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Dr Nick Bisley - Election 2012 is coming

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Matt Smith

Welcome to a La Trobe University podcast. I would be your host Matt Smith and with me today is Nick Bisley, Professor of International Relations at La Trobe University and convenor of the Politics and International Relations Program.  Thank you for joining me Nick.

Nick Bisley

Thanks Matt.

Matt Smith

We're months away from the 2012 election in the United States, which will be our topic of discussion today.  Nick, has the shine worn off Obama since his election?

Nick Bisley

There's no question that Obama entered office with enormous degree of popular support.  He won the election very, very cleanly, in 2008, with a surprisingly large majority, both of the electoral vote and the electoral college vote.  And as we've discussed I think previously, in a podcast, the expectations on him were so high from a lot of quarters that he was always going fail to deliver to someone in some way, because politics as we know is the game of compromise.  And this was particularly so given how difficult the economic circumstances are in the United States that he inherited.

So there has been since 2009, when he was inaugurated, I think been a general trend downward in his polling.  If you look at presidential approval polling, it's gone steadily backwards, over a period of time.  Partly this is because of a fairly relentless campaign from the Republicans against him, partly of his own making, where he was seen to be fairly slow on some issues, in responding to, whether it was Afghanistan, you have this almost twelve month period reviewing strategy before making a decision, and more generally having a demeanour that's a little bit aloof.  He has that kind of professorial manner of being somewhat distant from the constituents, so that whilst he gives a good campaign speech, as a President, there was a kind of lack of warmth that Presidents like.

So, the shine has gone off, yes.  Is it enough to get him tossed out of office?  We'll have to wait and see.

Matt Smith

It's very much taken a toll on him as well.  He seems to have lost a lot of his confidence.  He's gone quite grey since he was inaugurated, I believe.  So do you think that he's handling the Presidency well?

Nick Bisley

It depends on your point … there's lots of perspectives on this.  I mean, he's certainly aged, but everyone ages in that office.  In fact there was a great cartoon in The Economist about this about a year or two ago, where it had the kind of four ages of Obama.   Year 1 he goes grey, Year 2 he gets wrinkly, Year 3, you know, he's dying and Year 4 he's a corpse.  And so there's a lot of premature ageing.  It's a tough job and all of these things that we know.

Is he handling the Presidency poorly?  You know, I think it depends on the issue areas you look at.  He's delivered health care reform which has withstood constitutional challenge.  I mean, that's a big tick.  Whatever you think of it, just from a political point of view, that's a hard thing to have done, and he's done it.  And it was a signature part of his election campaign in 2008.  He got Bin Laden, another big tick, which you'll see a lot of in the campaign.  But I think on the economy, there's a perception that he's not quite handled both the economics of America's recession well, but also the politics of the recession, because I think they're two separate things and I think on both fronts he hasn't done particularly well.  His policies are not seen as sufficiently business-friendly to promote growth, and it's certainly true that his contacts and the Democratic Party generally, but his politics particularly with business are not good.  Certainly not as good as a lot of business people would like.

But also the politics of the recession – he hasn't been able to sell what he's doing particularly well.  Now, it's a hard sell, but I think he's not handling the downtime in the economy, he's not feeling people's pain in a way that Clinton did.  And that, I think, has hurt him.

Matt Smith

It's rare for a President to lose re-election.  The last time that happened I believe was George Bush snr.  Do you think it's likely in this case?

Nick Bisley

It's very hard to tell at this stage.  I think twelve months ago, you would have said he's a strong favourite to win, and I still think on balance he's in a better position than the Republican candidate, Mitt Romney.  And statistically as you said, it's unusual to lose a bid for re-election.  Jimmy Carter, prior to George Bush snr, basically one every ten to twenty years, and

Matt Smith

That doesn't bode well.

Nick Bisley

No, I was going to say, seeing where we're at, it's not looking good.  The big problem is everyone will tell you, is this is an election about the economy.  And about stewardship of the economy and about how … which side of politics provides a better way out of the mess that the US is in.  And I think, and for the Republicans, that's where Obama is weakest, this perception that his economic credentials aren't great.  And for a sitting President, it's a challenge, because historically, if you look at precedents, Presidents who are sitting during times of economic woe of this type, tend not to get re-elected.  They tend to get blamed, even if it's not their fault.  You know, George Bush snr lost because of a recession that he inherited.  And Obama got in because of discontent about an economic … a whole range of things, but partly about discontent about the economy, under the stewardship of George Bush 2, and he's going to cop the flak.

The other problem is, also, you're a President for four years – you can't sit there and go, it's the previous guy's fault.  Even if to some degree the big macro-economic story is complex, messy and long-term.  I think that's where he's most vulnerable.

Matt Smith

What are the polls telling us then, at the moment? What have you seen in those?

