The Anti-Intellectual Presidency
The Decline of Presidential Rhetoric from George Washington to George W. Bush
Elvin T. Lim
From Our Blog
By Elvin Lim Obama's speech last week was an attempt to be as partisan or liberal as possible, while sounding as reasonable as possible. "Why would that be a partisan issue, helping folks refinance?" the president asked as part of this strategy. The Republican Party continues to suffer an image problem of being out of the mainstream, and the president was trying to capitalize on this moment of vulnerability.
Posted on February 19, 2013
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By Elvin Lim Conservatives hate it; liberals love it. His Second Inaugural Address evinces Barack Obama coming into his own, projecting himself unvarnished and real before the world. No more elections for him, so also less politics. He is number 17 in the most exclusive club in America — presidents who get to serve a second term. Yes, there's still the bonus of a legacy. But the legacy-desiring second-term president would just sit back and do no harm, rather than put himself out there for vociferous battles to come.
Posted on January 27, 2013
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By Elvin Lim The tragic shootings in Newtown, CT, have plunged the nation into the foundational debate of American politics. Over at Fox News, the focus as been on mourning and the tragedy of what happened. As far as the search for solutions go, the focus has been on how to cope, what to say to children, and what to do about better mental health screening.
Posted on December 20, 2012
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By Elvin Lim For weeks, President Barack Obama seemed consumed with the challenges in governing. With the turmoil in the Middle-East taking one unanticipated turn after another, the White House has been in crisis management mode for the past several weeks. Decisions that matter to millions of people around the world, as well as to our allies, who want more of us than we are willing give in Libya, have had to be made. Despite our democratic fantasy, leadership occurs behind a barricade of confidentiality. Both Obama and George Bush well know that leaders must sometimes push on behind the scenes, with or without public and congressional support.
Posted on April 5, 2011
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By Elvin Lim The strategic gamesmanship leading up to the budget compromise that was reached late last week suggests a blueprint for the budget battles to come. But while many observers believe that Washington is bracing for even more epic battles to come, when Congress considers the budget for the rest of the fiscal year and legislation to raise the debt ceiling, my guess is that there will be more sabre-rattling than a serious effort to avoid raising the debt ceiling. Here are three reasons why.
Posted on April 12, 2011
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By Elvin Lim What exactly, for Republicans, is the budget debate about? It is not primarily about the public debt; it is not even about economic growth. The last two Democratic presidents, Carter, and Clinton both reduced the size of the public debt as a percentage of our GDP. On the other hand, Richard Nixon was the last fiscally conservative Republican. Every Republican president since has contributed to the rise of the public debt's share of GDP. Indeed, between Reagan and the first Bush, the gross public debt in nominal terms increased fourfold.
Posted on April 19, 2011
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By Elvin Lim Something of a myth of American democracy is that decisions are made in the ballot box by voters on election day. Actually, these outcomes are structured by fundraising efforts by would-be candidates years in advance. Aspirants to the GOP presidential nomination, now entering the crucial second quarter before election year and on the eve of their formal declarations of candidacies, are now racing for credibility by racing for cash. And those without name recognition, in particular, have to rake in
Posted on April 26, 2011
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By Elvin Lim
Osama bin Laden was reported to have been killed by US forces late Sunday night EDT at a compound in Abbottabad, just outside Islamabad. This will be a tremendous morale boost for the US, and it would be a crushing blow to Al Qaeda's. Sure, bin Laden is just a figurehead of an organization which has now sprouted branches all over the world, and sure his death will likely provoke retaliatory attacks by his followers seeking to revenge his "martyrdom," but there is little doubt that this development is a net gain for the US.
Posted on May 3, 2011
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By Elvin Lim In 2010, the Tea Party movement was out and about. Newly christened and newly outraged, they created the enthusiasm gap that creates victories in an age of evenly split bipolarized politics. This year, the rage has sizzled out to disgruntled listlessness. Even for those still against Obamacare, the memory of its passage has waned because the promised effects of its eventual implementation will not become evident for
Posted on May 19, 2011
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By Elvin Lim The tragic flaw of American democracy is that we seek the same qualities in candidates for political office as we do in the movies. Arnold Schwarzenegger is the most recent case in point. Celebrities have name recognition. They are easy on the eyes. And they pretend really well.
