Obama's refusal of federal funding

Obama's refusal to accept the $85 million standard offer of federal funding for presidential candidates (the first time it has been turned down by a presidential candidate since it was put in place after Nixon's Watergate) is another sign of Obama's distrust of central government, and a further suggestion he is not a typical big state, high tax, high spend liberal. 

The presidential campaign subsidy was created with the laudable aim of generating a level playing field for presidential candidates, and reducing the dependence on lobby groups. However, the sum may be augmented by supporting campaigns from political parties. This is where Obama, perhaps justifiably, identifies bias in the system. Currently the Republican party has $20 million in its coffers, whereas the Democratic party only has $2 million.

Obama's solution is radical, but not entirely surprising. Given the circumstances in which he finds himself, he prefers to raise his presidential campaign finance from private donations. This follows his unprecedentedly successful fundraising efforts for the Democratic nomination, during which he raised more than twice as much primarily from small donors ($265 million) as the formidable Clinton machine ($115 million). Is his preference for the free market in raising funds, as opposed to government subsidy, indicative of future policy? 

This question has been obscured by the recent criticism levelled at Obama in media such as the New York Times and Washington Post for reneging on an assurance which he gave last year that he would abide by the federal election funding scheme set up after the 1974 Watergate scandal. Obama argues that the well-funded Republican party "has mastered the art of gaming" what he calls a "broken system", for example by mounting supporting campaigns for its candidate such as the "swift boat" campaign which so damaged Kerry. If Obama committed himself to accepting the subsidy,  he would forgo the advantage of raising up to $400 million for his presidential campaign from private donors. He would thus throw away a major campaign advantage over McCain, who has not been able to remotely match him in direct fundraising from supporters. In the interests of reaching the presidency, and against the current criticisms of the New York Times and Washington Post, Obama's decision is not only understandable but reflects the tactical clarity and occasional ruthlessness which has characterised his entire campaign. 

There are two strands in Obama's thinking which support the conclusion that his preference for market fundraising reflects a deeper attitude than limited tactical campaign advantage. In his book The Audacity of Hope Obama constantly praises the free market, and cites its role as a key difference between the successful US economy and other countries, such as Indonesia, in which he has lived in or (in the case of Kenya) has consistently visited. The second strand is Obama's "outsider" status, his dislike of the federal government machine and its association with the "old" politics. This leads to the question: if Obama instinctively seeks solutions outside the federal machine for raising his own campaign finance, is he not equally likely to seek non-centrist solutions in managing the economy?

This orientation is present in Obama's campaign rhetoric. Hillary Clinton, a classic big tax, big spend centrist, often speaks of being the people's champion, which is code for imposing policy decisions through central government. By contrast Obama's campaign appeal is geared towards individual aspiration, towards encouraging the individual to overcome obstacles, so that groups of empowered individuals can make a difference ("Yes we can"). It could be said that Clinton, a policy wonk to her fingertips, prefers to rule, whereas Obama prefers to enable.

In an impressive article in the Times, the historian Tristram Hunt has analysed Obama's political gestation in the city of Chicago. Hunt points out that Chicago is the crucible of American socialism, but also that its formidable university (where Obama lectures in law) is perhaps most famous for the "Chicago school" of revolutionary free-market economists, whose leading lights included Milton Friedman and Friedrich von Hayek. 

Perhaps significantly, Milton Friedman's son David, a libertarian, has recently pronounced himself an Obamacon partly because he believes Obama supports school vouchers, but also because Obama's objectives of withdrawing from Iraq and reining back the Patriot Act fulfil libertarian ideals.

A combination of left wing social ideals (popular with the liberal audience) and small state economic radicalism (more acceptable to America's large libertarian wing than, say, Clintonite centralism) would be a formidable platform for gathering votes from both the left and right. Let us see whether these broad predictions are fulfilled over the next few months as Obama tacks to the centre and begins to assemble his presidential support.

David Davis part 2

Following the resignation of David Davis from Parliament over the issue of civil liberties, and his precipitation of a local constituency election, a number of commentators have pointed out that there is a significant difference in the response between those in the "Westminster village", who have largely been hostile to Davis, and the blogosphere and wider public realm, where the response has been strongly supportive.