Nick Bisley

Well, look, the polls are quite interesting.  I think what we've seen recently has been a narrowing of the gap between Romney and Obama.  For a long time Romney was trailing Obama in these kind of putative polls, so this is before Romney had secured the nomination, so you'd have these polls that say, is Obama going to get re-elected?  Who would you vote for, Obama or the Republican?  And if you sort of plonked Romney in those, Obama's advantage was quite considerable, 8 to 10% for a long period of time.  You'd get the odd outlier.

Since Romney has been confirmed as the presumptive candidate, as they call them in the States, and since the economy has really not moved much, that gap has narrowed considerably.  But, you know, recent data shows us that Obama still has a bit of a lead in the polls, and it's an Obama margin of error lead, so the most recent stuff I've been able to have a look at, shows that he's got … if you look at these aggregate polls where they bring together half a dozen different polls, he's got on average about a 4% lead, at the moment, which is reasonable, given the broader circumstances.  If you break it down to individual polls, some have it tied, Gallup has a dead heat, whereas Pew has a ten point lead to Obama.  And there's one poll, the CBS/New York Times poll most recently, which has Romney ahead by one point.

But on balance, it's a lot closer I think than we would have anticipated twelve months ago, and Obama is in front, but I think not by as much as he would like.

The other interesting thing to look at, I think, is those polls which tell us a lot, but then there's the markets.  And there's betting markets but there's actually a long-running futures market, the intrade market, which people effectively bet on the outcome, through trading contracts.  It's kind of complex, but in essence they're betting on who's going to win.  And that market, for so long as it's been around, has always very accurately predicted the outcome, and at the moment, the market is very strongly in favour of Obama.

So at the moment, on balance, the figures are telling us that Obama's in front, but there's three months to go and the campaign itself is really only just beginning.

Matt Smith

Do you think Mitt Romney provides sufficient challenge to Obama's Presidency?  And out of the Republican candidates, who would have offered Obama the greatest challenge?

Nick Bisley

Yeah, the Republicans unfortunately had a field of … you know, singularly lacking in any great candidate who stood out as someone who was going to provide a compelling argument against Obama and able to both bring together the base and mobilise a broader popular vote.  Romney's a classic kind of compromise.  He's telegenic, he's rich, he's got reasonably good economic credentials, business, big business background, corporate background, but he doesn't warm the base, his previous electoral position was as Governor in Massachusetts so the core of the Republican Party is not particularly enamoured of him, particularly the right, the energetic bit, the Tea Party dimensions, the Tea Party aspects rather.  They're very unconvinced that he's a true Republican and they've got this acronym, Republican in Name Only, a RINO.  So there's this sense that the Republicans are pretty cool on him, and even if you look at the US press, Republican-linked … columnists who are traditionally very supportive of the Republicans, are being openly critical of him and his campaign, which is almost unheard-of.

The problem that the Republicans have had was the other people who put their hands up were either not credible, electorally, you know, the fact that Donald Trump was even being talked about, I mean, no one took him seriously, but even the fact that he was kind of on the stage, so to speak, I think tells you a lot about the problems the Republicans had, and I think partly there was a sense that, twelve months ago or so, this was an election that the Republicans were unlikely to win.  And I think they didn't realise then, twelve, eighteen months ago, that Obama would be quite as vulnerable on the economy as he is.  No one expected the recession in the US to have lasted this long, because I think that if people had thought that, then a lot more credible and active Republicans would have put their hats in the ring.  So there's a sense that the Republicans had not a great field, I mean, the fact that it narrowed down to Santorum, who's completely unelectable from a national point of view, and Romney, a pretty underwhelming candidate, who's got some question marks for core voters for the Republican Party, tells you a lot about how weak the field was.

The other interesting thing was, during the primary process, how volatile it was.  You know, you had every candidate seemed to have this surge.  We had Rick Perry come from nowhere, a spike in the polls, it looked like he was the presumptive candidate, and then collapsed in a heap, in an embarrassing shambles.  And then you had Herman Cain and then we finished with Santorum.  And along the way Bachmann appeared, and various things.  So it was very volatile, which is an interesting thing of itself.  But the Obama campaign was sitting down, going we'll take any one of these guys on, to be perfectly frank.  The crazier the better, from an Obama point of view.  And in Romney they got the least crazy, so from that sense.  But as we've already seen with the advertising that's going out, they feel like there's a lot of ammunition.  He's a big target and they've got a lot of ammunition to fire at him, because of his background.

Matt Smith

Yes.  What do you think are the points that they are going to latch on during the campaign then?

Nick Bisley

I think that the lot that we've seen so far, obviously is, this guy's out of touch, this guy's a corporate raider who made his money, he made a lot of money, as the CEO of Bain Capital, a venture capital firm that they will say, and in a lot of respects it was, a corporate raider.  Buy up failing businesses, not quite asset strip them but essentially gut them, fire a bunch of people, outsource the jobs, make huge swadges of cash in fees, and sell the business on.  And so they could go after – here is a guy who makes tons of money, oppressing the working man and woman, and is completely isolated from the day to day travails of your average working American, who is doing it tough.  And that's going to be the angle.

