September 14, 2007
Florida's Primary Fight
In 2000 the country’s eyes were fixed on Florida, where a ballot dispute kept the presidency hanging in the balance for more than a month. Now Florida is again in the political news, after the Legislature voted to move the state’s presidential primary up to January 29, 2008. The change violates the rules of both national political parties, and late last month, the Democratic National Committee gave Florida’s Democrats an ultimatum – come up with a solution that doesn’t violate the rules, or lose all 210 delegates to the national nominating convention. Most of the Democrats, including the front-runners, Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama, have pledged not to campaign in Florida or other states that try to leapfrog the primary calendar.
Richard K. Scher is a professor of political science at the University of Florida whose research interests include voting rights, campaigns, and elections, particularly Florida’s and Southern politics. Mr. Scher, who is a Democrat, agreed to share some of his insights on the situation with The Chronicle.
How did we arrive at this point?
You could actually read the history of American political parties as a power struggle between the national organizations, the DNC and RNC, and individual state parties.
Ever since political parties began holding conventions to nominate candidates, there have been disputes over delegates. In just the Republicans’ second convention, in 1860, delegates were completely intimidated by noisy and enthusiastic Lincoln supporters, many of whom had been given fake tickets by Lincoln’s organization so they could enter the arena in Chicago…. General Dwight Eisenhower was nominated at the Republican convention in 1952, when delegates supporting him were seated over those favoring Senator Robert Taft of Ohio; acrimony was so great that there were fistfights on the convention floor. In 1964, in the middle of the civil-rights movement, the Democratic Party convention was rocked by controversy over which Mississippi delegation should be seated – one representing the old segregationist state party or one which included the state’s politically emerging black community.
How is the latest standoff playing among Floridians?
It is not clear how the DNC decision impacts rank-and-file members in Florida. State party leaders are angry and incensed. They are still of the view that the national party has no business determining when individual states schedule presidential primaries.
The January 29 primary date also has become inextricably intertwined with a much more important issue, at least as far as Floridians are concerned. At virtually the same moment that the Legislature – overwhelmingly dominated by Republicans – moved back the date of the primary, it also placed on the ballot for that date a draconian Constitutional amendment to slash property taxes in ways which would significantly benefit the wealthy but do virtually nothing for the middle class and poor.
Republican strategy for doing this was either brilliant or deviously Machiavellian, depending on one’s point of view…. In order to improve the property-tax amendment’s chances, GOP leaders recognized that they had to find a way to depress Democratic turnout. They assumed that DNC penalties against Florida Democrats would have that effect on January 29.
Florida’s not an insignificant state. It has 27 electoral votes – 10 percent of the majority of electors needed to choose a president — and large blocs of voters, particularly Hispanic voters, whom candidates from both parties would like to capture. Can presidential candidates afford to bypass Florida?
No. Floridians can expect a full barrage of campaigning, both in the primary and general elections. The psychological value of a candidate’s victory in the Florida primary – in both parties – is staggering. Florida is the fourth-largest state, one whose politics are a good bellwether of the nation. A win in the Florida primary – even a good showing – is worth more to a presidential candidate than that of all four early-bird states combined.
Plus, Florida is like a money tree – or a gusher, really – for both parties. Candidates simply cannot afford to write off the potential resources this state offers them, and so they will come…. To assume that the candidates of both parties would kick away this prize because of a changed primary date is absurd.
Is there a way out of this standoff? What kind of precedent could this political fight set?
The question is really, Who will blink first? If it is the state, then the Democratic Party will have taken another step towards increased centralization. If it is the DNC, then the Democrats will continue to remain a decentralized federation rather than a more nationally centered one, such as the Republicans are becoming.
Karin Fischer | Posted on Fri Sep 14, 02:15 PM | Permalink | Comment [3]September 13, 2007
Democrats Talk Education
College education, and how to pay for it, was a major theme in the Democratic candidate mash-up, which is billed as the first online presidential candidates’ forum. It was sponsored by Yahoo, the online magazine Slate, and the Huffington Post, a left-leaning blog.
