Michael Livingston's Blog

Purple in Pennsylvania

Obama and the 2010 races—Looking ahead

Still busy with family matters, but I wanted to take a moment to talk about Obama’s 100+ days and their implications for the 2010 elections.

Lawyers like to divide things between form and substance, or what others might prefer to call style and content. In style (form) Obama is a clear hit. There’s no question he’s dominating the news, and that Republicans—like the Democrats with Reagan—haven’t figured out how to respond.

In content (substance) I think it’s much less clear. Everyone says it was a great hundred days, but the reality is he passed one “stimulus” bill almost none of which has actually been spent. Foreign policy is an especially dangerous area: We are deeper and deeper into Afghanistan with Iraq not yet finished, and an Israeli attack on Iran could bring us into a still wider arc of uncertain conflict.

None of this is likely to make Obama personally unpopular any time soon. He’s smart, telegenic, and projects an overwhelming image of competence. But his policies remain less popular than he is, and the gap is likely to widen rather than narrow as time passes. It should be also be remembered that off-year elections have a smaller and more volatile electorate than presidential races, and are often a vehicle for protesting political excesses without removing the President himself. All of which suggests that 2010 could be a lot more interesting than it looks right now.

Of particular interest in Pennsylvania is what might be called the “populist” issue. Underneath the enthusiasm for Obama is a lurking sense that he has done more to rescue Wall Street financiers than Main Street auto workers. This is a tough issue for Republicans to raise, but not an impossible one, and one we may be hearing more about as time goes on.