One of the central claims of the Westminster village — that Davis's action will damage the Conservative party — already shows signs of being ill-founded. The latest opinion polls, taken after Davis's spectacular resignation, indicate an increased Conservative lead over Labour. If anything, the public seems to like politicians who act out of principle and against the interests of their own career.

In my last posting, I proposed that a key benefit of the Davis resignation and local election is that it demonstrates the fundamental divide between libertarians and authoritarians — a division which is arguably more important than that between the increasingly imprecise "right" and "left". Adding to this welcome new political theatre, the doughty maverick Labour MP Bob Marshall-Andrews, an anti-Iraq War protester and general thorn in the side of New Labour, has thrown his support behind Davis.

Who will stand against Davis, and champion the case that in the present international environment security should take precedence over liberty? It is a position profoundly worth arguing, and ideally it demands a polemicist of the highest order. Will one of the New Labour heavyweights step into the breach? Or perhaps a big Tory beast, like Michael Heseltine, who was one of the first to voice criticism of Davis's resignation?

We suspect not. In this respect, Davis has already demonstrated that his critics in the Westminster village may be happy to question his motives and his sanity from the sidelines, but when the opportunity arises to make their case in open and fair debate, all we have heard so far is the sound of shuffling feet.

David Davis and the emergence of the new politics

It is fascinating to observe the fallout from the resignation yesterday from Parliament by David Davis, the shadow foreign secretary and runner-up to David Cameron in the Conservative leadership election of two years ago. The resignation, on what appears to be a matter of deepest principle, has induced in the reporting classes something close to collective nervous breakdown.

Those who make their living by commenting on politics always seek, by instinct, to look beneath the action for an ulterior motive, preferably one which is self-serving and venal. Psychologists call this “projection”. In Davis’s case, that community simply cannot bring itself to believe Davis’s explanation — namely, that he was so disgusted by the recent narrow vote in favour of extending detention without trial to 42 days, and the background whipping and bribing which seems to have taken place to ensure that narrow majority, that he felt obliged to resign his Parliamentary seat and hold a local election on the issue of civil liberties. Davis has said the vote was the last straw for him in a long decade of the erosion of civil rights under Labour, including the recent legislation for identity cards and the installation of one public surveillance camera for every 14 people in the country.

With superb cynicism, Harriet Harman, Labour’s deputy leader, claimed that the resignation was the result of internal tensions within the Conservative party. This might sound plausible enough, but Davis and Cameron are both in strong agreement in their opposition to the extension to 42 days.

Members of the commentariat have variously assumed as Davis’s motive uncontrolled egotism, a rush of blood to the head, the frustrations of acting as second fiddle to David Cameron, various hypothetical (and largely unsupported) divergences of political view within the shadow cabinet — anything, that is, but what appears to be the actual motive, which is to bring to public view the central issue of Labour’s systematic attack on civil liberties through the admittedly dramatic intervention of a local election precipitated by Davis’s resignation.

Something else may surprise the commentariat when it has recovered from its hysteria over the fact that a politician is capable, for once, of acting out of principle. It is a feature which, so far as we know, has not been commented upon. This emerges from the fact that Nick Clegg, the leader of the Liberal Democrats, has refused to allow his party to compete for the seat because he believes that the issues on which Davis are resigning are more important than simple party advantage. Clegg emphasises that he does not agree on much else with Davis, who is in favour of capital punishment for certain offences and has somewhat draconian views on the restriction of immigration. But this only serves to emphasise the point. The resignation episode is one of the first signs of the radical reordering of politics into libertarians and centralists. The “right-wing” Davis and the “centre-left” Clegg have found an issue of principle — the defence of civil liberties against an overbearing state — on which both, in their own ways, are prepared to make a stand. Meanwhile, while allowing time for the commentariat to recover from their collective hysteria about Davis’s motives, let us prepare ourselves for a remarkable few weeks of much-needed debate on a crucially important subject until the local election takes place.