Hate Crimes Decline

David Gibson, the religion reporter for Politics Daily, wrote last month that, according to the FBI, "the number of reported hate crimes dropped significantly in 2009 from the previous year, to their lowest point in more than 15 years."

This happened, Gibson observed, "despite the deepening recession and growing social tensions."

And that's a good thing — if you can verify that hate–inspired crimes actually did drop, but that isn't as easy to verify as you might think.

I'll grant you that sometimes it's obvious — like that case a dozen years or so ago when the black man was dragged to his death by a group of white men in a pickup truck.

Sometimes it's a matter of suspicion. You may think that a crime was motivated by hate because the victim(s) belonged to a particular race or religion or gender — but suspicion alone is not sufficient to charge anyone with a crime, whatever the motivation.

I would argue that, at least to a degree, all crimes are hate crimes so I'm not sure how I feel about the special designation in the criminal code for hate crimes.

I understand what lawmakers are trying to do, but it seems to me that it is an invitation for the implementation of George Orwell's Thought Police — and I really don't believe that is what anyone really wants in America.

The laws already regulate — as much as is possible — the actions of the citizens. Do we also want to regulate the people's thoughts?

Gibson reports that the faithful are hailing the news, which is to be expected, I guess, in this season of love and hope and joy.

"[R]eligious groups are giving thanks for the decline," Gibson writes, "even if they have no clear explanations for the drop."

I guess no explanations are needed — except, perhaps, in Room 101.

The C Word

The "C" in "C word" doesn't stand for "color" — although I have no doubt that there are those among the Obama apologists who wish it did because that would be something their hero could blame that is beyond his control.

The "C" doesn't even stand for "conference" — as in "press conference," which is something Obama can control, and it's a good thing he held one on Thursday.

I say that not only because it is essential for a president to keep the country informed when the greatest disaster of its kind is happening in the Gulf of Mexico — which it is — but also because, as Doug Mataconis of Outside the Beltway reminded readers on Tuesday, the president's last press conference was nearly a year ago.

On that memorable occasion, Obama criticized the Cambridge, Mass., police for responding to a citizen's complaint and arresting a black man, who turned out to be a noted Harvard professor, for breaking into his own home.

It was also held during prime time, whereas Thursday's soiree was in the afternoon (and, presumably, drew a smaller audience). So, like Roger Maris' single–season home run record, I guess an asterisk is needed — because the clock is still running on Obama's streak between prime time press conferences.

Will the streak live for a year? Less than eight weeks to go. Does anyone know the Vegas odds?

The president pledged an open and accessible presidency, and, in fairness, he has been accessible for one–on–one interviews with some members of the press, usually the ones whose employers already have shown themselves to be editorially sympathetic to Obama's agenda.

A president has many ways of communicating with the people — and, since the Kennedy presidency, the televised press conference has been one of the most effective ways of explaining policy. Not all presidents have excelled at the give and take with the press (JFK did set that bar pretty high), but the nine men who succeeded Kennedy (including Obama — because, after all, no matter how many one–on–one interviews a president does, there's nothing more American, more democratic than an open press conference in which a dozen or more people get the chance to ask the president a question in front of a national TV audience) have utilized it.

In spite of his much–publicized oratorical skills, Obama has been reluctant to hold press conferences. He got off to a rather fast start, holding monthly press conferences in the first couple of months, but the pace of his press conferences seemed to taper off after his faux pas about his bowling skills and the Special Olympics — and was nonexistent after the Sotomayor confirmation hearings last summer.

No, the "C" in "C word" clearly doesn't stand for "press conference" — although maybe it does qualify as a word for which this White House has little fondness. After all, Obama could have used the occasion of Labor Day to hold a press conference and reassure unemployed Americans, who saw their ranks swell by nearly 250,000 the month before, but he did not.

Perhaps he didn't hold a press conference on Labor Day because he was too busy putting the finishing touches on the speech he was scheduled to give to America's schoolchildren the next day.

Or maybe he was too tired after traveling to Cincinnati to give a speech on health care reform on Labor Day.

Well, that's ancient history now, I suppose.

I guess the "C" in "C word" could stand for "crude," as in crude oil. Alphabetically, of course, it could — and perhaps that would be appropriate, given that, during Thursday's press conference, Obama told America that "[rapid response] has been our highest priority since this crisis occurred" more than a month ago.

Perhaps it was just coincidental that, as Obama was saying that, in my mind's eye, I saw the mayor from "Jaws" telling the sheriff "it's all psychological. You yell barracuda, everybody says, 'Huh? What?' You yell shark, we've got a panic on our hands on the Fourth of July."

