Congress still seems unable to put aside the ideological arguments and constant efforts to win partisan advantage that characterized American politics in the era the country has just left.
Congressional Republicans seem to believe that the economy can only be revitalized by tax cuts while Democrats say that only vast federal spending, some of it on the pet projects of Members, will produce economic recovery. As demonstrated by the recent House vote on final passage of the economic recovery bill, in which virtually all Democrats voted against all Republicans, working across party lines remains an elusive dream. Republican Members of Congress seem intent on following the strategy from their ideological battles with President Bill Clinton a decade ago in which the goal was to enforce party discipline in the hope that the President and his party would fail and Republicans could blame the Democrats in the next election. But with the stakes as high as they are now, the GOP should instead be listening to the author of that earlier strategy, Newt Gingrich, who has publicly made it clear that the country cannot afford for Obama’s economic recovery plan to fail.
Meanwhile, Democrats need to learn some new rules of behavior as well. While NDN's Globalization Initiative Chair Dr. Rob Shapiro has correctly noted that the recovery package now before the Senate contains only the "normal quotient of special interest subsidies on both the spending and tax sides -- think of it as a 'congressional tax,'" -- these clearly aren’t normal times. It may be true that, as Rob says, "they really can’t help themselves." But like others recovering from an addiction, Democrats will have to at least try to change their approach to building legislative consensus in this new era, one step at a time.
The American public clearly sees the distinction between Congress' approach and that of President Obama. A Pollster.com compendium of national surveys indicates that 70 percent of Americans have a favorable opinion of President Obama and 63 percent approve of his performance. By contrast, only 17 percent approve of the job Congress is doing, while 78 percent disapprove. More to the point, in a recent Rasmussen Reports survey, a plurality (42 percent) perceives Obama to be governing in a bipartisan manner. By contrast, only half that number believes the same of both congressional Democrats and Republicans (22 percent each).
Of course, there is a way out. Unlike the social issues that dominated American politics during much of the last four decades, the economic and fiscal issues that are the current focus can be bridged with a non-ideological, post-partisan, and pragmatic approach recognizing that each side may have something to offer. If properly targeted, the tax cuts advocated by Republicans should be useful. If aimed at the right mix of projects, the Democratic spending proposals should help the economy in the short run and provide the conditions for growth in the long run. Keeping people in their homes, as both parties seem to advocate, will help families, neighborhoods, and society.
In short, as Rob Shapiro points out the recovery package can be "a useful first step, and one for which NDN has long argued."
Unlike their legislative representatives, the public has moved on from the cultural wars of the last decade. In a late January Pew survey, more than eight in 10 named the economy (85 percent and jobs (82 percent) as top policy priorities for the federal government, significantly above the numbers saying this about any other issue. In a January Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll, only seven percent cited “social issues” as an area on which government should focus compared to 21 percent who cited such cultural issues a decade ago. Paul Helmke, The Republican former mayor of Fort Wayne, Indiana, summed up the historical nature of the shift, telling Naftali Bendavid of the Wall Street Journal, that in a time of war and financial crisis, "people tend to focus on pragmatic issues rather than what the framers meant in 1789."
Throughout our history, major transformations or civic realignments have occurred at a time of intense national crisis that threatens the viability or even existence of the Republic. One such crisis occurred in the mid-19th century when the nation, led by Abraham Lincoln, overcame secession and a civil war to preserve the Union and end the moral blight of slavery. Another took place in the 1930s as America, spurred by Franklin D. Roosevelt, created the governmental institutions that allowed it to overcome the greatest economic downturn in its history and later to overcome the threats of fascism and communism.
The makeovers stemming from these crises change almost everything about U.S. government and politics -- voting alignments, public policy, and the rules by which politicians are expected to act and are judged by the American people. In the idealist periods before these civic realignments political figures more often than not act as moralists bent on the uncompromising advancement of ideological positions across virtually every policy concern--economic, international, and cultural -- and, more often than not, the public applauds and rewards this behavior. But, after civic realignments, faced with overwhelming and severely threatening crisis, the behavioral expectations and evaluative standards of politicians are altered. The public wants politicians to work across party and institutional lines on a non-ideological basis to produce pragmatic policies that deal with the crisis facing the nation. It's time for the House and Senate to follow the lead of President Obama and the American people and adopt new rules for a new era.
Wednesday, January 28, 2009
new rules for a new era
One week after the inauguration of President Barack Obama, it is clear that his election and ascension to the presidency have moved America from one political era to another. Realignments like these occur about every four decades with the coming of age of a new, large, dynamic generation of young Americans whose political participation is enabled by a new communication technology. The most recent makeover stemmed from the emergence of the "civic" Millennial Generation (born between 1982 to 2003) and their use of social networks. Civic generations, like the Millennials and the GI Generation before it, are group-oriented, cooperative, and pragmatic. Their behavior stands in stark contrast to the individualistic and ideological Baby Boomers, who dominated American politics for the previous 40 years.
Makeovers or realignments change almost everything about U.S. politics -- election results, public policy, and presidential behavior. Apparently not everyone has noticed this change.
Perhaps the sharpest criticism of the Obama transition came from an unexpected quarter -- "progressive activists" and some of their congressional allies. These disappointed critics thought Obama’s cabinet and corps of advisors contained too many Clinton era pragmatists and too few minorities in high positions. Author and New York Times Magazine writer Matt Bai captured the obsolete nature of their complaint perfectly:
"That sound you hear is the last wheezing gasp of boomer-age politics, the cataloging of individuals according to their areas of oppression the endless process of tallying cultural differences rather than aggregating common objectives. It is a political philosophy that probably made sense 30 years ago but that seems sort of baffling at the dawn of the Obama era."
Bai compared those who criticized Obama to liberals of the early 1960s, such as Norman Mailer, who expected John F. Kennedy, as America's first Catholic president, to act like a political "outsider." But even though he is America's first African-American president, Barack Obama is no more an outsider than was JFK. Just like Kennedy, Obama's transition decisions were thoroughly consistent with the civic era we have now entered. And Obama’s behavior during the transition provides clear indicators of how the President will govern and the nation will respond in this civic Millennial era.
Here are just a few of the things to expect:
* Limited or no use of ideological labels. Unlike his predecessor who consistently described himself as a "compassionate conservative" or Democrats who spent much of the past four decades seeking a label for themselves that would replace the discredited "liberal," Barack Obama never labels himself ideologically or even uses terms such as conservative, moderate, or liberal. As the President said in his Inaugural Address, "On this day, we come to proclaim an end to the petty grievances and false promises, the recriminations and worn out dogmas, that for far too long have strangled our politics."
* Avoiding moral absolutes as the primary standard by which to structure and evaluate policy. In his farewell address to the nation, George W. Bush said, "America must maintain our moral clarity. I have often spoken to you about good and evil . . .. Good and evil are present in this world, and between the two there can be no compromise." In fairness, Bush was referring to global terrorism in his remarks, but the moralistic tone that characterizes idealist eras typified the approach of his Administration in almost all policy areas, especially social issues. President Obama signaled a far different and more pragmatic tone in his inaugural address "What the cynics fail to understand is that the ground has shifted beneath them - that the stale political arguments that have consumed us for so long no longer apply. The question we ask today is not whether our government is too big or too small, but whether it works."