Posted on May 24, 2011
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By Elvin Lim If Congressman Anthony Weiner loses his job because of a few lewd pictures, he would probably have lost the most among a long line of unfaithful politicians for having sinned the least. Bill Clinton's encounters happened in the Oval Office (among other places). At least Larry Craig managed to graze another foot at a bathroom stall. But Anthony Weiner didn't even go much beyond Twitter. There is a chance that Weiner would endure the political storm (as Senator David Vitter and President Bill Clinton did), by waiting the scandal out and hoping that the uproar subsides. But two things stand in the way.
Posted on June 9, 2011
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By Elvin Lim A lackluster field of Republican candidates for president will receive a significant jolt if Rick Perry, Governor of Texas, decides to throw his hat in the ring. There is significant buzz now to take this possibility seriously. The big story about Newt Gingrich's campaign implosion wasn't that 16 of his staff members walked out
Posted on June 14, 2011
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By Elvin Lim The election of 2012 will turn on the economy and jobs. But jobs or the lack thereof are only a component of a more pervasive sentiment in American politics today. That sentiment is pessimism, because Horatio Alger has become Joe the Plumber. The pessimism in American politics is concentrated in one part of the electorate — the white working class, also the group which has pulled most sharply from Obama's support. Understanding the disaffection of the
Posted on June 21, 2011
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By Elvin Lim New York has just become the sixth state to legalize same-sex marriage, together with Connecticut, Iowa, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Iowa, and the District of Columbia. New Jersey, Maryland, and Rhode Island have not legalized same-sex marriage, but they do recognize those performed in other states. State by state, the dominoes against same-sex marriage are falling away as surely as reason must conquer unreason. President Barack Obama has been accused of allowing a state governor
Posted on June 28, 2011
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By Elvin Lim Yesterday was Independence Day, we correctly note. But most Americans do not merely think of July 4 as a day for celebrating Independence. We are told, especially by the Tea Partying crowd, that we are celebrating the birth of a nation. Not quite. Independence, the liberation of the 13 original colonies form British rule, did not create a nation any more than a teenager leaving home becomes an adult. Far from it, even the Declaration of Independence (which incidentally
Posted on July 5, 2011
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By Elvin Lim It is often said that the public debt is a burden we leave to our children and grandchildren. Even Barack Obama said the same when he was a Senator. Invoking children is a great way to make a moral argument without sounding moralistic, but it is a spurious way to make an economic argument in committing the fallacy that all borrowing is deferred charge.
Posted on July 12, 2011
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By Elvin Lim Tea Party Republicans are about to be force-fed a slice of humble pie. In the first test of their political acumen since sweeping into Congress last year, they showed an ignorance of the first rule of democratic politics: never say never, because a politician's got to be a politician. Especially on an issue, the federal debt ceiling, with stakes as high
Posted on July 14, 2011
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By Elvin Lim America is the only country in the world that that has the luxury of creating an economic crisis when there isn't one. Ours is the only democracy with a debt ceiling, with the exception of Denmark, which raises its ceiling well in advance of when it would be reached. Economists say that our "debt crisis" is an unforced error, because people are more than willing to lend us money, at pretty good rates. This is the benefit of having a really good credit score.
Posted on July 26, 2011
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By Elvin Lim America's economy is not in crisis, but its political system is, or so thinks the S&P. The real problem, however, is not the political system per se, but its infection with populism. Even though the S&P has downgraded the US's credit rating, it did so from an exaggerated understanding of American politics based on its shrillness, and not its constitutional fundamentals. This is why on the first trading day after the downgrade, American bonds are still the place to go.
