The Personality

We've seen a number of replies to Powerline's Hindrocket's pessimistic appraisal of Bush's odds in this election (Hindrocket alone among the Northern Alliance picks Kerry to win the election).

Jay Reding had a good piece on the subject, as well as the Captain. I also commented yesterday.

But there's a bit in Reding's reply that I thought deserved some elaboration. Hindrocket said "The first is that he is associated with bad news--a recession which he inherited, and the Sept. 11 attacks for which he bears no responsibility. But the fact, fair or not, is that most people associate the Bush presidency with troubled times." Reding replies:

I don't believe that the American people reject political leaders just because they are associated with bad times. Abraham Lincoln led the country through the darkest hour in its history then or since and still won re-election (in fact, I believe the election on 1864 is the best historical analogue to 2004 for reasons I'll go into later).

Which Jay does - read his piece.

And I thought - to what extent do the American people impose their fortunes on a sitting, first term President during elections? And why?

Let's look at first-term presidents that had international and/or economic crises to deal with, going back to the dawn of economic records, the 1850's. For purposes of this post, let's limit it to presidents since the rise of the mass media; while I think the same patterns hold true before this, they're more pronounced since then:

First-Term President: Herbert Hoover
Economic Crisis: Crash of '29
Notes: Hoover had all the intellectual talent it would have taken to solve the problem; Hoover was perhaps the greatest technocrat ever to serve as President. Which may have been his undoing - he brought his tinkering, engineering personality to the White House. Hoover was the Jimmy Carter or Al Gore of the 1920's, more interested in manipulating the levers and pulleys of government than in leading the people.

First-Term President: Franklin D. Roosevelt
Economic Crisis: Great Depresson
Notes: Proof that leadership - even in the wrong direction - is frequently more important than having the right direction in the first place. FDR won re-election handily, and two more after that.

First-Term President: Truman
Economic Crisis: '47 Recession
NotesTruman was a special case; lots of economic and foreign policy issues, and lots of special circumstances getting him in and out of office. Technically, his first full term was his last. Hard to count him.

First-Term President: Eisenhower
Economic Crisis: '53 Recession
Notes: Mild recession (and a post-war one at that) - but Ike's leadership style promoted the sort of stability that both mediated the recession and got him re-elected.

First-Term President: Kennedy
Economic Crisis: '60-61 Recession
Foreign-Policy Crisis: Cuba, Vietnam
Notes: Responded aggressively to recession, cutting taxes. Responded aggressively to Bay of Pigs, creating Vietnam. Can't win 'em all...

First-Term President: Nixon
Economic Crisis: '69'70 Recession
Foreign-Policy Crisis: Vietnam War
Notes: How did Nixon survive his first term?

First-Term President: Ford
Economic Crisis: 1974-5 Recession - continuation of doldrums from Nixon administration
Other National Crisis: Fallout from Watergate.
Notes: Ford didn't have the time or mandate - or, possibly, potential - to lead the nation from these crises.

First-Term President: Carter
Economic Crisis: 1979-80 Recession Stagflation - simultaneous inflation and recession, double-digit unemployment.
Foreign-Policy Crisis: Iran Hostage Crisis, losing cold war.
Notes: Carter had a full plate - of problems. Unfortunately, his plate empty when it came to leadership ability. He was as inspiring as sauce-free spaghetti. He lost the '80 election, and has gone on to serve as a national laughingstock for 20-odd years.

First-Term President: Reagan
Economic Crisis: 1982 Recession - serious unemployment.
Foreign-Policy Crisis: Cold War, Grenada, Lebanon.
Notes: Despite massive problems and a hostile Congress, Reagan persevered politically (winning a massive, historic set of tax cuts) and won the '84 election by a historic landslide.

First-Term President: George Bush 41
Economic Crisis: '91 Recession
Foreign-Policy Crisis: Gulf War, Somalia
Notes: The elder Bush squandered the Reagan legacy and superhuman popularity after the Gulf War by caving in to his legislative opponents, waffled on taxes, and lost the '92 election (albeit with a lot of help from Ross Perot).

So on the one hand, we have Hoover, Truman, Ford and Bush I that fell afoul of their circumstances, and FDR, Ike, JFK and Reagan leading the nation out of the circumstances (or providing leadership and, in the cases of JFK and Reagan, economic reform while the economy did the job by itself), with Nixon has an in-between case.

What does this tell us? More or less what the Fraters' Elder says - "It's the personality, stupid."

Powerline's Hindrocket may be right - the President may fall victim to the combined recession and war-weariness - it really does depend on the type of leadership the President applies.

So what kind of leadership is the President applying?

If you're Virginia Postrel or Hindrocket, you say "not enough".

If you're Thomas Lifson (Via Big Trunk), you say "yeah, so what - it's intentional, so far".

A commenter to one of my threads yesterday echoes Lifson's point, and unintentionally echoes the same precise point made by Dinesh D'Souza about Reagan:

People always underestimate Bush... at their own peril. One gets the sense he cultivates this.

So is Bush letting the Dems have their day, and saving his campaigning, his money and his momentum for the stretch, where it (note to Howard Dean and Wes Clark) matters?

If so, is it a wise move?

Posted by Mitch at February 4, 2004 03:15 AM