* Working across partisan and institutional lines to get things done in the common interest. Obama’s successful campaign put an end to Karl Rove’s "play to the base" strategy that Democrats also attempted at great cost in many of their recent presidential campaigns. Unlike candidates in the idealist era that just ended, Obama ran a truly national campaign and competed in formerly rock-ribbed Republican states. He was rewarded with victories in nine 2004 red states. The same approach continued during the transition with Obama actively courting die-hard Republican Senators like Oklahoma's Tom Coburn over the release of the second half of the TARP funds and the thought leadership of the conservative movement over dinner at George Will’s house the Thursday night before the inaugural. The end result was bipartisan support for Obama's first legislative initiative with six Republicans, some very conservative, voting with Obama, offsetting the eight Democrats, some very liberal, who voted against the President-elect. It was an outcome reminiscent of the bipartisan votes of the 1950s and something that will continue to occur in this civic era.
* The end of identity politics. Even as Obama appointed the most demographically diverse Cabinet and set of personal advisors of any American President, the Obama team avoided the identity politics trap into which Boomer President Clinton had often fallen. Any mention of ethnicity or lifestyle differences was made from the perspective of unity and what all Americans have in common. As Obama said in his inaugural address: "We know that our patchwork heritage is a strength, not a weakness . . . We are shaped by every language and culture drawn from every end of this Earth…we cannot help but believe that the old hatreds shall someday pass; that the lines of tribe shall soon dissolve; that as the world grows smaller, our common humanity shall reveal itself."
* A new emphasis on personal and societal responsibility, service, and sacrifice. The ideas that individuals have the responsibility to behave properly to serve their community and nation and to sacrifice for the common good are all key civic era values. President Obama emphasized these values at many points during the transition, personally demonstrating his commitment to making Martin Luther King, Jr., Day a National Day of Service when he and his wife, Michelle, participated in DC area community renovation activities on the day before his inauguration. He returned to these themes throughout his inaugural address: "What is required of us now is a new era of responsibility--a recognition, on the part of every American, that we have duties to ourselves, our nation, and the world, duties that we do not grudgingly accept but rather seize gladly, firm in the knowledge that there is nothing so satisfying to the spirit, so defining of our character, than giving our all to a difficult task. This is the price and the promise of citizenship."
Last November marked the electoral realignment of the United States from an idealist to a civic era. It changed voting patterns and party coalitions for at least the next four decades. But that was only the beginning of the change that has come to America. With the inauguration of Barack Obama as the first president of the new civic era, the rules that guide the behavior of our leaders and eventually all Americans have changed as completely and substantially as have our politics. The nation is fortunate to have as its new leader a President prepared to teach by example how to live by these new rules for a new era.
Makeovers or realignments change almost everything about U.S. politics -- election results, public policy, and presidential behavior. Apparently not everyone has noticed this change.
Perhaps the sharpest criticism of the Obama transition came from an unexpected quarter -- "progressive activists" and some of their congressional allies. These disappointed critics thought Obama’s cabinet and corps of advisors contained too many Clinton era pragmatists and too few minorities in high positions. Author and New York Times Magazine writer Matt Bai captured the obsolete nature of their complaint perfectly:
"That sound you hear is the last wheezing gasp of boomer-age politics, the cataloging of individuals according to their areas of oppression the endless process of tallying cultural differences rather than aggregating common objectives. It is a political philosophy that probably made sense 30 years ago but that seems sort of baffling at the dawn of the Obama era."
Bai compared those who criticized Obama to liberals of the early 1960s, such as Norman Mailer, who expected John F. Kennedy, as America's first Catholic president, to act like a political "outsider." But even though he is America's first African-American president, Barack Obama is no more an outsider than was JFK. Just like Kennedy, Obama's transition decisions were thoroughly consistent with the civic era we have now entered. And Obama’s behavior during the transition provides clear indicators of how the President will govern and the nation will respond in this civic Millennial era.
Here are just a few of the things to expect:
* Limited or no use of ideological labels. Unlike his predecessor who consistently described himself as a "compassionate conservative" or Democrats who spent much of the past four decades seeking a label for themselves that would replace the discredited "liberal," Barack Obama never labels himself ideologically or even uses terms such as conservative, moderate, or liberal. As the President said in his Inaugural Address, "On this day, we come to proclaim an end to the petty grievances and false promises, the recriminations and worn out dogmas, that for far too long have strangled our politics."
* Avoiding moral absolutes as the primary standard by which to structure and evaluate policy. In his farewell address to the nation, George W. Bush said, "America must maintain our moral clarity. I have often spoken to you about good and evil . . .. Good and evil are present in this world, and between the two there can be no compromise." In fairness, Bush was referring to global terrorism in his remarks, but the moralistic tone that characterizes idealist eras typified the approach of his Administration in almost all policy areas, especially social issues. President Obama signaled a far different and more pragmatic tone in his inaugural address "What the cynics fail to understand is that the ground has shifted beneath them - that the stale political arguments that have consumed us for so long no longer apply. The question we ask today is not whether our government is too big or too small, but whether it works."
* Working across partisan and institutional lines to get things done in the common interest. Obama’s successful campaign put an end to Karl Rove’s "play to the base" strategy that Democrats also attempted at great cost in many of their recent presidential campaigns. Unlike candidates in the idealist era that just ended, Obama ran a truly national campaign and competed in formerly rock-ribbed Republican states. He was rewarded with victories in nine 2004 red states. The same approach continued during the transition with Obama actively courting die-hard Republican Senators like Oklahoma's Tom Coburn over the release of the second half of the TARP funds and the thought leadership of the conservative movement over dinner at George Will’s house the Thursday night before the inaugural. The end result was bipartisan support for Obama's first legislative initiative with six Republicans, some very conservative, voting with Obama, offsetting the eight Democrats, some very liberal, who voted against the President-elect. It was an outcome reminiscent of the bipartisan votes of the 1950s and something that will continue to occur in this civic era.
* The end of identity politics. Even as Obama appointed the most demographically diverse Cabinet and set of personal advisors of any American President, the Obama team avoided the identity politics trap into which Boomer President Clinton had often fallen. Any mention of ethnicity or lifestyle differences was made from the perspective of unity and what all Americans have in common. As Obama said in his inaugural address: "We know that our patchwork heritage is a strength, not a weakness . . . We are shaped by every language and culture drawn from every end of this Earth…we cannot help but believe that the old hatreds shall someday pass; that the lines of tribe shall soon dissolve; that as the world grows smaller, our common humanity shall reveal itself."
* A new emphasis on personal and societal responsibility, service, and sacrifice. The ideas that individuals have the responsibility to behave properly to serve their community and nation and to sacrifice for the common good are all key civic era values. President Obama emphasized these values at many points during the transition, personally demonstrating his commitment to making Martin Luther King, Jr., Day a National Day of Service when he and his wife, Michelle, participated in DC area community renovation activities on the day before his inauguration. He returned to these themes throughout his inaugural address: "What is required of us now is a new era of responsibility--a recognition, on the part of every American, that we have duties to ourselves, our nation, and the world, duties that we do not grudgingly accept but rather seize gladly, firm in the knowledge that there is nothing so satisfying to the spirit, so defining of our character, than giving our all to a difficult task. This is the price and the promise of citizenship."
Last November marked the electoral realignment of the United States from an idealist to a civic era. It changed voting patterns and party coalitions for at least the next four decades. But that was only the beginning of the change that has come to America. With the inauguration of Barack Obama as the first president of the new civic era, the rules that guide the behavior of our leaders and eventually all Americans have changed as completely and substantially as have our politics. The nation is fortunate to have as its new leader a President prepared to teach by example how to live by these new rules for a new era.
Wednesday, January 14, 2009
Mr. President: Bring us Together
The election of Barack Obama signaled the beginning of a "civic" realignment, produced by the political emergence of America's most recent civic generation, Millennials (born 1982-2003). Civic generations, like the Millennials, react against the efforts of divided idealist generations, like the Baby Boomers (born 1946-1964) to advance their own moral causes. Civic generations instead are unified and focused on reenergizing social, political, and governmental institutions and using those institutions to confront and solve pressing national issues left unattended and unresolved during the previous idealist era. The goal of a transition during such realignments has to be to lessen the ideological splits that have divided America during the preceding idealist era and take steps to unify the country so that the new Administration can more effectively deal with the major issues it faces.