Posted on August 10, 2011
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By Elvin Lim Rick Perry's star is on the rise. And the reason is that he is as authentically conservative as President Barack Obama is apologetically liberal. Already some polls are showing him edging ahead of previous frontrunner, Mitt Romney. This is not a post-announcement bounce, but a game-changer in the Republican race.
Posted on August 23, 2011
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By Elvin Lim On 9/11 each year, the media reenacts the trauma the American people experienced in 2001. Images already burnished in our minds are replayed. Memorials services are held, moments of silence are observed, and the national anthem is sung. National myth-making occurs at the very site where national disaster occurs, so that a new birth of freedom rises phoenix-like from the ashes of ruin.
Posted on September 13, 2011
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By Elvin Lim The two front-runners in the Republican nomination contest, Rick Perry and Mitt Romney, narrowed the distance between them in the last debate in Florida sponsored by Fox and Google. This is a debate that showcased both their Achilles' heels. Perry's problem is not the "ponzi scheme" comment about Social Security. Most conservatives agree with him, and the consistent conservative would actually agree with him that Social Security is a matter that should be sent back to the states to handle. Perry's problem is his
Posted on September 27, 2011
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By Elvin Lim Republicans waited and they waited for Sarah Palin, but all she is is a tease. They tried Michelle Bachmann, and she had her day in the sun (or on Newsweek's cover). They tried Rick Perry, and he had his day in the polls until his debate performances revealed certain holes (he would say "heart") in his conservative armor. And now people are asking if Governor Chris Christie of New Jersey might be the last ("portly") standing man between Romney and the Republican presidential nomination.
Posted on October 4, 2011
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By Elvin Lim To understand the Occupy Wall Street movement, it is helpful to understand that it is the antithesis of the Tea Party movement, though for now, much smaller in scale. Occupy Wall Street protesters are, like the Tea Party protesters, disenchanted at the state of the economy, and impatient for solutions. But unlike their compatriots on the Right, their animus is directed at corporate America (Wall Street), not at government (Washington, DC).
Posted on October 11, 2011
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By Elvin Lim When the dust settles on the history of the Obama presidency, a major theme historians will have to consider and explain, is the startling contrast in his record in domestic policy versus his successes in foreign policy, which now include the assassination of Bin Laden and the toppling of Qaddafi. To put the matter in another way: if 2012 were 2004, and Obama would be judged purely on his foreign policy alone, he wouldn't have to be doing any bus tours in the battleground states now.
Posted on October 25, 2011
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By Elvin Lim Mitt Romney must be the happiest Republican in the world. His political rivals for the Republican presidential nomination, Herman Cain and Rick Perry, seem to be trying to out-do the other in terms of whose campaign can implode faster.
Posted on November 15, 2011
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Posted on November 29, 2011
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By Elvin Lim With so many candidates moving in and out of frontrunner status in the Republican nomination race in the past months, it would appear that the winner of the game of musical chairs could simply be determined by when the music stops. And it stops on January 3, when the Iowa caucuses meet.
Posted on December 13, 2011
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By Elvin Lim The Republican game of musical chairs continues. One thing remains: Mitt Romney has held on to his seat as a leading contender for the nomination in the last four years.
Posted on January 3, 2012
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By Elvin Lim The first votes for the 2012 elections have been cast. Clearly the headline from last week's Iowa caucuses is the Santorum surge in the last couple of days, better timed than any of the other candidates who had had their day in the sun. Oh, and Mitt Romney eked out about an 8-votes win matching his own performance by percentage points in 2008.
Posted on January 10, 2012
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by Elvin Lim Newt Gingrich has won the biggest primary prize up for grabs so far. Romney's win in New Hampshire has been discounted because he's from neighboring Massachusetts, while poor Rick Santorum's newly recently declared victory in Iowa was quickly eclipsed by the news about Rick Perry dropping put of the race, ABC's interview with Gingrich's ex-wife, and the scuffle over Romney's tax returns. This is a huge victory for Gingrich because every winner in South Carolina since 1980 has gone on to win the nomination.