No, actually, the "C word" is "competence." Sometimes it is expressed directly. Sometimes it is implied.

But that is the buzzword I have been reading and hearing lately. And, upon reflection, it does seem to me that, if it was fair to use that as the standard by which to judge George W. Bush's handling of Hurricane Katrina or Jimmy Carter's handling of Three–Mile Island, it's fair in this case as well.

At first, I guess I tended to brush off criticism as more from the sour grapes crowd. In fact, I think the first article I saw was a double whammy — a column from former Reagan speech writer Peggy Noonan in the Rupert Murdoch–owned Wall Street Journal.

"He was supposed to be competent," moaned the headline on Noonan's column, and I almost didn't bother to read what she had written. But then I did, and I couldn't help admitting there were times when I felt she might be on to something. Like:

• when she started with the observation that "[t]his is his third political disaster in his first 18 months in office. And they were all, as they say, unforced errors, meaning they were shaped by the president's political judgment and instincts."


• or when she wrote that Obama "continues to govern in a way that suggests he is chronically detached from the central and immediate concerns of his countrymen. ... [H]e has not, almost from the day he was inaugurated, been in sync with the center. The heart of the country is thinking each day about A, B and C, and he is thinking about X, Y and Z. They're in one reality, he's in another."
  
  Kind of like that Labor Day thing I mentioned earlier. Seems like an obvious time for a president who is presiding over a nation reeling from an economic crisis to hold a press conference on job creation. And maybe, I mused at the time, that is precisely why he did not hold a press conference. Too obvious. Style would be critiqued with no attention given to substance. The spin would be all about politics.
  
  Well, I mused that at the time. But I never really believed it.
  
  Anyway, the days after Labor Day turned into weeks, and the weeks turned into months. At some point, it became obvious that the press conference on joblessness — which, for months, has been getting the top spot in polls about Americans' No. 1 concern — wasn't coming, that Obama hadn't merely been playing pre–emptive politics by not addressing the issue on Labor Day.


• or when Noonan complained that Obama "repeatedly took refuge in factual minutiae," observing that his professorial demeanor "made him seem like someone who won't see the big picture."
  
  His tendency to lecture isn't too appealing, either.


• or the thing that seems so incredible to so many people — "the way both BP and the government, 40 days in, continue to act shocked, shocked that an accident like this could have happened. If you're drilling for oil in the deep sea, of course something terrible can happen, so you have a plan on what to do when it does.
  
  "How could there not have been a plan? How could it all be so ad hoc, so inadequate, so embarrassing? We're plugging it now with tires, mud and golf balls?"

Peter Wehner also has ties to previous Republican administrations, so you've got to consider the source, but I am compelled to admit that he puts his finger on a problem I have seen in not only Obama but also his most strident supporters.

"Obama is among the most thin–skinned presidents we have had," Wehner writes for Politics Daily. "In Obama's eyes, he is always the aggrieved, always the violated, always the victim of some injustice. He is America's virtuous and valorous hero, a man of unusually pure motives and uncommon wisdom, under assault by the forces of darkness."

It all has a Nixonian feel to it, doesn't it? And, in a telling observation, Wehner writes, "When arrogant men lose control of events it can easily lead to feelings of isolation, to striking out at critics, to bullying opponents, and to straying across lines that should not be crossed."

Shades of Watergate, for sure.

Then Wehner makes another point: "With Obama there is also the compulsive need to admonish others, to point fingers, to say that the problems he faces are not of his doing." He's been president for 16 months now, and he continues to blame his predecessor for everything. I gather, from what I see in the polls and in the primaries that have been held so far, that it's wearing thin, even with those who bent over backwards to give him the benefit of the doubt.

Last week, Obama spoke in the Rose Garden of the "cozy relationship between the oil companies and the federal agency that permits them to drill." Wasn't 16 months enough time to do something — or at least get started on something — about that cozy relationship?

Wehner concludes that Obama "was as unprepared to be president as any man in our lifetime" and he is "overmatched by events."

As I said, you can make a case for disregarding such thoughts from Noonan and Wehner. They have reputations as being among Obama's loyal opposition.

It isn't so easy to overlook what Charles Blow of the New York Times writes.

"People needed to be assured that Obama possessed three basic presidential traits: being informed, engaged and empathetic," says Blow.

• "As for the first trait, he was superb as always. I think amassing facts is his idea of being warm and fuzzy."


• "On the second, he was a bit wobbly."


• "On the third point, empathy, Obama came up short."

And empathy is one of those things Americans want to see in their presidents. Even if there isn't a damn thing the president can do — and there often isn't — people like to know that a president, in Bill Clinton's famous words, feels their pain.