Reducing ideological divisions and unifying Americans to achieve important common goals has been a focus of Barack Obama since even before he announced his presidency. It is one of the key reasons his campaign had strong appeal to the emerging civic Millennial Generation, which he carried by a margin of more than 2:1. When CBS’s Steve Croft asked the then-candidate in a pre-election interview what qualified him, a junior senator with limited governmental experience, to be president of the United States, Obama led off his reply by citing his desire and ability to bridge differences and bring people together.
Through Your Actions
One way a civic era president-elect can demonstrate the importance he places on the need for national unity is to name members of the opposition party to his cabinet. The actions of Abraham Lincoln and Franklin D. Roosevelt, the only two other Presidents to preside over transitions to civic eras, demonstrate how this game should be played.
For all the media commentary on Lincoln's first cabinet, deemed a "Team of Rivals" by Doris Kearns Goodwin, it should be noted that it contained no one from the discredited Democratic Party, even though it did have representatives that spanned the breadth of opinion within the relatively new GOP. However, Lincoln did add a Democrat, Secretary of War, Edwin M. Stanton, to his cabinet less than a year after taking office. Stanton, a strongly pro-Union Northern Democrat, had opposed Lincoln's election and had served as Attorney General in the final months of the Buchanan administration. However, Lincoln’s selection of pro-Union Democrat, Andrew Johnson, as his vice-presidential running mate in his 1864 re-election campaign demonstrates that it’s sometimes possible to take even a good idea too far. FDR appointed two Republicans to his initial cabinet–industrialist William H. Woodin, who as Treasury Secretary helped FDR implement his economic and fiscal program at the outset of the New Deal, and Harold L. Ickes, who served as Interior Secretary throughout the entirety of the Roosevelt administration. Both Woodin and Ickes were progressives who had supported FDR in the 1932 election. While neither was a member of the Republican Old Guard, together they demonstrated Roosevelt's willingness to reach beyond his own party to enlist what today would be called "moderate Republicans" in a unified effort to overcome major national problems.
Reflecting America's changing demographics and social mores, Barack Obama has chosen the most diverse cabinet and set of top advisors of any president in U.S. history. Two members of Obama's larger number of appointees -- Robert Gates and Ray Lahood -- are not Democrats, the same number for which FDR found room. This represents a greater number of members of the a different or opposing party than were present in the Cabinets of any of Obama’s idealist era predecessors.
President-elect Obama’s attempt to include a wide range of political opinion and backgrounds in his Cabinet and White House team has generated criticism from the most ideological members of his party, just as FDR and Lincoln faced such criticism from the extreme partisans of their day. Obama's appointment of many "centrist" cabinet-level officers who previously served in Congress, the Clinton Administration, or as governors suggests to his critics that he is abandoning his pledge to bring about significant change in economic, foreign, and social policy. But as political scientist Ross Baker points out, "In uncertain times, Americans find it much more comforting that the people who are going to be advising the president are steeped in experience. A Cabinet of outsiders would have been very disquieting." And civic realignments like the present one have come at the most uncertain and stressful times in America's history.
Through Your Words
Lincoln and FDR are also renowned for their ability to use their words to rally Americans to a common cause. Both did so at the very outset of their terms. Both of these great civic presidents’ first inaugural addresses addressed the fears of a nation in crisis with rhetoric that has continued to ring through the ages.
Lincoln, in another last-ditch effort to forestall secession, told the South that neither he nor the Republican Party would make any attempt to undo slavery in states where it already existed. But he also reminded the South that, while only its actions could ultimately provoke civil war, his "solemn oath to preserve, protect, and defend" the Constitution would require him to prosecute that war if it came.
Lincoln concluded his address with an appeal to the secessionists to rejoin the Union:
Roosevelt used his inaugural speech to rally the country to the task ahead by telling it, "the only thing we have to fear is fear itself." He reminded his listeners that at previous dark moments in our national history vigorous leadership joined with a supportive public to win ultimate victory in the nation's trials. Perhaps most important, FDR gave clear recognition that the United States and its people had moved from what we have called an "idealist" era of unrestrained individualism to a "civic" era of unity and common purpose:
Even before President-elect Obama had a chance to utter similarly comforting and inspiring rhetoric, his inaugural plans came under fire for inviting Pastor Rick Warren, a fundamentalist minister and activist in the passage of California's Proposition 8 outlawing gay marriage, to give the invocation at his inauguration. But the selection of Warren should not have been surprising to careful observers. In his acceptance speech at the Democratic National Convention, Obama signaled his desire to find common ground on divisive social issues such as abortion, gay marriage, and gun control.
By bookending his inaugural with a benediction from Joseph Lowrey, a minister who favors legalizing gay marriage among other liberal causes, Obama has signaled his determination to put an end to the debates over social issues from an idealist era that is ending and enlist all those willing to join his cause to rebuild America’s civic institutions.
For in the end, it is the American people that Barack Obama must rally to his side. It is they who will ultimately decide the effectiveness of his transition as a springboard to a civic era Administration. So far their judgment is overwhelmingly positive. A late December 2008 CNN national survey describes "a love affair between Barack Obama and the American people." That survey indicated that more than eight in 10 Americans (82%) approved of the way Obama was handling his transition, a figure that was up by three percentage points since the beginning of the month. Obama's approval is well above that of either Bill Clinton (67%) or George W. Bush (65%) at that point in their transitions.
More specifically, the poll suggests that the public approves of Obama's Cabinet nominees, with 56 percent saying his appointments have been outstanding or above average. That number is 18 percentage points higher than that given to Bush's appointments and 26 points above that of Clinton's nominees. To quote CNN polling director Keating Holland: "Barack Obama is having a better honeymoon with the American public than any incoming president in the past three decades. He's putting up better numbers, usually by double digits, than Bill Clinton, Ronald Reagan, or either George Bush on every item traditionally measured in transition polls."
Of course, the final judgment of the Obama presidency by the American people and history will be based on his performance in office starting on January 20. Still, these polling results clearly suggest that Barack Obama has internalized and put into operation the historical transition lessons provided by Abraham Lincoln and Franklin D. Roosevelt, the presidents who led America's two previous civic realignments. If his inaugural address comes close to matching their first inaugural speeches, President-elect Obama will begin one of the most important administrations in the nation’s history with an enormous reservoir of political and public support that will serve him well in the crucial early days of his Administration.
Reducing ideological divisions and unifying Americans to achieve important common goals has been a focus of Barack Obama since even before he announced his presidency. It is one of the key reasons his campaign had strong appeal to the emerging civic Millennial Generation, which he carried by a margin of more than 2:1. When CBS’s Steve Croft asked the then-candidate in a pre-election interview what qualified him, a junior senator with limited governmental experience, to be president of the United States, Obama led off his reply by citing his desire and ability to bridge differences and bring people together.
Through Your Actions
One way a civic era president-elect can demonstrate the importance he places on the need for national unity is to name members of the opposition party to his cabinet. The actions of Abraham Lincoln and Franklin D. Roosevelt, the only two other Presidents to preside over transitions to civic eras, demonstrate how this game should be played.