We've also seen an attack on his tax. He won't release his tax forms, which is, I think, not a smart move on Romney's point of view, get it out, get the bad news out of the way, and then get on with it.  I think the longer you leave it out, that becomes the story.

So that's going to be the first one.  The second one I think it will, he hasn't had much experience.  You know, he's been Governor of Massachusetts for one term, that's it and introduced policies that the Obama administration has introduced, particularly the health care package, which is very similar to the kind of thing that Romney introduced, so I think they'll go after that as a sort of second line of attack.

And I think the third will be this guy just isn't credible, as a Commander-in-Chief, as a national leader.  At this stage this looks like the three prongs of attack.  And unfortunately, what we've seen so far in the advertising and the campaign more generally, is a hugely negative tone.  Neither side is standing up saying, we will do this, this is our vision for the future.  I mean, there's a bit of bromide stuff, but there isn't clear, hard policy on this.  Everything's relentlessly negative.  And if you look at the ads, it's quite interesting.  And they spent a lot on ads.  75% of the ads are negative, 25% are positive, according to people who monitor this stuff, so it's already been negative and it's only going to get more.

Matt Smith

And part of his character is becoming the narrative as well, as far as his religion is concerned, tying dogs to the roof racks of cars, issues like that are maybe not directly from Obama's campaign, but they're also becoming part of the narrative of who Mitt Romney is.

Nick Bisley

Yeah, the Mormon question is there.  I know no one wants to talk about it openly but it's going to be sitting there and you can bet the Democrats will be raising people's doubts in subtle, often potentially dubious ways, about his … you know, a lot of traditional Christians view Mormons with a degree of suspicion, is it a sect, is it really Christianity?  There's the kind of … the polygamy side of things.  They wear strange underwear, you know temple underwear.  There's all this stuff that … these sort of seeds of doubt that you can throw to add to, this guy isn't normal.   This guy isn't like us.  Which of course if you think about it, Obama's not like us either.  Here is this extraordinarily bright, extremely capable, very articulate, well educated, upper middle class kid.  He's not like your average working American either.  He think he got paid, he earned something like two million dollars last year, mostly out of book royalties.  But you know, so there's a degree of hypocrisy about it, but that's the game of politics.

Matt Smith

Now, what do you think are going to be the issues defining this election?  You've already spoken about the economy, and that's clearly going to be the big pool card, but what are the other issues that are going to be taking part?

Nick Bisley

I still think it's going to be the economy.  The economy, the economy, the economy, and when we're done with the economy, it will also be about the economy.

Matt Smith

But you've got health care as well.

Nick Bisley

Yeah, I think behind it will be this broader debate about the size and role of the State.  I mean, it's an old debate.  This is nothing new, and for a lot of people this is part of the reason why it's a bit, the campaign is a bit uninspiring is that we haven't really progressed in terms of the kind of policy debates in the United States for twenty-five years.  I mean, this is the argument which Reagan and company were having in the early '80s.  But in essence, the argument, whether it's about health care, whether it's about bailing out businesses, whether it's about surplus stimulus packages for the economy, is in essence boiling down to … to caricature it a bit, a big strong interventionist State that will help you, that's the view from the Democrats.  Or against the view from the Republicans, which is the State should be pared back, that individuals should be allowed to get with on it, that individuals are the drivers of the economy, and the bastions of society, and that the State largely hinders them getting on with business.  Not just business, but also civil society and the like.  So, the main theme I think between the two, is the Republicans see Obama and instinctively kind of the State … there's problems, the State will solve it, and that this is a bad thing.  Whereas the Democrats see the State as necessary in the sort of circumstances the United States finds itself in.  And that the Republicans are going to ruin things, particularly in times of economic recession.

And you'll see it polarised around health care, as the sort of signature piece of policy, from the first administration.  But I think Obama will probably, I think, generally play down health care because (a) it's kind of done, there it is, and it's gone through, the bulk of it, the coil of it has gone through the constitutional challenge, which surprised a lot of people.  But also it's because it's polarising.  So I think they'll try to play that, the Democrats will try to play it down.  The Republicans will try to play it up as the sort of … this is the thin edge of the wedge, stuff.  The nonsense about death panels and the like.  It's socialised medicine and that sort of stuff.  But these are, for a lot of conservative voters in the US, kind of lightning rod issues that if you can stoke the enthusiasm of these people with this stuff, you can not just rely on their vote, you can get them to turn out.  Because I think one thing we always forget about the US, not that we always forget, but that we ought to remember about the US, is that it's a voluntary election system, in that there's no compulsory voting as there is in Australia, and that getting your voters to the polling booth is as much a battle as winning over swinging voters.  So that's why we'll see these polarising issues appear, but I think Obama will try to play that sort of stuff down.

Matt Smith

That's all the time we've got today for a La Trobe University podcast.  I'd like to thank my guest today, Professor Nick Bisley, and you can follow him on Twitter @NickBisley.  If you have any questions, comments or feedback about this podcast, or any other, then send us an email at podcast@latrobe.edu.au.