All eight Democrats fielded questions from the moderator, Charlie Rose, but many of the queries — on education, health care, and the war in Iraq — were proposed by readers.
One reader asked Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. of Delaware if “we are founded on the concept of equal opportunity, though not necessarily equal result, and education is a great equalizer, shouldn’t a college education be free?”
“Absolutely, positively, unequivocally,” replied Mr. Biden, who went on to pitch his proposal to create a refundable tax credit to help families cover the cost of college tuition and fees.
John Edwards, the former senator from North Carolina, meanwhile responded to a single mother who, despite her college degree, has not been able to find a job after being laid off. Mr. Edwards, who has made education a central issue of his presidential bid, highlighted his “College for Everyone” plan, which would provide federal grants to pay the cost of tuition. He also called for the creation of “a national infrastructure for making sure people continue to learn as they age.”
Viewers can check out all the candidates’ takes on education, or pick and choose videos to watch on the mash-up Web site. Written transcripts also are available.
Karin Fischer | Posted on Thu Sep 13, 01:57 PM | Permalink | Comment [1]Where Have All the Yalies Gone?
Ivy League institutions — and Yale University, in particular — have been well represented in recent presidential campaigns, but they are relatively scarce among the résumés of the leading 2008 candidates.
In the last presidential election, two Yale graduates (George W. Bush and John F. Kerry) led their parties’ tickets. In 2000 it was a Yalie (Mr. Bush) versus a Harvard alumnus (Al Gore).
This year none of the nine leading Republican candidates has earned a bachelor’s degree from the Ivy League. Instead, their undergraduate diplomas were awarded by three public universities, the U.S. Naval Academy, several religious-affiliated colleges (one Catholic, one Lutheran, one Southern Baptist, and one Mormon), and another private college.
Only two Democrats — Mike Gravel and Barack Obama — received a bachelor’s degree from an Ivy League Institution. Both attended Columbia.
The other six Democratic candidates spent their undergraduate years at two public universities, a Catholic college, and three other private institutions.
The only 2008 candidate to have any Yale credentials is Hillary Rodham Clinton, a Democrat who got her law degree there. Mr. Obama and Mitt Romney, a Republican, also earned law degrees from the Ivy League, both at Harvard.
You have to go back to 1996 to find a presidential matchup between non-Ivy alumni. Bill Clinton went to Georgetown University (though he got a law degree at Yale) and Bob Dole earned his undergraduate degree at Washburn University, a public institution in Kansas.
The diversity of alma maters among the 2008 presidential contenders mirrors a trend in the private sector. The proportion of chief executives at Fortune 500 companies who were educated at Ivy League institutions fell from 16 percent in 1998 to 11 percent in 2004, according to a study cited in USA Today.
Sara Hebel | Posted on Thu Sep 13, 12:38 PM | Permalink | Comment [4]September 12, 2007
Education, Anyone?
For months, educators have listened closely to debates among the presidential candidates to hear how they would improve schools. And listened. And listened.
The Democratic and Republican candidates had faced a grand total of 440 questions on issues like Iraq, the economy, and immigration before getting the first query about education. It came in June, during a Democratic debate. By that point, Democrats had held two previous debates and the Republicans three.
That finding comes from Strong American Schools, a nonprofit organization that is waging a campaign, “ED in ’08,” to encourage the candidates to describe in detail their plans for improving elementary and secondary schools. Educational progress would help solve many other national problems, the group says.
The group says the first question involving education was asked during a debate at Howard University. DeWayne Wickham, a columnist for USA Today and Gannett News Service, noted that the unemployment rate in 2006 among black people who graduated from high school was 33 percent higher than for white people who had dropped out.
“To what do you attribute this inequity, which keeps many black families locked in the grip of poverty?” he asked U.S. Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. from Delaware.
Among the leading candidates, only Bill Richardson, the governor of New Mexico, responded by calling for ensuring Americans access to college, although other candidates have separately proposed ways to accomplish that.
Although the presidential candidates have also been quizzed about stem-cell research, Strong American Schools found only one question during any debates so far that mentioned academe. During an April debate at South Carolina State University for Democratic candidates, the question was: “Did any role that [the] federal government plays fail those students at Virginia Tech?” That led to a discussion of gun control.
