Learning From Obama Paul Krugman APRIL 1, 2016

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Learning From Obama

Paul Krugman APRIL 1, 2016

Like many political junkies, I’ve been spending far too much time looking at polls and trying to understand their implications. Can Donald Trump really win his party’s nomination? (Yes.) Can Bernie Sanders? (No.) But the primaries aren’t the only things being polled; we’re still getting updates on President Obama’s overall approval. And something striking has happened on that front.

At the end of 2015 Mr. Obama was still underwater, with significantly more Americans disapproving than approving. Since then, however, his approval has risen sharply while disapproval has plunged. He’s still only in modestly positive territory, but the net movement in polling averages has been about 11 percentage points, which is a lot.

What’s going on?

Well, one answer is that voters have lately been given a taste of what really bad leaders look like. But I’d like to think that the public is also starting to realize just how successful the Obama administration has been in addressing America’s problems. And there are lessons from that success for those willing to learn.

I know that it’s hard for many people on both sides to wrap their minds around the notion of Obama-as-success. On the left, those caught up in the enthusiasms of 2008 feel let down by the prosaic reality of governing in a deeply polarized political system.

Meanwhile, conservative ideology predicts disaster from any attempt to tax the rich, help the less fortunate and rein in the excesses of the market; and what are you going to believe, the ideology or your own lying eyes?

But the successes are there for all to see.

Start with the economy. You might argue that presidents don’t have as much effect on economic performance as voters seem to imagine — especially presidents facing scorched-earth opposition from Congress for most of their time in office.

But that misses the point: Republicans have spent the past seven years claiming incessantly that Mr. Obama’s policies are a “job killing” disaster, destroying business incentives, so it’s important news if the economy has performed well.

And it has: We’ve gained 10 million private-sector jobs since Mr. Obama took office, and unemployment is below 5 percent. True, there are still some areas of disappointment — low labor force participation, weak wage growth.

But just imagine the boasting we’d be hearing if Mitt Romney occupied the White House.

Where is that 6.9% unemployment rate that Romney promised by the end of his first term? Must be hiding behind the $5/gal gas number.


Then there’s health reform, which has (don’t tell anyone) been meeting its goals.

Back in 2012, just after the Supreme Court made it possible for states to reject the Medicaid expansion, the Congressional Budget Office predicted that by now 89 percent of the nonelderly population would be covered; the actual number is 90 percent.

The details have been something of a surprise: fewer people than expected signing up on the exchanges, but fewer employers than expected dropping coverage, and more people signing up for Medicaid — which means, incidentally, that Obamacare is looking much more like a single-payer system than anyone seems to realize.

But the point is that reform has indeed delivered the big improvements in coverage it promised, and has done so at lower cost than expected.

Before your reptilian brains go off REMEMBER what a healthcare paradise it was before the ACA, where premiums never got jacked up, people were not dropped from coverage, in between jobs COBRA was great, pre-existing conditions no big deal, doctors never moved or died and copays and deductibles were jut perfect and there simply were no winners and losers.

Which would make that pre- ACA period the ONLY time in American life in which there were NO winners and losers, Yep, those were the days.

Then there’s financial reform, which the left considers toothless and the right considers destructive. In fact, while the big banks haven’t been broken up, excessive leverage — the real threat to financial stability — has been greatly reduced.

And as for the economic effects, have I mentioned how well we’ve done on job creation?

Last but one hopes not least, the Obama administration has used executive authority to take steps on the environment that, if not canceled by a Republican president and upheld by future Supreme Courts, will amount to very significant action on climate change.

All in all, it’s quite a record. Assuming Democrats hold the presidency, Mr. Obama will emerge as a hugely consequential president — more than Reagan. And I’m sure Republicans will learn a lot from his achievements.

April fools!

Seriously, there is essentially no chance that conservatives, whose ideas haven’t changed in decades, will reconsider their dogma. But maybe progressives will be more open-minded.

The 2008 election didn’t bring the political transformation Obama enthusiasts expected, nor did it destroy the power of the vested interests: Wall Street, the medical-industrial complex and the fossil fuel lobby are all still out there, using their money to buy influence. But they have been pushed back in ways that have made American lives better and more secure.

The lesson of the Obama years, in other words, is that success doesn’t have to be complete to be very real. You say you want a revolution? Well, you can’t always get what you want — but if you try sometimes, you just might find, you get what you need.

James Landi
Salisbury, Maryland 22 hours ago

"No drama Obama" reflects the character of a politician who does not "self-promote" very well, and whose relatively quiet voice has often been drowned out by the yammering chorus of anti-Obama reactionary Republican loud mouths and political media types.

While Obama's reliance on measured, thoughtful and considered management of the presidency's voice and appeal to logic and intellect, certain Republicans knew that their 2016 candidate would have to be loud, bellicose, and intellectually monochromatic.

Once the political season gets into full swing, I suspect the "Missing Barack?" bumper stickers will begin to appear, and perhaps well be hearing "Don't Know what You Got Till It's Gone" a whole lot more on the radio.

Glenn
Tampa 20 hours ago

Obama is reaping the benefits of comparison. Republican candidates for president have been locked in a reality TV program called 'The Biggest Jerk'. Just when you thought that public approval of congress could get no lower the Republicans took over the Senate and the reality of what Republican governance really looks like sh*t. If Hillary is smart she'll push for Republican primaries starting in 2017. If she does that, she might be the most beloved president of all time.

Gary Bernier
Tarpon Springs, Fla. 11 hours ago

Republicans are an amazing example of willful ignorance. As a group they are a bit like those cults that are convinced, based on their faith, that their savoir will return at 3pm next Tuesday. They give away all their worldly goods and assemble on a hillside at the appointed time.

No savior (or supply-side economic prosperity). Do they think maybe they're wrong about the efficacy of their belief? Heck no, they double down. The only reason they didn't get the expected outcome is because they just didn't believe hard enough or some non-believers screwed things up for them.

They go through this over and over. They're faith in the correctness of their ideology gets stronger regardless of facts and a history of failure. It does appear to be a type of insanity. Maybe we should treat conservatism as a public health issue.

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