One thing thats striking about the presidential race which finally officially begins soon is how much the race has been shaped by Barack Obama. The course of the contests for both the Republican and Democratic nominations would be inconceivable absent the course of the Obama presidency.
This is most apparent in the phenomenon that goes by the name of Donald Trump. Trumps gratuitous insults of rivals reflect the coarseness of Obamas nonstop insults of Republicans and anyone who does not share his views and priorities. Despite his pre-presidential promises of nonpartisanship Obama has been the most grating and vitriolic partisan president of the last 60 years.
Trumps more outlandish proposals -- making Mexico pay for a border wall making common cause with Russia in Syria -- can be seen as a variation on Obamas insistence that climate change is the nations No. 1 problem and his acquiescence in well making common cause with Russia in Syria.
And the adoring crowds that throng Trumps monster rallies what do they remind you of? The crowds that cheered Obama in 2008 as he promised to fundamentally transform America and stop the rise of seas.
The Republicans who have emerged as Trumps chief rivals Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz had interesting beyond-the-Beltway careers pre-2008 (Rubio in the Florida legislature Cruz in the Texas attorney generals office) but emerged as national figures only after Obamas inauguration.
Both won upset victories against established figures in open Senate races. In 2010 Rubio challenged Gov. Charlie Crist who famously hugged Obama in February 2009 forced him out of the Republican primary and beat him handily in the three-way general. In 2012 Cruz challenged Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst held him under 50 percent in the primary and then won the runoff and general election.
Thus both these freshman senators got elected from the nations third and second largest states as Obama opponents. Their differences on immigration and foreign policy are framed as arguments over which one is more anti-Obama.
So Trump never a political candidate until 2015 and Rubio and Cruz unknowns nationally six years ago have been far more successful at engaging the attention and winning the support of Republican caucus-goers and primary voters than have rivals with greater but -- since they have not held public office since 2006 -- less recent achievements.
Jeb Bush is the prime example. I used to write that he was the most effective conservative governor in the last dozen years; now I have to delete dozen and substitute 20. Todays Republicans seem uninterested in Bushs genuinely impressive record in Florida. Theyre troubled by his current support of Common Core which he sees as imposing rigor but they see as imposing liberal mushiness and by his conviction that massive low-skill Latin immigration benefits the nation.
Even further down the pack are the last two Iowa caucus winners: Mike Huckabee who didnt run for re-election as governor of Arkansas in 2006 and Rick Santorum who was defeated badly for re-election in Pennsylvania that year.
Republican voters seem less interested in John Kasichs conservative achievements as House Budget chairman in the 1990s than his support of Obamas Medicaid expansion in 2014. Chris Christie has gained ground by campaigning on his pre-2008 record as U.S. attorney and ignoring his post-2008 record as governor of New Jersey.
On the Democratic side Hillary Clintons career predates the Obama presidency by a lot. At Yale Law she worked for Joe Duffeys Senate campaign in the election of 1970 when Obama was nine and Rubio and Cruz were not yet born.
But this year Clinton is running more on or to the left of the platform of Obama (who has 44 percent job approval) than on that of Bill Clinton (who left office with 65 percent job approval). She is obviously though not particularly deftly responding to a leftward lurch among Democratic voters an impulse often seen in the final years of Democratic administrations: See Gene McCarthy in 1968 Ted Kennedy in 1980 Ralph Nader in 2000 and Bernie Sanders in 2016.
Clinton hopes to replicate Obamas 51 percent coalition at a time when partisan preferences have been stubbornly stable for two decades. But turnout generally has been falling during the Obama presidency; Clinton is unlikely to match Obamas turnout and percentage numbers among blacks and Republican debate viewership has set new records. Its possible that the Obama presidency having reshaped the nomination contests may be reshaping the general electorate -- and not to Democrats benefit.