For all the media commentary on Lincoln's first cabinet, deemed a "Team of Rivals" by Doris Kearns Goodwin, it should be noted that it contained no one from the discredited Democratic Party, even though it did have representatives that spanned the breadth of opinion within the relatively new GOP. However, Lincoln did add a Democrat, Secretary of War, Edwin M. Stanton, to his cabinet less than a year after taking office. Stanton, a strongly pro-Union Northern Democrat, had opposed Lincoln's election and had served as Attorney General in the final months of the Buchanan administration. However, Lincoln’s selection of pro-Union Democrat, Andrew Johnson, as his vice-presidential running mate in his 1864 re-election campaign demonstrates that it’s sometimes possible to take even a good idea too far. FDR appointed two Republicans to his initial cabinet–industrialist William H. Woodin, who as Treasury Secretary helped FDR implement his economic and fiscal program at the outset of the New Deal, and Harold L. Ickes, who served as Interior Secretary throughout the entirety of the Roosevelt administration. Both Woodin and Ickes were progressives who had supported FDR in the 1932 election. While neither was a member of the Republican Old Guard, together they demonstrated Roosevelt's willingness to reach beyond his own party to enlist what today would be called "moderate Republicans" in a unified effort to overcome major national problems.
Reflecting America's changing demographics and social mores, Barack Obama has chosen the most diverse cabinet and set of top advisors of any president in U.S. history. Two members of Obama's larger number of appointees -- Robert Gates and Ray Lahood -- are not Democrats, the same number for which FDR found room. This represents a greater number of members of the a different or opposing party than were present in the Cabinets of any of Obama’s idealist era predecessors.
President-elect Obama’s attempt to include a wide range of political opinion and backgrounds in his Cabinet and White House team has generated criticism from the most ideological members of his party, just as FDR and Lincoln faced such criticism from the extreme partisans of their day. Obama's appointment of many "centrist" cabinet-level officers who previously served in Congress, the Clinton Administration, or as governors suggests to his critics that he is abandoning his pledge to bring about significant change in economic, foreign, and social policy. But as political scientist Ross Baker points out, "In uncertain times, Americans find it much more comforting that the people who are going to be advising the president are steeped in experience. A Cabinet of outsiders would have been very disquieting." And civic realignments like the present one have come at the most uncertain and stressful times in America's history.
Through Your Words
Lincoln and FDR are also renowned for their ability to use their words to rally Americans to a common cause. Both did so at the very outset of their terms. Both of these great civic presidents’ first inaugural addresses addressed the fears of a nation in crisis with rhetoric that has continued to ring through the ages.
Lincoln, in another last-ditch effort to forestall secession, told the South that neither he nor the Republican Party would make any attempt to undo slavery in states where it already existed. But he also reminded the South that, while only its actions could ultimately provoke civil war, his "solemn oath to preserve, protect, and defend" the Constitution would require him to prosecute that war if it came.
Lincoln concluded his address with an appeal to the secessionists to rejoin the Union:
We are not enemies, but friends…Though passion may have strained, it must not break, our bonds of affection. The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature.
Roosevelt used his inaugural speech to rally the country to the task ahead by telling it, "the only thing we have to fear is fear itself." He reminded his listeners that at previous dark moments in our national history vigorous leadership joined with a supportive public to win ultimate victory in the nation's trials. Perhaps most important, FDR gave clear recognition that the United States and its people had moved from what we have called an "idealist" era of unrestrained individualism to a "civic" era of unity and common purpose:
If I read the temper of our people correctly, we now realize as we have never realized before our interdependence on each other; that we can not merely take but we must give as well; that if we are to go forward, we must move as a trained and loyal army willing to sacrifice for the good of a common discipline, because without such discipline no progress is made, no leadership becomes effective.
Even before President-elect Obama had a chance to utter similarly comforting and inspiring rhetoric, his inaugural plans came under fire for inviting Pastor Rick Warren, a fundamentalist minister and activist in the passage of California's Proposition 8 outlawing gay marriage, to give the invocation at his inauguration. But the selection of Warren should not have been surprising to careful observers. In his acceptance speech at the Democratic National Convention, Obama signaled his desire to find common ground on divisive social issues such as abortion, gay marriage, and gun control.
By bookending his inaugural with a benediction from Joseph Lowrey, a minister who favors legalizing gay marriage among other liberal causes, Obama has signaled his determination to put an end to the debates over social issues from an idealist era that is ending and enlist all those willing to join his cause to rebuild America’s civic institutions.
For in the end, it is the American people that Barack Obama must rally to his side. It is they who will ultimately decide the effectiveness of his transition as a springboard to a civic era Administration. So far their judgment is overwhelmingly positive. A late December 2008 CNN national survey describes "a love affair between Barack Obama and the American people." That survey indicated that more than eight in 10 Americans (82%) approved of the way Obama was handling his transition, a figure that was up by three percentage points since the beginning of the month. Obama's approval is well above that of either Bill Clinton (67%) or George W. Bush (65%) at that point in their transitions.
More specifically, the poll suggests that the public approves of Obama's Cabinet nominees, with 56 percent saying his appointments have been outstanding or above average. That number is 18 percentage points higher than that given to Bush's appointments and 26 points above that of Clinton's nominees. To quote CNN polling director Keating Holland: "Barack Obama is having a better honeymoon with the American public than any incoming president in the past three decades. He's putting up better numbers, usually by double digits, than Bill Clinton, Ronald Reagan, or either George Bush on every item traditionally measured in transition polls."
Of course, the final judgment of the Obama presidency by the American people and history will be based on his performance in office starting on January 20. Still, these polling results clearly suggest that Barack Obama has internalized and put into operation the historical transition lessons provided by Abraham Lincoln and Franklin D. Roosevelt, the presidents who led America's two previous civic realignments. If his inaugural address comes close to matching their first inaugural speeches, President-elect Obama will begin one of the most important administrations in the nation’s history with an enormous reservoir of political and public support that will serve him well in the crucial early days of his Administration.
Sunday, January 11, 2009
National Service Day: Have You Signed Up?
The selection of former Secretary of State Colin Powell to announce the Obama Administration's national service initiative, "Renew America Together" is much more than a smart political move. It’s a perfect down payment on the promises Obama made to his most ardent supporters, the Millennial Generation (born 1982-2003).
The support of young voters was decisive in Obama's narrow nomination victory over Hillary Clinton and their 2:1 margin for him over John McCain accounted for 80 percent of his nearly nine million national popular vote lead last November. By giving Powell this important and visible role, Obama simultaneously burnishes his bipartisan credentials and demonstrates his understanding that the United States has moved to a new era dominated by the outlook of a new generation determined to make America a stronger and more unified country.
Millennials are of an archetype labeled "civic" by the seminal generational theorists William Strauss and Neil Howe. Like all other civic generations throughout American history, Millennials are defined by their strong desire to advance the welfare of the entire group and, by extension, all of society. The willingness of Millennials to help make things better was reflected in their enthusiastic reaction to Obama’s call during the campaign for a program aimed at young people that would help them pay for college in exchange for two years of public service, either in the military or one of the federal civilian service organizations. While the financial concerns of a generation heavily burdened by educational debt may have partially accounted for the loud applause this idea always generated, there is far more to it than self-interest.
A 2004 Harvard University Institute of Politics survey indicated that 85 percent of college-age Millennials considers public service an effective way to solve problems facing the country. A virtually unanimous 94 percent say that volunteer activity is effective in dealing with challenges in their local community.
Millennials have already clearly demonstrated their strong willingness to put these attitudes into action by participating in service programs in large numbers. In 2004, 80 percent of high school students, all of whom were Millennials, participated in community service activities. This contrasts with only 27 percent of high school students, all whom were members of the much more individualistic Generation X, that did so in 1984. Stemming from the virtually total public service participation of Millennials, by 2006 more than a quarter of those who volunteered for one of the federal government's National Service organizations (26 percent) were 16-24 year olds. That was twice the contribution of young people in 1989, when all of those in the 16-24 year old cohort were Gen-Xers.