Posted on January 31, 2012
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By Elvin Lim The very reason why Gingrich appeals to primary voters is the reason why he will not do well with independents voters in the fall. (And that's an assessment coming from Anne Coulter.) Gingrich has fire, but placed alongside No Drama Obama, he's going to look like a very unlikeable candidate. There's hardly anyone who has worked closely with the former Speaker who has endorsed him — which tells us a lot about the guy.
Posted on January 31, 2012
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By Elvin Lim The Republican party has traditionally been the more conservative party not only in terms of values but also in terms of organization reform. Leaders tend to be slower than their Democratic counterparts in reforming the nomination process, and voters tend to be more deferential to the last cycle's runner-up to the winner.
Posted on February 14, 2012
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By Elvin Lim The Republican nomination race is still Mitt Romney's to lose, but he is in trouble yet again, and his cloak of inevitability is fast disappearing.
Posted on February 28, 2012
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By Elvin Lim Mitt Romney had an ok Tuesday night, no better or worse than the ones he's had so far. But it is still a story because Romney needed his wins in Arizona and especially Michigan. No news is great news for a campaign's whose raison d'être has consistently been 'take whoever is the anti-Romney candidate down.'
Posted on March 6, 2012
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By Elvin Lim At this time four years ago, Senators Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama were asking Democratic primary voters to consider the question, "who would be the better president?" This year, Republican candidates are asking their electorate to consider, "who would be worse?" This contrast explains why President Obama has so far resisted the considerable headwind against his re-election.
Posted on March 13, 2012
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Rick Santorum had a great night, but he would need to win 70 percent of the delegates moving forward to unseat frontrunner Mitt Romney. That's not going to happen, but it'll be a painful road toward the increasingly inevitable. As late in this game, powerful conservatives like Thomas Sowell, Rush Limbaugh, and Tony Perkins are still advocating for Rick Santorum and other non-moderate candidates. Every day they continue to do this, they make less likely confident predictions from outside the beltway that Republicans will come together in the Fall against Obama.
Posted on March 27, 2012
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By Elvin Lim Democrats and the Obama administration have seriously if not fatally fumbled on the simple answer to a question Justice Scalia posed: "Could you define the market — everybody has to buy food sooner or later, so you define the market as food, therefore, everybody is in the market; therefore, you can make people buy broccoli?"
Posted on April 3, 2012
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By Elvin Lim The General Election campaign appears to be in full swing now that Mitt Romney is the presumptive nominee for the Republican Party. But this is really only true on the Republican side. Team Obama is obviously holding back.
Posted on April 24, 2012
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By Elvin Lim With the airwaves ablaze with a new controversy about President Obama campaign ad, it may be worth thinking about why it is so difficult for many Americans, even some on the Left, to give Obama credit for anything. To proffer a tentative answer, I'm going to sketch the landscape of the comparison group: how other presidents have been vilified.
Posted on May 8, 2012
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By Elvin Lim Barack Obama proved this week that his understanding of public opinion and how timing can be used to massage the media's storyline is head-and-shoulders above any campaigner we have known in modern history. Mitt Romney cannot begin to overestimate the gap between what Obama enacts by intuition and what he himself can barely perform by imitation.
Posted on May 15, 2012
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By Elvin Lim How quickly fortunes change. For the first time this election season, the Republicans look poised not only to match Obama's fundraising ability, but to beat him at it. There is certainly no way that Obama is going to enjoy the 3 to 1 advantage he had over McCain four years ago. All this is also to say, then, that for the first time this year, Mitt Romney could be the frontrunner in the presidential race.
Posted on June 12, 2012
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By Elvin Lim Senator Edward Kennedy called healthcare reform the 'the great unfinished business of our time.' Now it is finished. Every branch of the US government has had its say. The Supreme Court decision also marks the end of the Rehnquist era. No longer can we reliably predict that it would always send powers back to the states. Indeed, it said 'No' to 26 states which had challenged the Affordable Care Act.
