One of the odder stories of the last week has been the disappearance of SC Gov. Mark Sanford, who reportedly went hiking on the Appalachian Trail, and was out of touch with his staff and family for at least five days. His lieutenant governor, Andre Bauer–a fellow Republican, BTW–publicly freaked over the disappearance. And all sorts of fun-loving amateur sleuths have been all over this (including, according to Josh Marshall, a SC television reporter who’s found a witness who saw Sanford boarding a plane in Atlanta several days ago). Admittedly, you can get in a pretty good hike in at Hartsfield-Jackson Airport, but it’s not exactly the best place for getting close to God or nature.
Sanford finally called his staff, and will reportedly return to his office on Wednesday. But Southern Political Report‘s Tom Baxter has been the first to allude to the real mystery:

How, it was asked, could a governor be absent from his four sons on Father’s Day and think he could run for president? How could his wife not be certain of his whereabouts? Under what circumstances could Lt. Gov. Andre Bauer take charge if there were an emergency? And why was the last ping on the governor’s cell phone from a location near Atlanta, when there are easier ways to access the trail?
Perhaps the most puzzling question went unasked, however: How did anyone notice he was gone?
Sanford, who has feuded with Republicans and Democrats alike, and who inquired after he was elected whether he could live in his beach house on Sullivan’s Island rather than the governor’s mansion in Columbia, can lay claim to being – the first word to come to mind is “disengaged,” but it would be more accurate to say, “distant” governor in the country.

I can relate. I won’t name any names, but I once worked for an elected official who sometimes seemed to disappear for months at a time, right there in his office.
Which leads to a philosophical question: If a governor walks in the woods, and nobody’s there to see it, is he invisible?
UPDATE: As you may have heard by now, turns out Sanford was in Argentina, not Appalachia, because he wanted some place “exotic” to recover from the rigors of the SC legislative session, which ended with an assortment of veto overrides by the Republican-controlled legislature. Whatever else this “story” represents, it’s got to be one of the most inept public relations jobs by a major politician since Larry Craig’s explanation of why he got arrested in an airport restroom.
UPDATE II: Southern Political Report says that there’s now talk among SC legislators about impeaching Sanford. This really isn’t working out well for the would-be 2012 presidential candidate.

You may have heard that the U.S. Supreme Court issued its long-awaited decision on a challenge to the constitutionality of Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act, the provision that requires nine states and a scattering of other jurisdictions to secure “preclearances” from the Justice Department for changes in election procedures or legislative districts (congressional, state or local).
To the surprise of many, the Supremes chose on a 8-1 vote to decide the case on the very narrow grounds of enabling the petitioning local government unit a chance to “opt out” of Section 5 coverage. But the opinion penned by Chief Justice Roberts makes it abundantly clear that the next challenge will lead to invalidation of Section 5 unless Congress acts quickly to update the evidence of discrimination underlying Article 5 coverage, and tailor coverage accordingly. The data for Section 5 coverage currently only goes up to 1972, though the historic data, of course, of jurisdictions that used to keep minorities from voting at all isn’t going to change.
There’s a pretty strong feeling among legal beagles that Congress won’t be able to meet this condition because of the intense wrangling that comparisons of this or that jurisdiction’s voting rights behavior will engender. So it’s probably tiime to begin thinking about what the next round of decennial redistricting will look like without Section 5 as a factor (though Section 2 lawsuits after the fact will still be available). I’ve got a post up at fivethirtyeight.com that briefly gets into the potential impact.

To hear a lot of Republicans right now, Barack Obama is all but on the ropes, his approval ratings slipping, the credibility of his economic stimulus package in tatters, his health plan under seige, his foreign policy stature diminished each day by events in Iran, and above all, his entire agenda threatened by a surge of public worry about government spending and federal deficits.
You don’t have to scoff at any and every danger sign for the administration to understand that when push comes to shove, Republicans just aren’t providing any credible alternative. And via Greg Sargent, the latest evidence is in a series of questions asked in the new ABC/Washington Post survey about the comparative trustworthiness of Barack Obama and Republicans in Congress on some basic issues.
On health care, it’s Obama 55%, GOPers 27%; on the economy, it’s Obama 55%, GOPers 31%. And check out these two categories: on the federal budget deficit, it’s Obama 56%, GOPers 30%, and on the threat of terrorism, it’s Obama 55%, GOPers 34%.
As I pointed out the other day, all the expressed unhappiness in the world with Obama’s policies won’t ultimately matter (at least in terms of 2010 and 2012) unless they translate into support for the opposition party, and Obama’s problems continue to look pretty small compared to those of the Republican Party.
I’m sure most of you remember the moment earlier this year when the President, responding to demands that he let Republicans rewrite his stimulus legislation to fit their own views, reminded them: “I won.” When it comes to the two-party competition, he’s still winning.

