Advancing a Free Society

In 1992, Queen Elizabeth had a yearlong run of personal woe that she famously likened to an annus horribilis. And horrible it was: two princes’ and one princess’s marriages going up in flames; even Windsor Castle catching fire.

We still have seven-plus months before 2013 plays out, but so far so bad for President Obama in this, the first of his last four years in the Oval Office. Which begs the question of who or what’s to blame for this presidency going from the high of a sweeping re-election to the valley of scandal and unshakable controversy – the Benghazi affair that won’t go away, IRS heavy-handing with tax-exempts, Justice Department record-seizing.

What should we chalk it up to?

1) The inevitable fate of second-term presidents (George W. Bush, Bill Clinton, Ronald Reagan, Richard Nixon all hitting rough patches after their re-elections)?

2) Mr. Obama’s lack of preparation – scant leadership experience – for the job?

3) Much ado but nothing, the assumption being a friendly media will build Obama back up once they’re done treating his administration as a chew toy?

4) Bad karma in the personage of Michelle Obama and her bangs – the new hairstyle she broke out just in time for her 49^th birthday a precursor to this spate of political misfortune.

Forget about the bangs (the First Lady already has, reverting to her side-swept look). And the last thing the White House should complain about is critical press coverage. As for a second-term curse, let’s see where this White House stands going into 2016 and its last year.

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Pardon the cynicism, but I wonder if President Obama is really all that upset with the Senate’s inability to pass gun-control legislation this past week.

In case you missed it, the Democratic-controlled half of Congress failed to pass seven measures having to do with guns, gun-trafficking and gun-ownership, the most notable being an amendment to expand background checks that fell six votes shy of the mark.

The President wasted no time in showing his disgust, calling the 54-46 outcome “a pretty sad day in Washington” (more, in a moment, on why the majority advantage constituted a legislative defeat). A series of gun-control advocates joined the chorus. New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg labeled the background check vote a“disgrace”. Former Arizona Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, in this New York Times op-ed, said she was “furious”.

So why the cynicism?

Three reasons:

1)  The Votes Were Designed to Fail. Keep in mind that this Senate amendment didn’t merely fail – it failed under the rules of the debate. Let me amend that: rules determined by the Democratic majority leadership, with the entire chamber’s approval. Rather than setting the rules so that each gun-related amendment would need only 51 votes to pass, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid instead set the bar at 60 votes. Why? Because, as this analysis explains, it enabled Reid to get votes on the measures without opening the door to further tinkering by gun-rights advocates (for example, allowing concealed-weapon permits to cross state lines). Did Reid think he had 60 votes going into the debate? As a Nevadan surely he can count cards heads. If not, and he knew 60 was out of reach, why not lower the threshold to 51 votes (50, actually, since Vice President was presiding) and dare Republicans to filibuster?

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Once upon a time, the nation’s capital was synonymous with a special form of incompetence having nothing to do with politics – a cellar-dwelling baseball existence best captured by sportswriter Charles Dryden: “Washington – first in war, first in peace, last in the American League”.

That’s no longer the case. The current Washington franchise – that would be the Nationals, nee the Montreal Expos (Washington’s two previous franchises, both named the Senators, fled D.C. for the greener pastures of Minnesota and Texas) – resides in the National League. Moreover, the “Nats” are a consensus choice to make this fall’s World Series.

That said, the Washington Nationals aren’t the only prohibitive favorite found inside the beltway. Residing about 20 minutes from the ballpark is Hillary Clinton, the trendy choice these days to be the Democratic nominee in 2016 and America’s 45th president.

At least, that’s what the polls tell us. One survey shows Mrs. Clinton dominating both Republicans and her fellow Democrats in hypothetical 2016 matchups. Another poll has Florida voters preferring her to native sons Jeb Bush and Marco Rubio.

Add to those numbers: the chattering class’s clamoring for a Hillary run.

Paul Begala, the Democratic consultant who helped engineer Bill Clinton’s win in 1992, “hopes and prays” for a Clinton candidacy. Kathleen Parker, a Washington Postcolumnist, believes it’s nothing less than Hillary’s duty to run: “The calculus comes down to this: She has been working toward this moment essentially all her life, diligently clearing away the brush blocking her path. The zeitgeist is ready for a woman president. Most important, she can win – and few think the country would be worse for it.”

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Thanks to the NCAA basketball tournament, “March Madness” is now a household phrase.

It’s also applies to a crowded field of 2016 Republican presidential hopefuls. With two differences:

(1) 68 teams compete in the NCAA tourney; the Republican field right now may be larger;

(2) The basketball competition is over in less than a month, whereas the GOP’s winnowing process is a more prolonged mess.

Still, that doesn’t stop us from having a little fun with the idea of a 2016 primary competition, hoops bracket-style.

Here’s my list of 16 competitors, divided into two categories of contenders: eight possible candidates who make their living primarily inside the beltway; eight possible candidates from beyond the beltway.

(Author’s note: unlike the NCAA, I didn’t “seed” the field, ranking candidates from strongest to weakest. In this competition, the first round is all about similar/contrasting styles and good story lines.)

Your 2016 tournament (click to enlarge):

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In case you missed this weekend’s Conservative Political Action Conference, it was a good couple of days for Sens. Rand Paul and Marco Rubio, both of whom seem to be angling for higher office. They finished first and second, respectively, in CPAC’s 2016 presidential straw poll.

It wasn’t such a good time for former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, whose speech about “inclusion and acceptance” earned a tepid response. Bush opted out of the presidential straw poll (not that it’s much of an indicator – only two of its winners (Ronald Reagan and Jeb Bush’s father) have gone on the claim the presidency.

And it was a terrible weekend for the Republican consultancy class, which got blamed for pretty much everything from the party’s failing at the polls to the USA’s early departure from the World Baseball Classic.

At least, that’s how Patrick Caddell – the longtime Democratic consultant and a man who sounds like he’s read Shakespeare’s Henry VI, Part 2 one too many times – sees it.

About those consultants: they’re easy prey any time a candidate or a party loses – even more so in the aftermath of the Romney meltdown, as the political world began to learn of who all on the inside profited despite the candidate’s reversal of fortune.

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In a year in which Washington will be dominated by loose talk of federal largesse and limitations, congressional Republicans face an image challenge: how best to argue the case for budgetary austerity without coming across as . . . well, too austere.

To answer that question, let’s turn to another contact sport – football – and the curious case of Manti Te’o, the former Notre Dame linebacker.

As recently as early January, Te’o was in a most enviable position as far as his professional stock stood. In addition to leading his team to an undefeated regular season and a spot in the national title game, the linebacker had endured an incredible tale of personal woe – the death of his grandmother, followed a day later by the passing of his leukemia-stricken girlfriend. Te’o not only played through his grief, but took his game to a higher level – so high that NFL scouts rated him a top-ten pick in next month’s draft. With the help of Notre Dame’s publicity machine, Te’o was the runner-up for the Heisman Trophy, a rarity for a defensive player.

And then it all came crashing down.

The girlfriend, whom the media had turned into this generation’s George Gipp, never really existed. The “relationship” was in fact an Internet hoax (“catfishing”, it’s called), forcing Te’o to answer a lot of awkward questions about his character and gullibility. Add the personal drama to his underwhelming performances on the field in the championship game and off the field at the draft combine, and Te’o is now projected as a mid-to-late first-round pick at best.

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