But this won't be the first time that a civic generation has rallied to the service of America. And, it won't be the first time that a grateful country has rewarded this service. After the GI Generation great-grandparents of today's Millennials helped to defeat the Axis in World War II, the Servicemen's Readjustment Act, better known as the GI Bill of Rights, sent millions of returning veterans to college. This was not only a just reward for a job well done; it was also excellent public policy. By exponentially increasing the number of American college graduates and the size of the country's middle class, it paved the way for the long period of post-war growth that made the last half of the 20th century the American Century. If history is any guide, the Millennial Generation will follow in the footsteps of the GI Generation and through its dedication to public service will leave America an even stronger country than the one they inherited.
The support of young voters was decisive in Obama's narrow nomination victory over Hillary Clinton and their 2:1 margin for him over John McCain accounted for 80 percent of his nearly nine million national popular vote lead last November. By giving Powell this important and visible role, Obama simultaneously burnishes his bipartisan credentials and demonstrates his understanding that the United States has moved to a new era dominated by the outlook of a new generation determined to make America a stronger and more unified country.
Millennials are of an archetype labeled "civic" by the seminal generational theorists William Strauss and Neil Howe. Like all other civic generations throughout American history, Millennials are defined by their strong desire to advance the welfare of the entire group and, by extension, all of society. The willingness of Millennials to help make things better was reflected in their enthusiastic reaction to Obama’s call during the campaign for a program aimed at young people that would help them pay for college in exchange for two years of public service, either in the military or one of the federal civilian service organizations. While the financial concerns of a generation heavily burdened by educational debt may have partially accounted for the loud applause this idea always generated, there is far more to it than self-interest.
A 2004 Harvard University Institute of Politics survey indicated that 85 percent of college-age Millennials considers public service an effective way to solve problems facing the country. A virtually unanimous 94 percent say that volunteer activity is effective in dealing with challenges in their local community.
Millennials have already clearly demonstrated their strong willingness to put these attitudes into action by participating in service programs in large numbers. In 2004, 80 percent of high school students, all of whom were Millennials, participated in community service activities. This contrasts with only 27 percent of high school students, all whom were members of the much more individualistic Generation X, that did so in 1984. Stemming from the virtually total public service participation of Millennials, by 2006 more than a quarter of those who volunteered for one of the federal government's National Service organizations (26 percent) were 16-24 year olds. That was twice the contribution of young people in 1989, when all of those in the 16-24 year old cohort were Gen-Xers.
But this won't be the first time that a civic generation has rallied to the service of America. And, it won't be the first time that a grateful country has rewarded this service. After the GI Generation great-grandparents of today's Millennials helped to defeat the Axis in World War II, the Servicemen's Readjustment Act, better known as the GI Bill of Rights, sent millions of returning veterans to college. This was not only a just reward for a job well done; it was also excellent public policy. By exponentially increasing the number of American college graduates and the size of the country's middle class, it paved the way for the long period of post-war growth that made the last half of the 20th century the American Century. If history is any guide, the Millennial Generation will follow in the footsteps of the GI Generation and through its dedication to public service will leave America an even stronger country than the one they inherited.
Tuesday, January 6, 2009
Obama transition hits historical home run
Almost before the echoes of Barack Obama's Grant Park victory speech had died away pundits and the blogosphere began to keep score about the effectiveness of his transition. In a way, a presidential transition is like a political spring training that gives the incoming manager and his team a chance to prepare and set the tone for what amounts to a four-year long regular season. Every transition presents opportunities for an incoming administration to put together a game plan to deliver hardball policy ideas to give the new team an early lead in the beginning of the regular season. One danger the new team faces during the transitional preseason is being suckered by the other side into playing for keeps before opening day. With President Elect Obama’s Cabinet and White House policy team now in place, and the maneuvering over various economic bailout options mostly behind us, it’s time for some preseason analysis of the management decisions the Obama team has made.
This upcoming season is a particularly important one to get ready for because the new president is taking office during a political realignment. Realignments are rare events in U.S. politics, occurring only about once every four decades; the 2008 realignment is only the sixth in American electoral history. During and after a realignment, the old political truths–and the standards for judging presidential transitions–that appeared axiomatic during the preceding era no longer apply and the President-elect has to manage the process with an acute sensitivity to what the times demand.
As we indicated in our book, Millennial Makeover: MySpace, You Tube and the Future of American Politics, all political realignments are produced by the coming of age of a large, dynamic generation and the emergence of a new communication technology that effectively mobilizes the rising generation. All realignments give American politics an extreme makeover. However, because they are caused by different types of generations, either "idealist" or "civic," not all realignments are the same. Consequently, the standards for judging the success or failure of a presidential transition vary from one type of realignment to another.
Idealist generations, like the Baby Boomers (born 1946-1964), whose coming-of-age produced a realignment centered on Richard Nixon’s “law and order” campaign of 1968, try to impose their own personal morality on the country through the political process. Political debate in eras dominated by idealist generations often tends to focus on social or moral issues, not economic or foreign policy concerns. Because idealist generations are highly divided, ideological, and uncompromising, during these types of realignments, the most successful transitions are those that advance the ideological goals of the new President and his winning team.
The current realignment however, is a "civic" realignment, produced by the political emergence of America's newest civic generation, Millennials (born 1982-2003). Civic generations react against the efforts of divided idealist generations to advance their own moral causes. They expect their team to unify the country, focus on reenergizing political and governmental institutions and using those institutions to confront and solve pressing national issues left unattended and unresolved during the previous idealist era. The transition efforts of President-elect Obama should be measured against this set of expectations, not those of an idealist era like the one just ended.
Honest Abe's and FDR's Transition Lessons for Barack Obama
Previous civic realignments occurred in 1860 with the election of Abraham Lincoln and in 1932, when the Millennials' civic generation great grandparents, the GI Generation, put Franklin Roosevelt in the White House. It's no coincidence that these civic presidents, along with George Washington, top all lists of our greatest presidents. All three led the United States in resolving deep crises by inspiring and guiding new civic generations and creating, revitalizing, and expanding the country's civic institutions. It is this high historical standard that will set the bar for history’s evaluation of Obama’s presidency, making his preparation for the new season all the more challenging.
An incoming president during a civic realignment must avoid exacerbating the national crisis that he will soon inherit but also avoid being tied to the failed policies of the outgoing administration. So far, President-elect Obama has been able to maneuver through this political thicket as deftly as Lincoln and FDR did after their own realigning elections.
Southern states began seceding from the Union within days of Lincoln's election. Lincoln attempted to reassure the South that he would do nothing to tamper with slavery in states where it already existed, but he could not keep secessionist states in the Union without acceding to their demands to permit slavery in new territories. That would have required him to reject his own principles and those of his Republican Party, something he was unable and unwilling to do.
The outgoing Democratic President, James Buchanan, argued that secession was unconstitutional, but also that he had no power to prevent it. Consequently, he did virtually nothing when the seceding states took control of federal institutions throughout the South and blockaded Fort Sumter in Charleston harbor. Lincoln waited until South Carolina actually fired on Fort Sumter before he announced his intention to use military force to relieve the federal garrison there. Not being precipitous or overly anxious made it easier for Lincoln to prepare for, rally, and lead the country in the war that followed.