Jeffrey Brainard | Posted on Wed Sep 12, 08:34 AM | Permalink | Comment [1]September 11, 2007
Presidential Interviews From a Dorm Room
James Kotecki, a recent graduate of Georgetown University, is 99 percent sure that he conducted the first-ever interview with a presidential candidate in a college dorm room last spring when Ron Paul dropped by for a conversation.
For 30 minutes, Mr. Paul, a Republican and U.S. congressman from Texas, talked with Mr. Kotecki about a range of issues, including monetary policy, war, and the importance of the Internet.
The two conversed in front of a backdrop of tan-colored furniture, on which various detritus of college life was displayed: books, snapshots, cereal boxes, bottles of lotion.
Actually, it seemed relatively tidy for a dorm room. But, Mr. Kotecki says, “a lot of people pointed out that it was kind of messy.”
So, before the next candidate — Mike Gravel, a Democrat and former U.S. senator from Alaska — swung through a few weeks later, he says, he straightened up a bit more.
Mr. Kotecki, who graduated in May with a bachelor’s degree in foreign service, has made a name for himself by offering critiques of the presidential candidates’ YouTube offerings. To make them more effective, he tells candidates, their videos should be shorter, more intimate, more casual, even funny.
Young voters are generally cynical about political ads, the 21-year-old says, especially since they are well versed in how media images can be easily manipulated through Photoshop and other editing tools.
Mr. Kotecki says candidates can win points among youth for appearing genuine, such as when Bill Richardson appears on YouTube looking a bit bleary-eyed after flying back from North Korea. He also likes it when candidates respond to individuals directly — especially, of course, when they talk to him.
Sara Hebel | Posted on Tue Sep 11, 01:14 PM | Permalink | Comment [4]September 10, 2007
Stumping for Free College
Dennis J. Kucinich milked the audience for applause at the University of Miami during last night’s Democratic debate when he asked, rhetorically: “What do you think? Should we have free college?”
Mr. Kucinich, a U.S. representative from Ohio, had been responding to a question about how he would change the fact that one of every three Hispanic students in the United States does not finish high school.
He advocated providing all Americans access to education from pre-kindergarten through college by redirecting federal funds from the budget for the Pentagon.
The debate, which aired in Spanish on the Spanish-language Univision television station, focused on the major concerns of Hispanic voters.
Barack Obama and Bill Richardson were also asked to respond to education-related questions.
Among other policies, Mr. Obama, a U.S. senator from Illinois, advocated the passage of federal legislation often referred to as the Dream Act. It would give states the clear power to charge in-state tuition to illegal immigrants and would put some of them on a path to a green card.
Bill Richardson also advocated the Dream Act. As governor of New Mexico, Mr. Richardson has signed laws that allow some illegal immigrants to pay in-state tuition and also receive aid under the state’s lottery-financed college-scholarship program.
For information about how education-related debates about immigrants are playing out among Republicans, check out our story about the candidates’ positions on policies related to college access.
Sara Hebel | Posted on Mon Sep 10, 01:32 PM | Permalink | Comment [3]The 800-Pound Stem Cell?
When it comes to the presidential campaign, could embryonic-stem-cell research be the 800-pound gorilla in the room? That’s the worry of some observers, like C.D. Mote Jr., president of the University of Maryland at College Park. In an article published today in The Chronicle, Mr. Mote says he is concerned that the issue is so divisive that it risks polarizing the larger, and considerably more bipartisan, discussion about supporting American research and cultivating American innovation. “We have to be careful not to push people into corners,” warns Mr. Mote, who helped author a recent National Academies report on global competitiveness.
There are no signs of pushing or shoving yet, but the Republican candidates – as opposed to their Democratic counterparts, who appear to be pretty uniform in their support for lifting the limits on federal spending on embryonic-stem-cell research imposed by President Bush – are staking out somewhat differing positions on this issue.