Data point one: virtually all congressional Republicans violently oppose a “public option” in a competitive system for health plans.
Data point two: half of rank-and-file Republicans support a “public option” in the most credible recent surveys.
So, if Barack Obama wants to break the decades-long gridlock on health reform, exhibit “bipartisanship,” and expose weaknesses in the opposition, which Republicans should he focus on?
My answer is in a post over at fivethirtyeight.com. Positive comments by Jonathan Cohn are here, and by Digby here. Suffice it to say that if I’ve been right about Obama’s strategy of “grassroots bipartisanship,” this is an excellent opportunity for him to pursue it.

Veterans of the political wars of the 1990s will recall that some conservatives perpetually alternated between describing Bill Clinton as “liberal! liberal! liberal!” and attacking him for “stealing our ideas” (this last thought motivating my colleague Will Marshall to note that “it’s hard to steal from an empty wallet”). We’re already seeing the same dynamic at work in their takes on Barack Obama.
Check out this characterization of the President (via Jason Zingerle) by The Corner’s Andy McCarthy:

The key to understanding Obama, on Iran as on other matters, is that he is a power-politician of the hard Left : He is steeped in Leftist ideology, fueled in anger and resentment over what he chooses to see in America’s history, but a “pragmatist” in the sense that where ideology and power collide (as they are apt to do when your ideology becomes less popular the more people understand it), Obama will always give ground on ideology (as little as circumstances allow) in order to maintain his grip on power.

So he’s a hardened ideologue except when he’s not.
In a follow-up post at TNR, Christopher Orr offered this hilarous comment:

I just wish that, as long as McCarthy was offering such a pointless analysis, he’d been a little more creative with his opposing categories. Something on the order of, “The key to understanding Obama is that he is a hybrid of delicate, magic unicorn and ravenous zombie. He will frolic in the woodlands, spreading pixie dust and joy, until his hunger for human brains begins to rise…”

Orr offers a parody which is funny because it’s not far from what people like McCarthy are actually saying.

It hasn’t gotten much attention in self-absorbed Washington, but the continuing budget struggles of state governments in much of the country aren’t getting any better. Abby Goodnough of The New York Times has the sad details:

With state revenues in a free fall and the economy choked by the worst recession in 60 years, governors and legislatures are approving program cuts, layoffs and, to a smaller degree, tax increases that were previously unthinkable.
All but four states must have new budgets in place less than two weeks from now — by July 1, the start of their fiscal year. But most are already predicting shortfalls as tax collections shrink, unemployment rises and the stock market remains in turmoil.
“These are some of the worst numbers we have ever seen,” said Scott D. Pattison, executive director of the National Association of State Budget Officers, adding that the federal stimulus money that began flowing this spring was the only thing preventing widespread paralysis, particularly in the areas of education and health care. “If we didn’t have those funds, I think we’d have an incredible number of states just really unsure of how they were going to get a new budget out.”

Voters ought to be asking the congressional Republicans who almost unanimously voted against the stimulus legislation about that.
But in the meantime, the worst may lie ahead, as Pamela Prah of Stateliine.org explains:

While 2009 is bad, states worry 2010 and beyond will be even worse. Even if the national recession ends this year as many predict, the outlook for states is bleak. State fiscal conditions historically lag behind national economic recovery. The year after a recession ends is typically when state budgets are hit hardest, because by then, Medicaid rolls have swelled with the higher numbers of the unemployed who have lost their health insurance.

In April the National Conference of State Legislatures estimated that aggregate state budget shortfalls for fiscal year 2010 would reach $121 billion.
You should read the New York Times piece for examples of where the states are cutting or threatening to cut services, from Arnold Schwarzenegger’s suggestion that California’s entire public assistance program be shut down, to the poignant decision in Illinois to stop paying for about 10,000 funerals for poor people. We’re going to be hearing a lot more of these type of stories in the immediate future, and at some point, they should get some serious attention in Washington.