Posted on July 3, 2012
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By Elvin Lim In our fast-paced world where candidates throw everything but the sink at television and Internet audiences to see what sticks, Mitt Romney made a particularly gutsy move last week by adopting Medicare in his fight against Obama and Obamacare. Together with the selection of Paul Ryan as VP candidate, this was a game change revealing that Team Romney is going straight for demographics in this home stretch of the campaign.
Posted on August 21, 2012
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By Elvin Lim The Republicans' convention bump for Mitt Romney appears to be muted. Why? There was a lot of bad luck. Holding the convention before the Labor Day weekend caused television viewership to go down by 30 percent, as did the competing and distracting news about Hurricane Isaac. The Clint Eastwood invisible chair wasn't a disaster, but a wasted opportunity that Romney's advisors should have vetted. V
Posted on September 4, 2012
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By Elvin Lim The Democrats are enjoying a little bump from their convention last week, but it had little to do with Barack Obama and a lot to do with Bill Clinton. The reason why Clinton's speech worked was because he was specifically charged to address the substance of his speech to independents and older white males. He was very successful in making his speech appear reasonable, while delivering very partisan conclusions. As such, the speech was becomingly presidential.
Posted on September 11, 2012
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By Elvin Lim Mitt Romney definitely did not count on foreign policy becoming a major issue two weeks after he chose budget hawk, Paul Ryan, to be his running mate, making his the weakest ticket on foreign policy for decades. What is even more perverse is that Romney himself chose to go off message.
Posted on September 18, 2012
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By Elvin Lim The Obama campaign, by fortune or by wit, has peaked at the right moment. Early voting has already started in Virginia, and starts in Iowa and Ohio next week. This means that the polls telling a uniform story of an Obama surge in crucial swing states aren't just snap-shots; they are predictive of how voters — about 35 percent of total voters — are actually starting to vote as we speak.
Posted on October 2, 2012
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By Elvin Lim President Obama had a bad night. The key to succeeding in a presidential debate is recognizing that it is not a parliamentary debate. The rules, the moderator, and even the immediate audience (since they are not permitted to applaud) do not matter. Instead, candidates should bare their souls to the camera lenses. There, magic is made.
Posted on October 9, 2012
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By Elvin Lim The second presidential debate tells us about the candidates' readings of their own campaigns. Both Romney and Obama were fighting for air time, trying to break out of the impasse of "he-said-she-said." Women were mentioned about 30 times in the debate because Romney knew that he had to close the gender gap. Obama joined in on the China bashing because Romney has started to gain traction with workers in Ohio with his attacks on China's trade violations.
Posted on October 23, 2012
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By Elvin Lim Mitt Romney barely passed the bar on Monday night's debate. He was tentative and guarded, not just because he was being strategic, but because he wasn't (understandably) in command of the facts of foreign policy of which a sitting president is in command. Barack Obama 'won' the debate, but it will have minimal impact on altering the fundamental dynamics of the race.
Posted on October 30, 2012
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By Elvin Lim Everything is political at this time of the electoral calendar, so there is no use pretending that Hurricane Sandy will not have an effect on the presidential race. President Obama has been given a new life line. Forced to take politics out of his campaign, he can take a break from defending his record for two days. When an incumbent president is forced by emergency events to stop talking politics, he always enjoys the glow emanating form the Oval Office.
Posted on November 6, 2012
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By Elvin Lim It is tempting now that the election returns are in for us to want to plow forward and forget the spectacular silliness we just traversed. But before we move on, it is critical that we call out those who had predicted a huge Romney victory, among them Dick Morris, Michael Barone, and Karl Rove. Ours is the era of partisan polling, and it is intellectually dishonest and bad for democracy.
Posted on November 13, 2012
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By Elvin Lim What is it about conservative opposition to Obama's policy in Libya? It appears conservative critics think he has done both too little too late in Libya, and also too much. While there is agreement on the Right that whatever Obama does is bad policy, the divergent critical voices are not so much evidence of
Posted on March 29, 2011
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