The transition between the administrations of Herbert Hoover and Franklin D. Roosevelt was far more strained. In contrast to Buchanan, Hoover made a number of post-election attempts to persuade or, in the view of pro-FDR historians, entrap Roosevelt into endorsing Hoover's monetary and fiscal policies. Hoover presented to FDR an offer to share power in the public interest, but what he really wanted Roosevelt to do was commit to killing the New Deal before it even started. In letters to conservative Republican senators Hoover said that if the president-elect agreed to what Hoover wanted "he will have ratified the whole major program of the Republican administration; that is it means the abandonment of 90 percent of the so-called new deal." More specifically, Hoover wanted his successor to renounce, among other things, aid to homeowners unable to pay their mortgages, public works projects, and plans for the Tennessee Valley Authority. FDR studiously avoided making any policy commitments or even responding to the outgoing president's efforts to contact him, going so far as to claim that a secretary had misplaced a letter to him from Hoover. FDR's ability to preserve his political independence and policy flexibility made the historically high-scoring first hundred days of his presidency possible.
Obama is a good student of history
Both the Bush administration and the Obama team seem to be well aware of the rocky Hoover-Roosevelt transition during which an already bad economy worsened. Both Obama and Bush wanted to avoid open conflict and strained to be, or at least appear, cooperative on issues such as the auto company bailout and the use of TARP funds to stabilize the nation’s financial system. This approach fits the promise of Barack Obama to avoid excessive partisan confrontation. It fits the desire of the Bush administration to shape a historical record as positive as possible.
It is also clear, however, that Obama is attempting to follow in FDR’s footsteps by seeking to avoid collaborative policy making or commitments to continue any Bush administration policies. For example, Obama’s economic team has resisted overtures from the Bush administration to coordinate more fully on a financial sector rescue package or endorse the release of the second tranche of TARP funds. Instead the Obama team has kept its focus on the next political season by pushing Congress to quickly pass an Obama-designed stimulus program even before January 20, 2009.
From the beginning of the transition, Obama and his team have repeated the mantra that the United States has "only one president at a time,” a nice way to say, “wait until spring training is over and the regular season starts before we start playing for real." Based upon the professionalism and historical sensitivity he has demonstrated during the transition, his team should be not only a pennant contender, but also one capable of winning the World Series of a civic realignment.
Morley Winograd and Michael D. Hais are fellows of NDN and the New Policy Institute and co-authors of Millennial Makeover: MySpace, YouTube, and the Future of American Politics (Rutgers University Press: 2008), named one of the 10 favorite books by the New York Times in 2008.
This upcoming season is a particularly important one to get ready for because the new president is taking office during a political realignment. Realignments are rare events in U.S. politics, occurring only about once every four decades; the 2008 realignment is only the sixth in American electoral history. During and after a realignment, the old political truths–and the standards for judging presidential transitions–that appeared axiomatic during the preceding era no longer apply and the President-elect has to manage the process with an acute sensitivity to what the times demand.
As we indicated in our book, Millennial Makeover: MySpace, You Tube and the Future of American Politics, all political realignments are produced by the coming of age of a large, dynamic generation and the emergence of a new communication technology that effectively mobilizes the rising generation. All realignments give American politics an extreme makeover. However, because they are caused by different types of generations, either "idealist" or "civic," not all realignments are the same. Consequently, the standards for judging the success or failure of a presidential transition vary from one type of realignment to another.
Idealist generations, like the Baby Boomers (born 1946-1964), whose coming-of-age produced a realignment centered on Richard Nixon’s “law and order” campaign of 1968, try to impose their own personal morality on the country through the political process. Political debate in eras dominated by idealist generations often tends to focus on social or moral issues, not economic or foreign policy concerns. Because idealist generations are highly divided, ideological, and uncompromising, during these types of realignments, the most successful transitions are those that advance the ideological goals of the new President and his winning team.
The current realignment however, is a "civic" realignment, produced by the political emergence of America's newest civic generation, Millennials (born 1982-2003). Civic generations react against the efforts of divided idealist generations to advance their own moral causes. They expect their team to unify the country, focus on reenergizing political and governmental institutions and using those institutions to confront and solve pressing national issues left unattended and unresolved during the previous idealist era. The transition efforts of President-elect Obama should be measured against this set of expectations, not those of an idealist era like the one just ended.
Honest Abe's and FDR's Transition Lessons for Barack Obama
Previous civic realignments occurred in 1860 with the election of Abraham Lincoln and in 1932, when the Millennials' civic generation great grandparents, the GI Generation, put Franklin Roosevelt in the White House. It's no coincidence that these civic presidents, along with George Washington, top all lists of our greatest presidents. All three led the United States in resolving deep crises by inspiring and guiding new civic generations and creating, revitalizing, and expanding the country's civic institutions. It is this high historical standard that will set the bar for history’s evaluation of Obama’s presidency, making his preparation for the new season all the more challenging.
An incoming president during a civic realignment must avoid exacerbating the national crisis that he will soon inherit but also avoid being tied to the failed policies of the outgoing administration. So far, President-elect Obama has been able to maneuver through this political thicket as deftly as Lincoln and FDR did after their own realigning elections.
Southern states began seceding from the Union within days of Lincoln's election. Lincoln attempted to reassure the South that he would do nothing to tamper with slavery in states where it already existed, but he could not keep secessionist states in the Union without acceding to their demands to permit slavery in new territories. That would have required him to reject his own principles and those of his Republican Party, something he was unable and unwilling to do.
The outgoing Democratic President, James Buchanan, argued that secession was unconstitutional, but also that he had no power to prevent it. Consequently, he did virtually nothing when the seceding states took control of federal institutions throughout the South and blockaded Fort Sumter in Charleston harbor. Lincoln waited until South Carolina actually fired on Fort Sumter before he announced his intention to use military force to relieve the federal garrison there. Not being precipitous or overly anxious made it easier for Lincoln to prepare for, rally, and lead the country in the war that followed.
The transition between the administrations of Herbert Hoover and Franklin D. Roosevelt was far more strained. In contrast to Buchanan, Hoover made a number of post-election attempts to persuade or, in the view of pro-FDR historians, entrap Roosevelt into endorsing Hoover's monetary and fiscal policies. Hoover presented to FDR an offer to share power in the public interest, but what he really wanted Roosevelt to do was commit to killing the New Deal before it even started. In letters to conservative Republican senators Hoover said that if the president-elect agreed to what Hoover wanted "he will have ratified the whole major program of the Republican administration; that is it means the abandonment of 90 percent of the so-called new deal." More specifically, Hoover wanted his successor to renounce, among other things, aid to homeowners unable to pay their mortgages, public works projects, and plans for the Tennessee Valley Authority. FDR studiously avoided making any policy commitments or even responding to the outgoing president's efforts to contact him, going so far as to claim that a secretary had misplaced a letter to him from Hoover. FDR's ability to preserve his political independence and policy flexibility made the historically high-scoring first hundred days of his presidency possible.
Obama is a good student of history
Both the Bush administration and the Obama team seem to be well aware of the rocky Hoover-Roosevelt transition during which an already bad economy worsened. Both Obama and Bush wanted to avoid open conflict and strained to be, or at least appear, cooperative on issues such as the auto company bailout and the use of TARP funds to stabilize the nation’s financial system. This approach fits the promise of Barack Obama to avoid excessive partisan confrontation. It fits the desire of the Bush administration to shape a historical record as positive as possible.
It is also clear, however, that Obama is attempting to follow in FDR’s footsteps by seeking to avoid collaborative policy making or commitments to continue any Bush administration policies. For example, Obama’s economic team has resisted overtures from the Bush administration to coordinate more fully on a financial sector rescue package or endorse the release of the second tranche of TARP funds. Instead the Obama team has kept its focus on the next political season by pushing Congress to quickly pass an Obama-designed stimulus program even before January 20, 2009.
From the beginning of the transition, Obama and his team have repeated the mantra that the United States has "only one president at a time,” a nice way to say, “wait until spring training is over and the regular season starts before we start playing for real." Based upon the professionalism and historical sensitivity he has demonstrated during the transition, his team should be not only a pennant contender, but also one capable of winning the World Series of a civic realignment.