In this YouTube clip from a debate held earlier this year, the candidates offered more-nuanced positions. For example, Mitt Romney, who vetoed legislation to expand embryonic-stem-cell research as governor of Massachusetts, said federal funds should go to research using altered nuclear transfer. U.S. Senator John McCain said he supported using federal money for human embryonic-stem-cell research, while the former New York mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani said he backed such research as long as the embryos were not created specifically for it. Fast-forward to the clip’s two-minute mark for more of the candidates’ positions.
One contender, however, is missing — Fred Thompson, the former senator from Tennessee, had not yet declared his candidacy when the clip was recorded. In a video recorded for the National Right to Life Committee, Mr. Thompson said research should be conducted on adult, not embryonic, stem cells.
Karin Fischer | Posted on Mon Sep 10, 01:24 PM | Permalink | CommentSeptember 7, 2007
Famous Vol Backs Fred Thompson
More than half of the roughly $2-million in donations made by the end of July to the Friends of Fred Thompson exploratory committee were given by supporters from the former senator’s home state of Tennessee.
One of the state’s most famous college-football stars was also among the givers. Peyton Manning, who played quarterback for the University of Tennessee Volunteers in the late 1990s, contributed $2,300 (the maximum allowed for the presidential primary) to Fred Thompson’s committee in June, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. Mr. Manning’s wife, Ashley, also gave $2,300 on the same day, the center said.
Mr. Manning is now the quarterback for the Indianapolis Colts, whom he led to a Super Bowl championship earlier this year.
Sara Hebel | Posted on Fri Sep 7, 05:22 PM | Permalink | CommentJohns Hopkins President Plans Candidate Forums on Health Care
The president of Johns Hopkins University, William R. Brody, announced today that he is putting together a series of half-hour television segments in which he plans to question the presidential candidates about their positions on various issues related to health care.
Speaking at a luncheon gathering at the National Press Club, Mr. Brody said officials at his institution would be teaming up with the National Coalition on Health Care and the Retirement Living TV network to produce and air the discussions, to be called “Presidential Spotlight on Healthcare ’08: Which Way Forward?”
“These programs will give each individual an opportunity to explain in detail what he or she proposes to do about this issue,” Mr. Brody said. “Polls show that health care is the No. 1 domestic concern. Americans expect action.”
Before Mr. Brody can get the candidates to elaborate on their health-care plans, however, he first has to get them to agree to be on his proposed show. He said people involved with the planned program are in talks with various candidates’ campaign organizations, but have yet to get commitments from any of them.
Will the candidates want to spend a half-hour of their time offering retirees their views on subjects such as Medicare, insurance costs, prescription coverage, and HMO’s? Hard to say at this point. As one leading Democratic candidate, Hillary Rodham Clinton, learned in taking on health-care issues while her husband was in the Oval Office, any plan to overhaul the nation’s health-care system is likely to have winners and losers, and the losers are unlikely to agree to suffer quietly. A program featuring an open-ended policy discussion would offer the candidates plenty of opportunity to say something one powerful constituency or another does not want to hear.
For his part, Mr. Brody appears determined to stay out of the fray. In a question-and-answer session following his speech, he refused to comment on legislation pending before Congress. Asked what advice he would give the next president on health care, he said, “I am not an expert on policy.”
Peter Schmidt | Posted on Fri Sep 7, 04:44 PM | Permalink | CommentSeptember 6, 2007
Fred Thompson Comments on Higher Education
Fred Thompson, the former Republican U.S. senator and television actor who formally — and finally — jumped into the presidential race last night, has had a lot to say about college topics in commentary he has provided for ABC News Radio over the past six months.
In “The Fred Thompson Report,” he lamented that “political correctness has crept into the halls of academia,” as he cited a case at Marquette University involving controversy over the public posting of a quip by Dave Barry, the humorist.
He also urged the nation to pay more attention to its nursing shortage and advocated more college studies of
military history.
Mr. Thompson also made several remarks about the shootings at Virginia Tech last spring. Among other things, he said responsible adults should be allowed to carry weapons on college campuses to protect themselves. He also criticized Virginia Tech for lobbying against state legislation that would have permitted some people to carry concealed weapons on campuses.
Sara Hebel | Posted on Thu Sep 6, 03:13 PM | Permalink | Comment