Lawrence J.

Haas

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November 10, 2008

Four Crucial Tests Await Obama

In late October, Vice President-elect Joe Biden predicted that “it will not be six months before the world tests Barack Obama.” As it turned out, the world proved a bit more impatient.

Just a day after Obama’s election, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev lashed out at the “mistaken, egotistical and sometimes simply dangerous” United States. He threatened to deploy new missiles within the range of our European allies in response to U.S. plans to install missile defense systems in Europe, and to jam the radar on which missile defense systems rely.

Medvedev’s challenge was striking in tone and timing but, in fact, it reflects only one of the four sets of tests that all new presidents of recent vintage have faced – foreign, congressional, public, and internal. Obama must pass each of them if he hopes to be successful.

The foreign test. Maybe the best-known case of global testing came with President Kennedy, who, at 43, was the youngest man ever elected president – four years younger than Obama. The lessons are sobering.

Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev verbally abused Kennedy in a June 1961 meeting in Vienna and, unimpressed with Kennedy’s resolve, pursued the risky gambit a year later of building nuclear missile sites in Cuba, just 90 miles from America’s shore. Only Kennedy and Khrushchev’s level-headedness during the Cuban Missile Crisis prevented a nuclear war.

Obama’s tests could come in multiple directions beyond Medvedev’s salvo. Iran, Syria, Hezbollah or Hamas could launch war against Israel; North Korea could resume its nuclear program; or China could take steps that threaten Taiwan. In response, Obama will have to make clear that he will protect U.S. interests, defend our friends and confront advances by our foes.

The congressional test. Conventional wisdom holds that, with the presidency and Congress each in Democratic hands, the two branches will work smoothly to implement Obama’s agenda.  Don’t bet on it.

On Capitol Hill, Democratic chairmen will assert their independence as they did under Democrats Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter. They will have their own ideas about priorities and their own legacies to worry about. They will try to make Obama bend to their will by forcing their ideas – about taxes, health care, global warming and so on – onto the new administration.

Obama needs to assert his primacy while avoiding unnecessary public confrontations with the congressional barons. He should insist that Congress work within the framework he proposes to address major problems, while letting lawmakers work out the details within each framework.

The public test. Through his many months of campaigning, Obama had lots to say. Beyond the soaring rhetoric, he proposed a specific policy agenda that he promised to pursue if elected.

Once in office, new presidents are often tempted to stretch campaign promises to the breaking point. They sometimes face bigger budget deficits than they had expected. So, to reduce the deficit or finance their spending priorities, they propose higher taxes on more people than they had pledged. The first President Bush memorably broke his “no new taxes” pledge in 1990, accepting higher taxes as part of a deficit-cutting deal with congressional Democrats.

Nothing jeopardizes a new president’s public standing more than an early and notable broken promise. The public is cynical about politics to begin with. A new president, particularly one who has inspired as much hope as Obama, would add to that cynicism at his own political peril.

The internal test. Obama will appoint thousands of staff to top jobs in the White House, Cabinet departments and independent agencies. They will serve at his pleasure, and they are supposed to implement his agenda, all while avoiding steps that embarrass him or Vice President Biden.

Most will do so. A few undoubtedly will not. With fancy titles, impressive offices and all the trappings of power that anyone would envy, a few appointees will forget the limits of their positions. They will pursue policies that conflict with Obama’s or use their office for personal gain or enjoyment.

When the first such incident occurs, Obama must move quickly and aggressively, making clear that he will tolerate no such behavior by firing the individual in question. That will send a strong warning to his other appointees to remember what they are, and are not, supposed to do. Failure to respond strongly to internal insubordination will only breed more.

From foreign leaders to congressional barons, from the people on Main Street to the new appointees in Washington, the world is about to take the measure of our dynamic new leader.

To each test, Obama must respond in ways that reinforce his authority, not diminish it. Only then will he have the standing at home and abroad to pursue his agenda. This is no time for weak knees.

© 2008 North Star Writers Group. May not be republished without permission.

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