Newswise — Patrick James of the USC College offers a play-by-play on the tactical decisions in each camp that led to Barack Obama's victory. What did Obama do right? Did choosing Sarah Palin cause John McCain's defeat? James also sketches a roadmap for Obama — and the smarting Republican Party — as they look ahead to 2012.
Obama's Slam Dunk
"The Obama campaign did almost everything imaginable right. It was one of the most confidently executed campaigns I've ever seen," James says. Because no black candidate had been elected before, there was an extreme danger to Obama, a pressure like that faced by Jackie Robinson when he broke through the color barrier, James notes. "To win, Obama had to be almost letter perfect, and he was.
"The damage control around him was superb," James adds. "They never fell into a quagmire where they got into talking about someone else's agenda. Obama is a very alive and adaptive thinker, and I just think they ran about as good a campaign as they could. If he had made the mistakes McCain did, he would have been doomed."
McCain's Missteps
Over in McCain's camp, "it was almost a perfect storm of mistakes and box canyons," James comments. "People are post-morteming, saying, 'How could you have picked Sarah Palin? That's where you blew it.'
"But I've reassessed this in my own mind," James notes. "Because McCain was in a desperate position. Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and other people who have strong influence over the Republican base were eviscerating him. That put him in a terrible box. He ran to the middle. He was doomed with the Republican right. They were not going to campaign for him." That lack of support guided McCain's vice presidential pick, according to James.
"It leaked that Palin wasn't exactly his first choice," James says. McCain wanted someone like Joe Lieberman, who was more his type of politician, but that would have sunk his chances with the Republican base. "He was forced to pick Palin or somebody similar to her," James says, and other hard-right conservatives like Bobby Jindal didn't want to join what they saw as a losing campaign.
McCain made one other major error, according to James. "He had a tremendous opportunity when Obama caved to Wall Street pressure on the bailout bill. Obama, George W. Bush and Congress were all saying the same thing. Here's what McCain did terribly wrong," James continues. "He's in this situation where he's many points behind and needs to differentiate himself, the bailout is incredibly unpopular, Bush is supporting it and so is Obama — McCain could have taken away votes by opposing it. That could have had an enormous effect.
"When you look back on the bailout deal, it was really damaging to McCain. Obama's lead opened up at that time, and McCain never caught up," James says. "That was his chance, his golden opportunity."
McCain had lousy political instincts, James concludes. He made bad choices, including floundering around with attack ads, trying to please the base. "None of it worked."
Presidential Mandate vs. Economic Meltdown
In Tuesday's election, which drew record voter turnout in many areas, Obama captured 364 electoral votes to McCain's 162, and a popular vote victory of 53 percent to 46 percent. "I think it would be fair to say it's a mandate for Barack Obama," James comments. But what will he be able to accomplish with it?
"Obama has an almost F.D.R. kind of mandate. That's the good news. The bad news is that the country's broke," James says. Obama may have to put aside the large programs he described on the campaign trail and forget about them. "His economic advisers say to him that some of the big public packages he wanted aren't going to happen. So we'll see a more limited stimulus package than Obama would have wanted. He's a very charismatic guy — he's going to get through some of his agenda, but it's going to be very hard, because we're in hard times."
Strategy Lessons from 2008
James also speculates on the Republican Party's chances to rebuild before 2012, and what it needs to learn from the 2008 race. "In sports, politics and life, there are two reactions to failure. One is to bury your head in sand and look stupid," he says. The other option is to candidly assess what went wrong, and correct course.
The party has drifted from where it was two decades ago, James believes. "Ronald Reagan in his era and George H.W. Bush kept the Republican Party factions in equilibrium," he notes. Republicans today must learn the lesson that you cannot run hard-right, he adds.
"Extremism causes mistakes. If you're busy painting people as atheists and communists, you'll lose, because you'll lose focus. And you'll keep losing until you smarten up," James says. "A lot of work must to be done to make people believe that Republican Party will go back to its principles: small government and defense. All they're talking about is gay marriage, alienating educated voters who are interested in small government and security. Those are the ones who abandoned the Republicans in this race." James advises party strategists to pay attention to shifts in the American populace. "The social conservatives think they're enough to win on their own, and they're not. The Republican base has shrunk."
This election season also held an important lesson for both the Democratic and Republican parties about negative campaigning, James believes. He says that the 2008 race was marked by some really vicious attacks against Barack Obama and Sarah Palin from people on the hard right and hard left — including veiled race-baiting directed at Obama and a sexist dissection of Palin's wardrobe costs. "We got a steady diet of hateful advertising. The public does not want gutter politics; they're tired of it," James says. "And why would good people want to run for office if this is what will happen to them?"
Predictions for Election 2012
Finally, James looks at how the new president-elect must proceed in order to position himself for reelection. "Obama is a skilled politician, but he can do the kind of things that will cause him to be out in 2012," James explains. "His party will be demanding huge expenditures and that he take the party far to the left. If he does those things, a moderate Republican will annihilate him in four years.
"If he's smart, Obama will run to the center," James advises. "He should remind Congress that they're not popular: 'People don't think much of you. They voted for me.' The middle of the road — that's his path back into the White House. If he takes that, he's virtually unstoppable."
Patrick James is professor of International Relations in the USC College and director of USC's Center for International Studies. He is an expert on American foreign policy and U.S. politics.
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