Download Politics

 Politics and fiat
 Public and/versus congressional perception
 Perception of and tradeoff between issues
 Spin—who controls perception of the plan, and thus
shapes public/congressional reaction
 Media
 Opposition Party
 White House
 Members of president’s party
 Does ‘normal means’ require congressional
involvement/action
 Obama tends to get credit and blame
◦ Visibility
◦ Psychological needs of the electorate (leadership)
◦ Overstatement of importance in policymaking
◦ Perceptual unitary nature of presidency vs. other branches
 Teams often use alternate agents (agencies, congress,
courts, other countries) to avoid politics links
 Key Question—who will the hurt / benefitting groups
blame
 THESIS: gestures that appeal to the other party
increase the probability that other legislation will pass
 Bipart: Plan fosters cooperation, this spills over to
other issues
 Olive Branch: Plan is a sop to the GOP, invites horsetrading
 Logrolling: Passing one policy “breaks the logjam”
that prevents other policies from passing… fosters
momentum that transfers between legislative
initiatives
 THESIS: Presidents lose credibility when they are seen
to change positions on important issues
 Most ‘flip flop’ links describe Bush’s rolling of Kerry in
the ‘04 presidential campaign: “I voted for war funding
before I voted against it”
 Has weaknesses as an internal link argument—easier
to challenge uniqueness
 Is the GOLD STANDARD of politics internals—most
internal links can be explained and described in terms
of political capital
 Describes the president’s overall ability to get their way
with Congress—twist arms, offer favors, issue threats
 Key considerations include
 Is it limited?
 Does it cross over between issues?
 Is it replenishable
 THESIS: Presidents with public approval are more
likely to get their way with congress—congress is afraid
to challenge popular presidents
 This is backed up by a ton of social science-esque
research (Edwards et al.)
 Argument applies to both the POLICY and the
PRESIDENT
 Interest groups can shape public reaction to a policy
 THESIS: Winners Win—presidents that push through
contentious policies as being successful (winners),
decreasing the chance that congress will challenge
them in the future
 Health care reform (ACA) is a decent example
 Thesis was originally proposed by Norman Ornstein
 Argument also works in reverse—presidents who lose
have a more difficult time forcing congress into line
on future votes
 THESIS: The reactions of like-minded lawmakers to
the plan influence the chance of passage of future
legislation
 At the most basic level
◦ Democrats (unity)
◦ Republicans (cooperation)
 Other groups
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Dem moderates
Blue dogs
New Democrats
GOP moderates
 McConnell (GOP senate leader)
 Boehner (GOP house leader)
 Reid (Dem senate leader)
 Pelosi (Dem house leader)
 McCain, Collins (GOP senators, centrists)
 THESIS: organized groups react to the plan in ways
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that impacts the future political process
This can include rewarding or punishing politicians
through the use of campaign funding, directing
advertising, and other means of exerting influence
Are VERY powerful link arguments, especially because
the media and academics like to talk about their
relative power
Are KEY on this topic because public reaction to most
cases will be pretty minimal
Who are important lobbies on this topic?
 Control of House (GOP) and Senate (Dems) is split
between the two major parties
 House: 234 GOP / 201 Dems
 Senate: 54(55) Dems / 45 GOP
 Probability of passage of *any* meaningful legislation is
very low
 Hastert Rule (House)
 Filibuster (Senate)
 Passage of any major legislation requires at least some GOP
support
 GOP-acceptable bills likely alienate more liberal
Democrats
 Election-season starts this fall and compromises a lot of
potential politics arguments
 Immigration Reform
 Climate Change (EPA authority)
 Budget
 Gun Control
 Transatlantic Trade/TPA