Thusday Review 05-12-2012

In a presidential election year there is no such thing as a "slow news" week. This past seven day stretch--Mitt Romney's easy primary wins in Indiana, West Virginia and North Carolina notwithstanding--should be a part of the season one might be reasonably call the doldrums. But we forget our recent history: four years ago this week, however, Democratic frontrunners Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama had raised the ante, with verbal hacking and slashing reaching such epic proportions that DNC chairman Howard Dean, working the Sunday-morning talk shows, practically begged for peace and harmony.

The myth of the springtime slow news days should have already been erased from our political consciousness. Still, we forget.

So it was that an offhand, from-the-heart comment (or perhaps a carefully planned and calculated trial balloon) by vice-President Joe Biden on NBC's Meet the Press sparked a hubbub, and set in motion a complex series of strategic shifts in the race for the White House. Biden said he supports the rights of people of the same sex to marry--a reasonable enough position to take for a longtime socially liberal Democrat--but in a presidential election year, and an election cycle with more than its share of social issue stress-points, this was not merely Joe Biden wandering off-message, this was big news.

In the ensuing escalation of discussion, President Obama, whose vague position on the matter was rumored to be in a state of transition, was forced off his fence and impelled to take an actual position. And almost immediately two competing views emerged, giving the presidential election a new set of talking points.

The first interpretation is simple enough: a high risk move will sometimes yield a high reward. In this view, the President has injected new life into his campaign--and, by extension, he has prodded his sagging, sluggish polls numbers by reaching out to his socially progressive flank on a key social issue. And the timing may be right, both for the weight and merit of the matter for gay Americans, and in the sense that by venting this steam early the resulting tempest will have time to quiet between now and the conventions.

Further, as seen from the perspective of Obama's strategists in the White House and in Chicago, this will have little effect tactically on the language of Mitt Romney's day-to-day campaign, and may even provide a useful distraction by taking Romney's attention away from the economy. Last quarter's employment report showing only anemic growth? No problem: take a social issue with huge consequences and stake out a dramatically sharper, clearer stand. Attention will be drawn from the central narrative of job creation, slow economic growth and high energy prices, and diverted instead to a social issue--much like, one could easily argue, the seemingly endless parade of discussions from earlier in the year, from birth control to women's health to the war of words over working moms.

The current surge in Obama's fundraising totals seems to bear out the advantages of such a move. Indeed, coupled with George Clooney's high dollar fundraiser for the President this week (donors gave $50,000 apiece to attend an exclusive dinner party which the President attended), the Obama campaign had their best week yet in terms of donations. The Chicago headquarters reported a spike in individual small donations as well. High risk yields high reward.

But there is a second view which says that Obama's embrace of same-sex marriage rights carries almost all risk and very little electoral reward, at least at this moment in time. The President's soul-searching transition on the issue aside, would the decision to align himself with the rights of gays to wed have been better presented after November, assuming he defeats Romney? Even some Democrats are worried about the timing, openly expressing concern that the President's bold move could push some middle-of-the-road voters and moderate Democrats--especially in the key states of Ohio, Florida, North Carolina, Virginia--into the Republican column, or at minimum, into the ranks of the undecided. In addition to his arguments about the economy, Romney can now easily hit Obama on a key social issue when he campaigns in these states, areas where a shift of a few thousand votes by moderates could be decisive.

Far from being a distraction to Romney, the former governor can now take a sharply differing position from Obama, which will in turn disarm the skeptics within the Republican Party, those from the ranks of the Gingrich and Santorum camps most wary of his stance on key social issues. Further, Romney gets a pass on the flip-flopping issue, for if the President can justify his attitude change as transitional and "evolving," then why would Romney waste time and energy in a defensive posture because of his own migrations on similar issues.

And there are other risks for the President, though not as volatile: Obama's position could run afoul of socially conservative African Americans, especially in churches, where same-sex marriage would still be viewed as a distortion of traditional Judeo-Christian boundaries--that is, that marriage is a sacred vow of commitment between a man and a woman. And though it is unlikely that Romney would pick up much new support from blacks, Obama's shift on gay rights could still cause enough dismay to prompt some voters to simply stay at home. Then there are the Log Cabin Republicans--pro gay rights, but on the whole a group aligned comfortably with the larger GOP philosophies of free market economies and pro-growth policies, smaller government, and lower taxes.

Of course, for Republicans, there is a third path. Mitt Romney can always choose to not take the bait on this one. After all, talking about the economy is still Romney's best tool for reaching voters. In the slow process of Republicans coalescing around their de facto leader, the sidebar conversations--once so central to the narrative when Romney was under constant attack from his GOP rivals--need not take time away from the immeasurably more valuable issues of job creation and economic recovery.

If Republicans win in November, it will be because of the economy.

Now that Romney has transcended the status of front-runner to become the nominee-apparent, the conversation for the electorate is really about a direct comparison, and for Romney that means asking the famous Ronald Reagan question: are you better off than you were four years ago?