Morley Winograd and Michael D. Hais are fellows of NDN and the New Policy Institute and co-authors of Millennial Makeover: MySpace, YouTube, and the Future of American Politics (Rutgers University Press: 2008), named one of the 10 favorite books by the New York Times in 2008.
Monday, January 5, 2009
Millennials hold the key to Big Three's Future
The current debate over whether to save our domestic auto industry has revealed some starkly different views about the future of manufacturing in America among economists, elected officials, and corporate executives. There are many disagreements about solutions to the Big Three’s current financial difficulties, but the more fundamental debate is whether the industry should be bent to the will of the government’s environmental priorities or serve only the needs of the companies’ customers and their shareholders.
But there’s something more at stake: the long-term credibility of Detroit among the rising generation of Millennials. These young people, after all, are the future consumers for the auto industry and winning them – or at least significant portion of them – is critical to the industry's long-term prospects in the marketplace and in the halls of Congress.
The enormous investments the federal government has been making in private enterprises, including the auto industry, will test the ability of private sector executives to meet the expectations of this very civically minded generation. Sadly, so far, it’s a test many business leaders seem likely to fail
In the case of the American auto industry this failure has deep roots. Over the past few decades the leaders of the Big Three repeatedly have failed to move their industry in new directions, even when the opportunity to do so has plainly been put before them.
Attempts to nudge Detroit into producing more fuel-efficient vehicles have been going on since the 1973-4 Arab Oil embargo, which led Congress to establish Corporate Average Fuel Efficiency (CAFÉ) standards for cars and light trucks. The target was for cars to meet an average of 27.5 miles per gallon (mpg) by 1985. On Earth Day, 1992, Bill Clinton proposed to raise that standard even further to 45 mpg after he was elected President.
When Al Gore was asked to join the ticket, auto industry executives, terrified at the prospect that the man who had called for the abolition of the internal combustion engine might become Vice President, implored the leadership of the United Automobile Workers (UAW) to meet with the candidates and bring them to their senses. The lobbying effort worked. Under pressure from Owen Beiber, then UAW president, and Steve Yokich, who was his designated successor, and the powerful Democratic Congressman from Dearborn, Michigan, John Dingell, Clinton agreed to delay the adoption of higher CAFÉ standards until it could be proven that such goals were attainable.
This formulation opened the door for what came to be known as the Partnership for a New Generation of Vehicles or PNGV. Reluctantly supported by the Big Three, PNGV provided approximately a quarter of a billion dollars in government research funds to demonstrate the feasibility of producing a midsize sedan that could get 80 mpg. Often called “the moon shot of the 90s,” each car company was to make a prototype of such a vehicle by the politically convenient year of 2000 and begin mass production by 2004, another presidential election year.
After a few years of technological research, reviewed by the independent National Research Council (NRC), the partnership settled on the combination of a hybrid gasoline and electric powered propulsion system as the most promising approach. But by 1997, the car companies began to resist expending their resources to develop even a prototype for such a vehicle.
Vice President Gore, who had been in charge of the PNGV program since its inception, decided to meet with the Big Three CEOs to make sure they did not forget their past commitments. The answer from Detroit was emphatic: profits were coming from SUVs and heavy-duty trucks, not cars. When Gore suggested they deploy a 60 mpg hybrid passenger sedan in 2002 rather than waiting for an 80 mpg version in 2004. Ford’s Peter Pestillo and his UAW ally, Steve Yokich, quickly replied, “no way.” Pestillo maintained, “we need much more time than that to make them cost competitive.” Gore could have, but didn’t, embarrass his host by pointing out that Toyota’s Prius was already delivering 55 mpg.
Not all executives were blind to the challenge. General Motors’ Vice-Chairman, Harry Pearce had been the driving force behind GM’s ill-fated EV1 electric car experiment. Despite a bout with leukemia that took him out of consideration for CEO of the company, he and his allies within GM had a powerful influence on the company's CEO, Jack Smith, and a powerful ally at Ford in the Chairman of its Board of Directors, William Clay “Bill” Ford, Jr., great grandson of the company’s founder.
At the Detroit Auto Show in January, 1999 Bill Ford personally introduced a new line of electric cars, under the brand name, THINK. Even though Honda and GM had abandoned the concept of an all electric vehicle by then, Ford said he thought there was still a niche market for such a car. Tellingly, Jac Nasser, Ford’s newly installed CEO, demonstrated his attitude toward these ideas by treating the visiting Secretary of Transportation, Rodney Slater, to a personal trip in a new Jaguar Roadster with the highest horsepower and worst gasoline mileage of any car at the show.
Right after that display of internal differences at Ford, Harry Pearce personally presided over the public introduction of General Motors’ PNGV hybrid prototype car, which delivered 80 mpg fuel efficiency, while seating a family of five comfortably. He then surprised everyone by revealing GM’s real vision of the future--a hydrogen fuel cell powered car called the “Precept” that got 108 mpg in its initial EPA tests. He grandly predicted that such cars would be on the road by 2010.
Clearly the industry was at a critical fork in the road. At a 2000 meeting at the Detroit airport, almost exactly one year to the day since their last meeting, Vice President Gore suggested to auto company executives that developing these products could enhance the industry’s image as well as each company’s individual brands. Gore reminded his listeners, “It’s not just the substance of the issue you need to consider. You also need to think about the symbolism of the decision. Putting SUVs into the PNGV project would change the public’s perception of where you are going in the future.”
Jac Nasser wanted to know if they made such a commitment could they count on a change in the dialogue between the industry and government. Gore suggested he would put his personal reputation behind such an agreement, which would garner the auto industry a great deal of positive press and appeal to the growing ranks of environmentally minded consumers.
But when it came time to put their reputation on the line, the auto executives blinked. The CEOs were not ready to commit to any specific production goals. This less-than-clarion call for a green automotive industry future made it only to page B4 of the Wall Street Journal the next day and was otherwise ignored by the rest of the public that the participants were hoping to impress.
Today, only Ford, the one American auto company not to ask for a bailout in 2008, is ready to offer a car that meets the original Clinton target. In showrooms in 2009, its Fusion Hybrid five-passenger sedan uses the hybrid technologies first explored in the PNGV to get 45 mpg in city driving, more on the highway, and costs about $30,000. As a result, Ford is in a much better position today to weather the whirlwind of change in consumer tastes and financial markets, even without the support of the federal government.
Unfortunately for America, General Motors the largest of the Big Three went in almost the opposite direction. Rich Wagoner, who became General Motors' CEO in June 2000, chose to pursue an SUV-centered strategy that won big profits for a brief period. Since then, however, GM stock has plunged 95%, from $60 per share to roughly $3 in late 2008. General Motors, which lost $70 billion since 2005, has seen its market share cut in half. Having failed to embrace a public partnership with a sympathetic government, Wagoner was forced to beg for a federal bailout with onerous conditions to avoid bankruptcy. Seven years after the fateful auto summit with Al Gore, when asked what decision he most regretted, Wagoner told Motor Trend magazine, “ending the EV1 electric car program and not putting the right resources into PNGV. It didn’t affect profitability but it did affect image.” [emphasis added]
Had the auto industry taken Gore’s lead a decade ago and built a positive image among the very environmentally conscious Millennial Generation, it might have built a constituency to support the government’s bailout. Instead, the companies’ brands, particularly GM’s, have taken such a beating that the President-elect recently reminded the car companies that “the American people’s patience is wearing thin.” In contrast to young Baby Boomers buying songs by the Beach Boys celebrating the Motor City’s products, the country seems ready to drive their “Chevy to the levee” and tell the company “the levee is dry.”