The reluctance of moderate Democrats in both Houses of Congress to support key elements of the Obama administration’s agenda has unsurprisingly angered others in the progressive coalition.
Among the angry, OpenLeft’s estimable Chris Bowers has come up with a new strategy that’s more immediate than his site’s general argument for launching or threatening primary challengers to “centrist’ Dems: molding the Progressive Caucus into a more aggressive faction that will withhold votes for unacceptable legislation, just like the Blue Dogs:

Instead of 60 votes in the Senate, what progressives need is Democratic control of both branches of Congress, control of the White House, and a progressive block of at least 13 Senators and 45 House members that will vote against Democratic legislation unless their demands are met. What we need is our own version of the Blue Dogs and Evan Bayh’s “conservodem” Senate group that is large enough, and staunch enough, to be able to block Democratic legislation by joining with Republicans.
We need this group to draw hard lines in the sand for the two biggest legislative priorities of 2009: health care and climate change. The group needs to make it clear that, if their demands are not met, then no climate change or health care legislation of any sort will be passed. Demands like:
1. Health care: A public health insurance option that is immediately available to all Americans.
2. Climate change: Restoring the EPA’s ability to regulate carbon and renewable energy targets that surpass those put in place by China..

The impact of such a group of Super-Blue Dogs, of course, totally depends on the credibility of its threats to vote with Republicans against Obama and leadership-sponsored legislation. Chris Bowers obviously thinks they should and would, but the administration’s point of view on this dynamic will be crucial. Maybe they’d actually like a left-counterpart to the Blue Dogs,or maybe they think there are enough dogs-a-barking right now.

As discussed here, there was a lot of talk yesterday about two big national polls that showed some weakening of public support for elements of the Obama agenda, and a sudden upsurge of concern about budget deficits, along with continued high support levels for the President, and continued hard times for Republicans. (A third poll, from Pew, came out later in the day, and generally showed the same trends).
Most of the commentary on the polls focused on short-term issues, particularly health care. But over at The New Republic, TDS Co-Editor William Galston offered a much broader assessment about public opinion trends that point towards possible difficulty for Democrats in the 2010 elections. After noting the President’ still-strong overall approval ratings, and the strong public belief that he inherited many of the country’s problems, Galston notes these danger signs for Obama and Democrats:

[T]he people have little confidence in government as an effective instrument of public purpose. Trust in government remains near an historic low and has not improved significantly since the beginning of Obama’s presidency. Only 34 percent think that government should do more to solve national problems, down seven points in the past three months. Sixty-nine percent express “a great deal” or “quite a bit” of concern about the expanding role of the federal government in areas such as automobile companies, corporate compensation, and health care.
Second, people are unsure about Obama’s overall economic strategy. Only 46 percent say that they are “extremely” or “quite” confident that the president has the right set of goals and policies to improve the economy; 53 percent are not. According to Pew, approval of the president’s handling of the economy has declined by eight points (from 60 to 52 percent) since mid-April.
Third, evidence is accumulating that the administration misjudged the public’s reaction to increased spending and rising budget deficits, which now rank second in the list of top concerns in the NYT/CBS poll, behind only job creation and economic growth, and ahead of health care costs as an economic issue….
Fourth, while there is majority support for the broad architecture of health reform that the administration espouses, doubts about specifics are multiplying.

Moroever, says Galston, the economic situation is not likely to visibly improve–particularly in terms of unemployment–before voters go to the polls in November of 2010:

Indeed, [the] history of recessions over the past three decades suggests that unemployment is likely to be at least as high on Election Day next year as it is today. In the face of jobless recoveries, both Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton saw their personal popularity decline during their first two years in office, and their parties experienced significant losses during the first mid-term test.
The best thing Democrats have going for them right now is the public’s near-total withdrawal of confidence from the Republican Party, which now “enjoys” its lowest rating ever recorded in the NYT/CBS survey–a finding that Pew confirms. But if the deficit surges while the job market languishes, even the Republicans’ collapse may not be enough to save the governing party from a painful reverse next year.

