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America Suddenly Has Two Presidents
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Charles Dharapak/AP
Obama has taken a more active pre-inauguration role than any other president-elect in recent history.
Americans are watching the extraordinary sight of two presidents working at once. As President George W. Bush limps through his final days in office, with the economy struggling and seemingly on the verge of collapse, we are greeted every day to roll-outs of President-elect Barack Obama’s new initiatives through another press conference and another policy proclamation. What’s more, there is evidence that the Bush and Obama people have been talking through these immediate decisions.
The visibility of President-elect Obama is unprecedented in scale and scope. More common are experiences such as the one that existed between Franklin D. Roosevelt and Herbert Hoover after 1932. As the economy sank further into a hole, the two did almost nothing together. Hoover reached out to FDR, but the President-elect refused to accept his invitations because he understood that Hoover was attempting to get him to sign on to his policies. When Hoover wrote Roosevelt asking him to make a statement promising to balance the budget and keep the country on the gold standard, as well as to avoid government borrowing, he refused to answer for ten days. When he did finally write back, he said, “I am equally concerned with you in regard to the gravity of the present banking situation, but my thought is that it is so very deep-seated that the fire is bound to spread in spite of anything that is done by way of mere statements.”
The visibility of President-elect Obama is unprecedented in scale and scope.
Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan only met once in period between the election and inauguration in 1980 and 1981. When President Carter met with President-elect Reagan on November 20 at the Oval Office to brief him on the key issues that he would face, including stagflation, the hostage crisis in Iran, and the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, Reagan didn’t say a thing or ask any questions. The president, who was baffled, asked the president-elect if he wanted a notepad, to which Reagan replied no. The two barely interacted over the coming months. And while the Carter White House did the tough work of negotiating with the Iranians, the hostages were not released until the minute after Reagan took the oath of office in order to humiliate the outgoing president.
This split-screen presidential transition is different from others. One reason is the obvious—the fragile state of the economy and reality of a grave economic crisis. The problem is so severe and the failures are so interconnected—not just within the U.S., but also around the globe—that the risk of inaction on any given day is severe.
The second factor has to do with the events of September. In the midst of the presidential campaign and Wall Street meltdown, Congress passed its financial bailout package. The program was structured in such as way that Treasury Department was granted enormous discretionary authority to handle the distribution of funds. As a result, Obama and his team must be a visible presence as discussions are underway about how to handle the fund.
The third factor is that President Bush has taken the term lame duck presidency to new extremes. The president has been resistant to act as economic conditions deteriorate, and even Secretary of the Treasury Henry Paulson has been stumbling in his efforts to implement the financial bailout, sending different signals each day and failing to provide an overall argument to the nation about what has gone wrong and how they are trying to fix it.
The final factor is the media environment. The media does not allow any room for a politician to be quiet—and this is not necessarily a bad thing. With constant chatter on the Internet and reporters hunting for breaking stories, the scrutiny is relentless. For the media, there is no interregnum, no transition, and the honeymoon is already over, as the press demands to know how the president plans to handle this crisis.
The terrorist attacks in India have heightened concern over national security. Bush has already been keeping Obama up to date on the information they have and these discussions will only accelerate in the coming month. In the end, this jump-start may be a good thing. The Obama administration has a more advanced and organized transition than any we have seen in recent times. When Obama is inaugurated on January 20, he will already have been working on the problems facing America for months, and his team will have much more experience than when the campaign ended. Perhaps, without an economic crisis, this accelerated transition can serve as a healthy precedent for future presidents.
Julian E. Zelizer is a professor of history and public affairs at Princeton University's Woodrow Wilson School. He is the co-editor of Rightward Bound: Making America Conservative in the 1970s and is completing a book on the history of national security politics since World War II, to be published by Basic Books.
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This will result in a "weighted" assessment of a President's First One Hundred Days - they'll need to review Obama's First 100 61.
...hmm... no plus-signs allowed here at the Beast.
That's: "Obama's First 100 Plus 61".
