Enlightened Confusion

In the wake a fairly healthy shellacking of all things GOP, perhaps the national party should take note that, despite a flurry on new voters likely making party line votes¹ and turning Indiana blue for the first time since 1964, Mitch Daniels was re-elected by a larger popular margin than Obama managed to achieve (18% vs. 7%).  Mitch isn’t the most charasmatic politician on the planet.  He certainly can’t conjure the rhetorical flourish that makes people believe he can “make the oceans cease to rise, and the earth begin to heal”.  In fact, over the course of his first term, he managed to tick off just about everyone at one point or another.  He began by angering his base with the suggestion of raising taxes temporarily, and quickly moved on to angering many in the north by earning interest on leasing the toll road rather than continuing to loose money operating it.  Yet, in the end, an astonishing percentage of Hoosiers decided they’ld like him to lead the state for another 4 years.  Why was this?  I’ll sum it up for you in two words:  competent governance.

The current administration in Washington came to power by shrewdly playing the political game.  Love him or hate him, you have to admit: Karl Rove’s got game.  However, political success and governing success are two very different things.  The administration chose to continue to play the political game throughout their eight years, always sticking to an ideallogically driven political agenda, even when facts on the ground changed and policy change was warranted from a governing perspective.  As a result, so called conservatives presided over some of the largest expansions of the federal goverment since the Great Society.

In stark contrast, Mitch inherited a terribly managed state goverment and managed to nicely turn the ship of state onto a better course in just four years.  Not by playing political games, but by adopting innovative and fiscally responsible policies and producing results.  In the end, those results hold much more sway with the voters than who scored more points playing the game.