Democrats need to take these warning signs seriously, but I would note three mitigating factors, all related to the fact that elections are between parties and candidates, and are never pure “referenda” on the “governing party.”

Read more…

The “expectations game” is important in politics not just in terms of polls and elections, but also public policy. We’re seeing an excellent example of the power of lowered expectations on the health care front this week.
As noted here yesterday, higher-than-expected CBO cost estimates of draft Senate plans created a bit of a panic among health reform advocates, with gloom-and-doom sentiments enjoying a sudden bull market. So when the Senate Finance Committee leaked a “revised” draft plan to WaPo’s Ezra Klein late yesterday, the reaction was a lot more muted than you might normally expect. The new draft scales down subsidies, ramps up an individual mandate, deploys purchasing cooperatives rather than a public plan, and doesn’t touch the tax exclusion for employer-provided benefits–all decisions that might have produced a major progressive backlash a week ago.
Not so much today. Sure, there’s plenty of unhappiness in the blogosphere. Digby had a succinct reaction:

It’s a good day to be an insurance company CEO. An mandate from the government forcing people to buy your product and no serious competition from anybody but your monopolistic buddies in the industry, all of whom look after each other very, very well.

At Open Left, which has been conducting an aggressive campaign in favor of a strong public plan, the Finance draft produced more of a sigh than a shout:

[E]ven if we can find cost savings, the Senate says it’s too expensive to provide a public healthcare option. Rural Democrats have in many cases sided with the health insurers on this one, in spite of the fact that the small business and self employment base of the rural economy faces significant healthcare infrastructure hurdles.
It’s shameful the way these legislators have completely abandoned their constituents. Who acts like this?
Stand with Dr. Dean and ask your representatives where they stand on a public option.

Then there Ezra Klein, who visibly struggles with himself to characterize the draft plan–finally settling on the term “comprehensive incrementalism”–and then offers this glass-half-full assessment:

It is one of the paradoxes of the legislative process that something that is substantively quite timid can also be quite bold. This version of health reform is far from what the country needs. It is far from what any health-care experts would develop left to their own devices. But it is still a monumental initiative and, if passed, it would be the most significant step forward since the creation of Medicare and Medicaid.

Both Ezra and Matt Yglesias also fell back on hopes that are the legislative equivalent of the halftime locker-room cry: “We’ll get ’em in the fourth quarter:” Here’s Matt:

[T]he cost savings implied by a robust public plan would do a lot to resolve some of the financial issues that are making it difficult for Finance to offer coverage that’s as generous as they initially intended. Thus far, unfortunately, cost conscious centrist senators haven’t tended to look at the public plan in that light. But since any legislation will go through several rounds of ping-pong with more liberal outfits—HELP Committee, the House of Representatives—I hope there’s still some time to turn their thinking around.

Indeed: House Democrats could unveil an outline of their own health care proposal as early as today. It will be most interesting to see if it changes the dynamics of a health care debate that’s gotten quickly bogged down in the Senate. And then the President, who has been relatively quiet about congressional developments on health care, will need to decide when and how to weigh in.
UPDATE: Here’s Jonathan Cohn’s initial and optimistic take on what’s coming out of the House committees.

As alluded to in my earlier post today, two separate developments are coinciding to create a pretty bad atmosphere for progressives and the Obama administration: public opinion surveys indicating that Americans are beginning to worry a lot about budget deficits, and real-life events on Capitol Hill that reinforce the argument that universal health coverage may be more expensive than originally calculated.
In terms of the public focus on deficits, it’s worth noting that polls continue to show that very few Americans blame Barack Obama for the fiscal condition of the country. I have a post up at fivethirtyeight.com examining that finding, and speculating that Republicans may be accidentally insulating the president from blame for deficits in their obsessive desire to attack George W. Bush for “betraying conservative principles” by spilling so much red ink.
While you are over at 538, you should check out Nate Silver’s post examining public opinion trends during the Clinton health care debate of 1993-94. He concludes that the president’s willingness to serve as a front-and-center advocate for health reform mattered then, and matters now. And as I indicated earlier today, I couldn’t agree more. More importantly, that’s the advice being offered by TDS Co-Editor Stan Greenberg, who has been there and done that when it comes to health care reform.
It’s time for some beef from the Bully Pulpit.