Can't wait to see what will happen next. U.S. is changing - I'm glad to see U.S. is moving toward the 21st century and sheds its past. No one will really know the future, but it's looking promising, and I hope president Obama will be able to turn things around for the better for the United States. What makes United States great is that we can shed our pasts and move on, we can change our president every 4 or 8 years, and we are multi-culture country. Peace among races is a must for a multi-culture country like our, and president Obama has strengthen this very idea by becoming a president. Our future is uncertain, but our hope is high.
Okay, even if we stretch the theory and call Obama one of the controlling Presidents, who the hell is the other one? Alexander Haig? And Bush is hardly limping through this final days. He is doing what he has been doing for the past eight years; screwing things up behind the scenes. That would make an interesting item.
Well, all I can say is thank God we have someone who knows what's going on.....Bush seems to be out to lunch most of the time now!!!!
I think Obama is smart to keep abreast of things going on and to let the American people know that although he's not sworn in as yet he is concerned about it all.
I just don't want him to take on anything that Bush is still in charge of though, all this stuff is on Bush's watch not Obama's.
Bush has about much interest in what is happening now as I have for running for President in 4 years time...zippo!!!!
So I reckon Bush cannot wait for Jan 20th to come quite frankly and hand over the reins to Obama and you know what....neither can I.
Congress usually has a pro forma session on the 3rd of January and goes home until the twentieth. Not this term. Everybody's going to work on the 3rd and I believe the new President will have legislation on his desk his first week in office. And Congressional leaders are already working toward this end. Right Now.
And Bush took the 6 months of his first eight months in office vacationing in Texas.
Well, all I can say is thank God we have someone who knows what's going on.....Bush seems to be out to lunch most of the time now!!!!
I think Obama is smart to keep abreast of things going on and to let the American people know that although he's not sworn in as yet he is concerned about it all.
I just don't want him to take on anything that Bush is still in charge of though, all this stuff is on Bush's watch not Obama's.
Bush has about much interest in what is happening now as I have for running for President in 4 years time...zippo!!!!
So I reckon Bush cannot wait for Jan 20th to come quite frankly and hand over the reins to Obama and you know what....neither can I.
Hi Guys! Remember that although Mr. Obama is assembling great teams to help him solve our problems, it will not take a day to solve these problems that were created over 8 years. He and his team will need contructive criticisms form all of us to meet the needs of our countries. He will eventually get there with our support. So far so good!
One glaring omission is that Bush is a NICE GUY. In spite of the MSN making him out as a mean idiotic lunatic, he is simply a nice person and wants to do what is best for the country. He is courteous, friendly, and not a vicious partisan, therefore he is being as helpful as possible, even to playing second banana. He possesses one thing the Messiah does not, humility. It is his humility that allows him to be so magnanimous during this transition. Humility that appears as weakness to his detractors.
While it is indeed a new way of transitioning between presidents, I submit that the incoming president SHOULD be this active in preparing to take office. Several posts talk about the lame beginnings and the derailments caused by lack of good tranisitions. We should shorten the timing between election and inauguration. We don't need 2 1/2 months to travel by horse to the capitol. Now, even building time in for recounts or other legal disputes - can't we get it done in 4 weeks?
Please, we have ONE president and that is George Bush. The Obamanation has no authority, no say, and nothing to do with government. The Idiot is not even the President-elect and will not be until mid-December. And given his inability in the past to get a security clearance, he may not be then! All we are getting is Clinton Administration, Part Two. YOu do remember -- the administration that turned their backs on terrorists that ultimately lead to 9/11? I wished you left wing-nuts would quit drinking the kool-aid. this is the most dangerous, inexperienced, lying SOB ever elected to this office. He will destroy this country, our constitution and our freedoms, not to mention bankrupt whatever is left of our economy.
It's simple: The Decider has decided not to decide.
clubed60090
I totally agreee with you, why does it have to take so long for this change of power to take place!!! It's obvious that Bush does not really have any interest now, so why can't Obama just take over and get the ball rolling.....we need things to start happening like yesterday?
All this hurry up and wait is getting frustrating to say the least!
Thank you.
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