While in France the political theater is in full swing with its numerous candidates from both the right and left, the U.S., in contrast, is in the opposite situation. We’re looking in vain right now for someone who will compete next year against Barack Obama. In nine months, the Iowa primaries will begin, the first step on a journey that will lead to the presidential elections on Nov. 6, 2012. At this point in 2007, no fewer than 10 Democrats and eight Republicans had already declared that they were running. This year … no one has yet taken the plunge.
President Obama should make known his intention to seek reelection during the month of March, and he’s already moved his political office from Washington, D.C. to Chicago. But the Republican race remains open. While the GOP won a major victory in the congressional elections last November — regaining the majority in the House of Representatives and taking 11 governor seats from the Democrats — its strategy for the presidential election is anything but developed. Each day brings its share of withdrawals. There are a few mavericks who are willing to enter the forum of the primaries to advance their ideas, like Ron Paul, the libertarian Texan elected to the House of Representatives, or businessman Donald Trump, but they have no real hope of victory.
The serious candidates are not in a hurry to enter the fray. Some already have a sufficient reputation in the country for not taking hits earlier than necessary. This also allows them to conserve their resources, although funding for the 2012 campaign season should be much easier. According to a 2010 Supreme Court ruling (“Citizens United”), companies now have the right to participate in the financing of media campaigns for candidates of their choosing.
As a result, Mitt Romney, former candidate in 2008 and former governor of Massachusetts, has stepped up his public appearances but hasn’t jumped into the water. Currently considered the most serious potential candidate for the GOP, the wealthy businessman shares with Jon Huntsman, the former U.S. ambassador to China, the handicap of being Mormon. A former Minnesota governor, Tim Pawlenty, meanwhile seeks to represent the socially conservative right. He is currently touring the country to promote his latest book, “Courage to Stand.”
Fox News, Rupert Murdoch’s news channel, houses within its walls a slew of potential candidates. It just suspended the airtime (and pay) of former Senator Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania, as well as Newt Gingrich, pending their decision to run or not. Gingrich, the former speaker of the House of Representatives, is sure to be a great “show man” if he runs. He has worked hard in recent months to bridge the gap between the Republican Party and the tea party. The face of that movement, Sarah Palin, continues to hesitate. The Republican Party establishment is against the former vice-presidential candidate to John McCain because it sees her candidacy as a guaranteed loss against Barack Obama. But many are willing to bet that she’ll run anyway, if only to maintain an image that she has become a millionaire since the last campaign. Nevertheless, along the lines of Mike Huckabee, an unsuccessful candidate for the 2008 Republican primaries, she prefers for now to continue to enjoy her role on Fox News and her income from the channel.
On the ground, Republican activists are impatient. “A curious trend is emerging in the early days of the 2012 presidential race: Republican voters are searching for candidates far more aggressively than candidates are searching for voters,” The New York Times recently observed.
Despite the election results last November, the Republican Party is very hesitant. In spite of the test of his power, economic hardship, the bitterness of his left wing and a recent unfavorable vote to his party, Barack Obama will be very difficult to beat. Today, the polls consistently indicate that he will win, regardless of his opponent.
His recovery during the congressional session that followed the November elections shows that he knows how to refocus his agenda. The fact that he extended tax cuts for two more years has improved his image with Republicans and independents, who will be key to his reelection. According to a poll released last week by Bloomberg, 51 percent of Americans believe that Barack Obama doesn’t have the right formula to create long-term growth. But when asked who has the best vision for the future, 45 percent of them responded in favor of the current president compared with 33 percent in favor of Republicans.
The newly elected GOP members, who went to war against unions and who want to cut spending at both the local and federal levels, seek to profit from the mobilization of the tea party. But they may also, by eliminating government jobs and various types of government assistance, risk alienating Americans who are still suffering from the crisis. A recent report by “60 Minutes” on CBS examined the daily life of millions of children who live in motels or in their parents’ cars because their homes were lost, hitting America in the gut. All parts of the country are still suffering, even if unemployment has fallen to 8.9 percent. That’s a reality that the next candidates won’t be able to ignore, no more than the profound rejection still experienced on Wall Street. This has already led David Plouffe, Barack Obama’s political advisor, to single out the housewife from Ohio, one of the states that the next president absolutely must win if he wants to win the election, as the umpire of the next election.
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