Demur, Dodge, Punt
It seems un-American, and politically suicidal, to suggest some belt-tightening—let alone new taxes.
You can't blame Tom Brokaw for trying. In the second presidential debate, he asked Barack Obama and John McCain an obvious question with an all-too-obvious answer: will the economy get worse before it gets better? "No," said Obama, before launching into a paean to American can-do optimism. "Depends on what we do," said McCain, who then launched into an attack on his foe. But everyone knew the real answer.
Our sinking economy would get worse. And it did. After Tuesday, the Dow fell another 10.5 percent, the Big Three Detroit automakers were near bankruptcy and the world's finance ministers were jetting to Washington in hopes of a deal to rescue the planet.
Truth, they say, is the first casualty of war. But it hasn't even made it onto the battlefield of economics in this presidential election. Asked about how the global meltdown will change their priorities, the candidates demur; asked how they will call on the American people to sacrifice, they dodge. Asked to tell us how they see the world in 2009, they punt. "It's frustrating and dangerous, because neither candidate is building the credibility that comes from candor," says Maya MacGuineas, who heads the nonpartisan Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget.
It seems un-American, and politically suicidal, to suggest some belt-tightening—let alone new taxes. In 1984, Walter Mondale declared that he or President Reagan would have to raise taxes, regardless of who won. The earnest Minnesotan lost 49 states. In 1988, George H.W. Bush was determined not to repeat Mondale's mistake. So he declared at the Republican convention: "Read my lips—no new taxes!" His own economic adviser had tried to strike the line, but Bush's political aides kept it in. Bush won 40 states—and raised taxes two years later. The last to talk grimly about the trouble ahead was Ross Perot in 1992.
The economic crisis is so vast that the candidates can be excused if they don't know what to say. They claim that they have answers, but not comprehensive ones; they talk about crisis without daring to describe its nightmarish permutations. The most specific or sweeping proposals can be rendered irrelevant by one day's dramatic events; the planetary numbers are so huge that the candidates can seem as though they're doodling with crayons on the margin of a wall-size oil painting. "Up to a point, you have to give these guys a pass, I guess," says MacGuineas. "Things are moving too fast for them to keep up."
As a result, the debates on and off the air can seem divorced from reality. To take them seriously requires voters to exercise what Samuel Taylor Coleridge called a "willing suspension of disbelief." The 19th-century poet was talking about the attitude of mind you need to appreciate a poem, but that attitude may be precisely what voters need in the last weeks of the campaign. They need to assume that the country and the world can dig out of this mess—and that a new president can make the difference in doing so. Is there a candidate equipped to do this? It will need to be someone willing—and, most important, able—to explain unpleasant truths, to admit that he doesn't know all the answers and yet not forget the sense of hope Americans hold dear as a secular faith. With three weeks left, time to find him is running out.
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Howard Fineman is Newsweek's Senior Washington Correspondent and Columnist, senior editor and deputy Washington bureau chief. He is the author of "Living Politics," a column that began on MSNBC.COM and Newsweek.com and that now also appears in the print magazine. An award-winning reporter and writer, Fineman also is an analyst for NBC News and MSNBC, appearing regularly on "Countdown with Keith Olbermann," "Hardball with Chris Matthews" and "TODAY." The author of scores of Newsweek cover stories, Fineman's work has appeared as well in The New York Times, The Washington Post and The New Republic. His 2008 national best-selling book, "The Thirteen American Arguments," was released in paperback by Random House in the spring of 2009.
One of the nation's leading political reporters, Fineman has interviewed every major presidential candidate from (then-vice president) George H.W. Bush in 1985 to (then senator) Barack Obama early and often in the 2008 campaign cycle. His current work focuses on the Obama Administration and its top officials, as well as on Congress and politics throughout the country. Although based in Washington, Fineman travels widely in the U.S. and has covered politics and other events in 49 of the 50 states.
Fineman's work has produced many milestones and awards. A cover story in November 2001 featured President George W. Bush's first extensive interview after 9/11. Another cover, "Bush and God," was part of a series of articles that won the 2003 National Magazine Award for General Excellence. His reporting has helped Newsweek win many honors from the Magazine Publishers Association and the American Journalism Review. Other awards include a "Page One" from the Headliners Club of New York, a "Silver Gavel" from the American Bar Association and a "Deadline Club" from the Society of Professional Journalists (SPJ). In 2006 he received the Alumni Award from Columbia University's Graduate School of Journalism.
As a reporter and writer, Fineman ranges widely. Besides campaign-year covers, other projects have included: race and politics, the impact of digital technology on society, the influence of Hollywood on politics, the rise of the religious right and of conservative talk radio. He has interviewed business leaders such as George Soros, Bill Gates, Steve Case and Robert Rubin and entertainment figures such as Warren Beatty, Jane Fonda and Jay Leno.
Although now under exclusive television contract to NBC, Fineman over the years has appeared on major public affairs shows, such as Nightline, Face the Nation, Fox News Sunday, Larry King Live, Charlie Rose and the NewsHour. He was a regular panelist on Washington Week in Review on PBS (1983-95) and on CNN's Capital Gang Sunday (1995-98). He worked with Ted Koppel on Nightline specials, and has been a guest on Comedy Central's "The Daily Show with Jon Stewart" and "The Colbert Report."
A native of Pittsburgh, Fineman began his career at The Courier-Journal in Louisville, covering the environment, the coal industry and state politics before joining the newspaper's Washington bureau in 1978. He moved to Newsweek in 1980, was named chief political correspondent in 1984, deputy Washington bureau chief in 1993, senior editor in 1995 and senior Washington correspondent and columnist in 2008.
Fineman holds an A.B., Phi Beta Kappa, from Colgate, an M.S. in journalism from Columbia and a J.D. from the Brandeis School of Law at the University of Louisville. His legal education included a year as a visiting student at the Georgetown University Law Center. He received Watson and Pultizer Traveling Fellowships for study in Europe, Russia and the Middle East, and has traveled to more than 40 countries, among them China, Vietnam, Japan, Ukraine, Israel, Turkey and the West Bank Palestinian Territories.
Fineman is married to Amy L. Nathan, a senior counsel at the Federal Communications Commission. They live in Washington with their two children, Meredith and Nicholas.
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