Obama often seems to be above their pain.

Not. So. Fast.

Until today, frankly, I didn't know much of Carl Cannon.

Cannon is the senior Washington correspondent for PoliticsDaily.com. According to his online bio, he has worked for Reader's Digest and National Journal. He has covered every presidential election since 1984, he worked for half a dozen newspapers before coming to Washington and he has written several books.

His credentials clearly show that he has been observing presidential politics for a long time. From what I have learned about him, he was born in San Francisco — but, despite that city's reputation for liberal politics, I can't absolutely say with any certainty what Cannon's political leanings may be. He worked for the San Diego Union. Its descendant, the San Diego Union–Tribune, is considered dependably conservative. He also worked for the Baltimore Sun, which, at least in my circles, enjoys a more moderate image.

My intention here is not to recite Cannon's resume. It is simply to establish that, unlike many of the writers one finds online or in print these days, Cannon is not a johnnie–come–lately expressing knee–jerk opinions.

But, for a man with his background, I think he's way off in his conclusions about 2012 in today's article for Politics Daily — "Six Reasons Barack Obama is Still the Odds–on Favorite in 2012."

That may turn out to be the case, and, granted, things do seem to move at a much faster pace than they used to. As Cannon points out, Obama had only been in office for about six months when some conservative commentators were ready to label him a "lame duck."

While I'm not sure Obama is a sure thing when 2012 rolls around, there's plenty of time for him to get his train back on track. So let's examine the six reasons Cannon gives in support of his hypothesis that Obama will be the favorite in 2012:

1. There is no such beast as a "generic Republican."
   
   That reference to "generic Republican" arises from a recent Gallup Poll that showed Obama trailing a "generic Republican" by a wide margin among independent voters.
   
   And Cannon's point is well taken — that, after running more and more to the right to capture Republican primary victories, the eventual nominee is likely to have established a record that is more conservative than most independents tend to be. He/she will have an identity and will no longer be a "generic" candidate.
   
   But that ignores the fact that Obama has been in the process of taking many positions that are more liberal than most independents tend to be. Even he acknowledged that he was a blank screen upon which voters could project whatever they wished when he ran for the presidency in 2008. After three years in the White House, his agenda — and his success rate — will be known to all.
   
   Lately, Obama and the Democrats have been making noises about throwing in the towel on the bipartisanship thing and pursuing objectives like health care reform on their own. Unless Obama's party suffers setbacks in this year's midterms that rival the ones handed to Bill Clinton's Democrats in 1994, that sounds like the implementation of a leftist agenda in a nation that tends to be center–right oriented.


2. It might not be a "binary" election, anyhow.
   
   When he uses the word "binary," Cannon means a two–way race. And he observes that Ross Perot was a third–party candidate in 1992 and 1996, keeping Clinton from getting a clear majority of the vote either time.
   
   But then he and I part ways on our assessment of the impact of Perot's candidacy — and, consequently, what it could mean to Obama's re–election bid.
   
   In fairness to Cannon, he writes that some of Clinton's aides believed that Perot's presence on the ballot was responsible for giving Clinton the presidency in 1992. Perot's vote, he asserted, was made up of "disaffected Americans who likely would have shuffled into the voting booth, held their noses, and voted for George H.W. Bush" if Perot had not been an option.
   
   But the exit polls I saw suggested that Clinton would have won even if Perot had not revived his candidacy about a month before the election.
   
   Those exits polls showed that, if Perot had not decided to re–enter the race, 40% of his supporters would have voted for Clinton, 40% would have voted for Bush and 20% would not have participated at all, which would have made virtually no difference to the ultimate outcome.
   
   And that tends to support my experience — which is, essentially, that, if Candidate A is the incumbent and he/she is running against two other candidates, the votes for Candidates B and C are, to a certain degree, anti–incumbent votes. If either Candidate B or Candidate C is removed from the equation, his/her votes are more likely to gravitate to the other challenger.
   
   That, actually, was a scenario that was bandied about here in Texas last week, when Republicans chose their gubernatorial nominee. The incumbent, Rick Perry, was being challenged by Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison and a "Tea Partier," Debra Medina.
   
   Initially, Hutchison and her supporters (and Medina, too, I guess) believed Perry was unpopular, after a decade in office. But Hutchison turned into Texas' Martha Coakley and, by the time the primary voters went to the polls last week, the question was whether Medina could siphon off enough votes to force a run–off between Hutchison and Perry — which, Hutchison's supporters hoped, they would win with the help of Medina's votes.
   