But that is not the right answer. Millennials bring not only an acute environmental consciousness to the country’s political debate, but a desire for pragmatic solutions to the nation’s problems that promote economic equality and opportunity. To secure their support, however, the domestic automobile industry has to be seen as a contributor in ending America’s dependence on foreign oil and improving our environment. Not only would such an approach assure the industry’s future profitability, it would also remake its image in a way that will appeal to the next generation of customers, Millennials, and the politicians they support.
But there’s something more at stake: the long-term credibility of Detroit among the rising generation of Millennials. These young people, after all, are the future consumers for the auto industry and winning them – or at least significant portion of them – is critical to the industry's long-term prospects in the marketplace and in the halls of Congress.
The enormous investments the federal government has been making in private enterprises, including the auto industry, will test the ability of private sector executives to meet the expectations of this very civically minded generation. Sadly, so far, it’s a test many business leaders seem likely to fail
In the case of the American auto industry this failure has deep roots. Over the past few decades the leaders of the Big Three repeatedly have failed to move their industry in new directions, even when the opportunity to do so has plainly been put before them.
Attempts to nudge Detroit into producing more fuel-efficient vehicles have been going on since the 1973-4 Arab Oil embargo, which led Congress to establish Corporate Average Fuel Efficiency (CAFÉ) standards for cars and light trucks. The target was for cars to meet an average of 27.5 miles per gallon (mpg) by 1985. On Earth Day, 1992, Bill Clinton proposed to raise that standard even further to 45 mpg after he was elected President.
When Al Gore was asked to join the ticket, auto industry executives, terrified at the prospect that the man who had called for the abolition of the internal combustion engine might become Vice President, implored the leadership of the United Automobile Workers (UAW) to meet with the candidates and bring them to their senses. The lobbying effort worked. Under pressure from Owen Beiber, then UAW president, and Steve Yokich, who was his designated successor, and the powerful Democratic Congressman from Dearborn, Michigan, John Dingell, Clinton agreed to delay the adoption of higher CAFÉ standards until it could be proven that such goals were attainable.
This formulation opened the door for what came to be known as the Partnership for a New Generation of Vehicles or PNGV. Reluctantly supported by the Big Three, PNGV provided approximately a quarter of a billion dollars in government research funds to demonstrate the feasibility of producing a midsize sedan that could get 80 mpg. Often called “the moon shot of the 90s,” each car company was to make a prototype of such a vehicle by the politically convenient year of 2000 and begin mass production by 2004, another presidential election year.
After a few years of technological research, reviewed by the independent National Research Council (NRC), the partnership settled on the combination of a hybrid gasoline and electric powered propulsion system as the most promising approach. But by 1997, the car companies began to resist expending their resources to develop even a prototype for such a vehicle.
Vice President Gore, who had been in charge of the PNGV program since its inception, decided to meet with the Big Three CEOs to make sure they did not forget their past commitments. The answer from Detroit was emphatic: profits were coming from SUVs and heavy-duty trucks, not cars. When Gore suggested they deploy a 60 mpg hybrid passenger sedan in 2002 rather than waiting for an 80 mpg version in 2004. Ford’s Peter Pestillo and his UAW ally, Steve Yokich, quickly replied, “no way.” Pestillo maintained, “we need much more time than that to make them cost competitive.” Gore could have, but didn’t, embarrass his host by pointing out that Toyota’s Prius was already delivering 55 mpg.
Not all executives were blind to the challenge. General Motors’ Vice-Chairman, Harry Pearce had been the driving force behind GM’s ill-fated EV1 electric car experiment. Despite a bout with leukemia that took him out of consideration for CEO of the company, he and his allies within GM had a powerful influence on the company's CEO, Jack Smith, and a powerful ally at Ford in the Chairman of its Board of Directors, William Clay “Bill” Ford, Jr., great grandson of the company’s founder.
At the Detroit Auto Show in January, 1999 Bill Ford personally introduced a new line of electric cars, under the brand name, THINK. Even though Honda and GM had abandoned the concept of an all electric vehicle by then, Ford said he thought there was still a niche market for such a car. Tellingly, Jac Nasser, Ford’s newly installed CEO, demonstrated his attitude toward these ideas by treating the visiting Secretary of Transportation, Rodney Slater, to a personal trip in a new Jaguar Roadster with the highest horsepower and worst gasoline mileage of any car at the show.
Right after that display of internal differences at Ford, Harry Pearce personally presided over the public introduction of General Motors’ PNGV hybrid prototype car, which delivered 80 mpg fuel efficiency, while seating a family of five comfortably. He then surprised everyone by revealing GM’s real vision of the future--a hydrogen fuel cell powered car called the “Precept” that got 108 mpg in its initial EPA tests. He grandly predicted that such cars would be on the road by 2010.
Clearly the industry was at a critical fork in the road. At a 2000 meeting at the Detroit airport, almost exactly one year to the day since their last meeting, Vice President Gore suggested to auto company executives that developing these products could enhance the industry’s image as well as each company’s individual brands. Gore reminded his listeners, “It’s not just the substance of the issue you need to consider. You also need to think about the symbolism of the decision. Putting SUVs into the PNGV project would change the public’s perception of where you are going in the future.”
Jac Nasser wanted to know if they made such a commitment could they count on a change in the dialogue between the industry and government. Gore suggested he would put his personal reputation behind such an agreement, which would garner the auto industry a great deal of positive press and appeal to the growing ranks of environmentally minded consumers.
But when it came time to put their reputation on the line, the auto executives blinked. The CEOs were not ready to commit to any specific production goals. This less-than-clarion call for a green automotive industry future made it only to page B4 of the Wall Street Journal the next day and was otherwise ignored by the rest of the public that the participants were hoping to impress.
Today, only Ford, the one American auto company not to ask for a bailout in 2008, is ready to offer a car that meets the original Clinton target. In showrooms in 2009, its Fusion Hybrid five-passenger sedan uses the hybrid technologies first explored in the PNGV to get 45 mpg in city driving, more on the highway, and costs about $30,000. As a result, Ford is in a much better position today to weather the whirlwind of change in consumer tastes and financial markets, even without the support of the federal government.
Unfortunately for America, General Motors the largest of the Big Three went in almost the opposite direction. Rich Wagoner, who became General Motors' CEO in June 2000, chose to pursue an SUV-centered strategy that won big profits for a brief period. Since then, however, GM stock has plunged 95%, from $60 per share to roughly $3 in late 2008. General Motors, which lost $70 billion since 2005, has seen its market share cut in half. Having failed to embrace a public partnership with a sympathetic government, Wagoner was forced to beg for a federal bailout with onerous conditions to avoid bankruptcy. Seven years after the fateful auto summit with Al Gore, when asked what decision he most regretted, Wagoner told Motor Trend magazine, “ending the EV1 electric car program and not putting the right resources into PNGV. It didn’t affect profitability but it did affect image.” [emphasis added]
Had the auto industry taken Gore’s lead a decade ago and built a positive image among the very environmentally conscious Millennial Generation, it might have built a constituency to support the government’s bailout. Instead, the companies’ brands, particularly GM’s, have taken such a beating that the President-elect recently reminded the car companies that “the American people’s patience is wearing thin.” In contrast to young Baby Boomers buying songs by the Beach Boys celebrating the Motor City’s products, the country seems ready to drive their “Chevy to the levee” and tell the company “the levee is dry.”
But that is not the right answer. Millennials bring not only an acute environmental consciousness to the country’s political debate, but a desire for pragmatic solutions to the nation’s problems that promote economic equality and opportunity. To secure their support, however, the domestic automobile industry has to be seen as a contributor in ending America’s dependence on foreign oil and improving our environment. Not only would such an approach assure the industry’s future profitability, it would also remake its image in a way that will appeal to the next generation of customers, Millennials, and the politicians they support.
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