Michael Barone senior political analyst for The Washington Examiner (www.washingtonexaminer.com) is a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute a Fox News Channel contributor and a co-author of The Almanac of American Politics
One thing thats striking about the presidential race which finally officially begins soon is how much the race has been shaped by Barack Obama. The course of the contests for both the Republican and Democratic nominations would be inconceivable absent the course of the Obama presidency.
This is most apparent in the phenomenon that goes by the name of Donald Trump. Trumps gratuitous insults of rivals reflect the coarseness of Obamas nonstop insults of Republicans and anyone who does not share his views and priorities. Despite his pre-presidential promises of nonpartisanship Obama has been the most grating and vitriolic partisan president of the last 60 years.
Trumps more outlandish proposals -- making Mexico pay for a border wall making common cause with Russia in Syria -- can be seen as a variation on Obamas insistence that climate change is the nations No. 1 problem and his acquiescence in well making common cause with Russia in Syria.
And the adoring crowds that throng Trumps monster rallies what do they remind you of? The crowds that cheered Obama in 2008 as he promised to fundamentally transform America and stop the rise of seas.
The Republicans who have emerged as Trumps chief rivals Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz had interesting beyond-the-Beltway careers pre-2008 (Rubio in the Florida legislature Cruz in the Texas attorney generals office) but emerged as national figures only after Obamas inauguration.
Both won upset victories against established figures in open Senate races. In 2010 Rubio challenged Gov. Charlie Crist who famously hugged Obama in February 2009 forced him out of the Republican primary and beat him handily in the three-way general. In 2012 Cruz challenged Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst held him under 50 percent in the primary and then won the runoff and general election.
Thus both these freshman senators got elected from the nations third and second largest states as Obama opponents. Their differences on immigration and foreign policy are framed as arguments over which one is more anti-Obama.
So Trump never a political candidate until 2015 and Rubio and Cruz unknowns nationally six years ago have been far more successful at engaging the attention and winning the support of Republican caucus-goers and primary voters than have rivals with greater but -- since they have not held public office since 2006 -- less recent achievements.
Jeb Bush is the prime example. I used to write that he was the most effective conservative governor in the last dozen years; now I have to delete dozen and substitute 20. Todays Republicans seem uninterested in Bushs genuinely impressive record in Florida. Theyre troubled by his current support of Common Core which he sees as imposing rigor but they see as imposing liberal mushiness and by his conviction that massive low-skill Latin immigration benefits the nation.
Even further down the pack are the last two Iowa caucus winners: Mike Huckabee who didnt run for re-election as governor of Arkansas in 2006 and Rick Santorum who was defeated badly for re-election in Pennsylvania that year.
Republican voters seem less interested in John Kasichs conservative achievements as House Budget chairman in the 1990s than his support of Obamas Medicaid expansion in 2014. Chris Christie has gained ground by campaigning on his pre-2008 record as U.S. attorney and ignoring his post-2008 record as governor of New Jersey.
On the Democratic side Hillary Clintons career predates the Obama presidency by a lot. At Yale Law she worked for Joe Duffeys Senate campaign in the election of 1970 when Obama was nine and Rubio and Cruz were not yet born.
But this year Clinton is running more on or to the left of the platform of Obama (who has 44 percent job approval) than on that of Bill Clinton (who left office with 65 percent job approval). She is obviously though not particularly deftly responding to a leftward lurch among Democratic voters an impulse often seen in the final years of Democratic administrations: See Gene McCarthy in 1968 Ted Kennedy in 1980 Ralph Nader in 2000 and Bernie Sanders in 2016.
Clinton hopes to replicate Obamas 51 percent coalition at a time when partisan preferences have been stubbornly stable for two decades. But turnout generally has been falling during the Obama presidency; Clinton is unlikely to match Obamas turnout and percentage numbers among blacks and Republican debate viewership has set new records. Its possible that the Obama presidency having reshaped the nomination contests may be reshaping the general electorate -- and not to Democrats benefit.
Michael Barone senior political analyst for The Washington Examiner (www.washingtonexaminer.com) is a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute a Fox News Channel contributor and a co-author of The Almanac of American Politics
