Obama's live-mic gaffe this morning had the strange effect of starting an actual, semi-serious conversation about foreign policy, at least until the next politicians yells bulls**t or accuses articles of clothing of murder.
Jennifer Rubin, who for some reason abbreviates microphone M-I-K-E, like the person, couldn't believe her Romney-turned ears when she heard Obama's chat with Medvedev:
Is there anyone who thinks Obama, should he get a second term, wouldn’t run wild with policies and positions that the majority of the electorate oppose? Otherwise, he’d roll them out now, of course...In sum, the election is not simply a referendum on President Obama’s actions to date; it’s essentially a blank check for the president’s second term. Romney should be asking wary independent and moderates: Is there a scintilla of a chance that Obama would be less liberal in a second term?
Blank checks imply no checks and balances, like a Republican House and conservative Supreme Court, but whatevs: Rubin's afraid Obama will kneel to Iran and hand over Israel and all sorts of other appease-y type stuff that just reeks of liberalism.
"Based on recent evidence," replies Foreign Policy's Daniel Drezner in his own italics, "there's an excellent chance Obama will be less liberal in the second term."
Drezner argues that second term presidents almost always moderate their first term ideological leanings. Here's his rundown:
Reagan tacked in a decidedly liberal direction with respect to the Soviet Union, switching from rhetoric about the "evil empre" to cutting substantive arms control agreements with the Soviet Union. Clinton, on the other hand, tacked in a more conservative direction. After being enamored of multilateralism and leery of using fore in his first term, he became more comfortable with using force and using it outside of UN strictures in his second term. Finally, Bush 43's second terms was decidedly more liberal. In his first term, he declared an "Axis of Evil" and invaded Iraq without UN support. In his second term, however, the Bush administration was decidedly more dovish, working through the UN on both Iran and North Korea, demonstrating a willingness to directly negotiate with the Iranians, and refusing to use force in Syria.
Drezner points out some significant exceptions and counterarguments--most crucially that second term presidents tend to have adversarial legislatures--and there's a bit of the analogical fallacy to his list. Nonetheless, he's right; previous presidents have simply not used their second terms as playgrounds of ideological purity. "Presidents change tack until they hit on a more successful formula," Drezner writes. "This usually means overcoming one's personal ideology and embracing new ideas."
If there's any way in which Rubin's picture of Obama's second term of liberalism run amok, it's that by and large Obama hasn't had success with biartisanship. Republicans tend to rebuff his efforts, and brand his already moderated proposals as socialism or appeasement or whatever the buzzword of the day is. The result is that Obama has found more success with taking a center-left tack: negotiating for the overturn of DADT, arguing for increased spending in the fact of calls for austerity, and so on. If he tacks even further to the left in his second term, it won't be due to any illusion of mandate from the electorate, but from the stubornness of his opposition.
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Related: Obama Admits Opposition To Missile Defense Strictly Political – But You Already Knew That
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