   But Perry won outright, which doesn't necessarily prove that he will prevail in November. It does, however, indicate the existence of a relationship between the expectations of the electorate and an incumbent's performance. Obama's record will be measured against his promises in 2012, and there are still a couple of years for him to work on fulfilling those promises.


3. He's already got the job.
   
   True. So did George H.W. Bush, Jimmy Carter and Gerald Ford, all of whom were denied a four–year term by the voters. Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton won second terms in spite of midterm setbacks — largely because they were able to compromise and, consequently, position themselves better.
   
   Can Obama do the same? I don't know. He's talked a lot about bipartisanship, but this scenario would require him to do most, if not all, of the heavy lifting.


4. The midterm elections can be cathartic.
   
   Yes, they can. And, as Cannon points out, they also can be liberating. If Democrats lose control of either house of Congress, there will be lessons from history for both parties to ponder.
   
   For that matter, it is true, as Cannon says, that Dwight Eisenhower and Bill Clinton overcame losing control of Congress. But neither did much to help their parties retain it.
   
   Cannon offers a caveat for Republicans if they do flip the House or the Senate — make sure that the blood you smell in the water isn't your own. And that's good advice. But let's wait and see how the midterm elections go first.
   
   My guess is that the Republican cause will be enhanced more if the party fails to capture either house of Congress but makes significant dents in the Democrats' majorities.


5. Youth will be served.
   
   Cannon seems to believe 2008 was the fruition of the liberal's fond fantasy that the expanded youth vote would be the salvation of progressivism in the United States.
   
   But that demographic has seldom participated at anything close to the level that was imagined when the 26th Amendment, giving the vote to Americans between the ages of 18 and 21, was approved.
   
   Young voters do seem to have played an important role in Obama's election in 2008. And many of them do seem to hold him high regard today. But their failure to participate in significant numbers in the gubernatorial elections in Virginia and New Jersey last fall and the special election in Massachusetts in January did not confirm that they have embraced their roles as regular voters.
   
   Perhaps Obama's presence on the 2012 ballot will encourage them to come to the polls. But that isn't a contributing factor that I would want to depend on.
   
   While it is true, as Cannon says, that "[a]lthough unemployment has hit the young disproportionately, they have a sunny view of their own futures," many who voted for him did not do so because of the economy or health care. They voted for him expecting the wars to be ended (which may still happen, but, for now, they have been escalated). They gave him their support because they wanted Guantanamo Bay to be closed, but it remains open more than a year after Obama took office. They voted for him expecting him, whether justifiably or not, to support causes like the growing movements to legalize gay marriage or marijuana (whether for medicinal or recreational purposes).
   
   If Obama does indeed seek a second term, he will no longer be a blank screen to anyone. He will have a record, and much will be made whenever his words do not match that record. I'm not convinced that record will play as well with young voters in 2012 as Cannon is — especially if the Republicans nominate a charismatic candidate whose age is comparable to Obama's but who offers different solutions to nagging national problems.


6. Bad news is driving the public dissatisfaction.
   
   It always does. And Cannon seems eager to fall back on the excuse that the economy went bad during a Republican presidency, that Obama inherited the problems that have plagued him. But, in a culture in which ownership of problems is quickly transferred in the public's mind, Obama and the Democrats have just about used up the blame excuse. Unless it is used sparingly in the next two years, it will have no value anymore when 2012 gets here.

All of Cannon's assumptions are based on the presumed continuation of the always tenuous alliance between conservative evangelical Christians and traditional fiscal policy Republicans that permitted the party to succeed for the better part of three decades.

Now, following two consecutive setbacks, Republicans appear poised to bounce back in the 2010 midterms. But to regain their competitive edge nationally, it may be time for the party forge a new partnership, one that will attract supporters in the 21st century. If the Ronald Reagan–Jerry Falwell coalition is crumbling, it may be time for someone with a new vision to step forward.

If that happens — if Republicans decide, through their primaries and caucuses, to nominate a candidate who embodies the 21st century image they wish to project — how will that affect Obama? In order to reinvent the world, Republicans may find it is necessary for them to reinvent themselves first. Who can say that, opportunists that they are, they won't do exactly that?

Times are changing, and unpleasant choices must be made. My feeling is that, the way things are going, both parties will have to offer plausible solutions to serious problems that can no longer be ignored.

There is an important historical trend to keep in mind a couple of years from now as well. Obama's two immediate predecessors both served two full terms. If, as expected, Obama seeks a second term, he will be trying to do something that has been extremely rare in the American experience.

America has only re–elected three consecutive presidents once in its history — about two centuries ago, when Thomas Jefferson, James Madison and James Monroe each served eight years.