Obama: U.S. Gov’t ‘Tilted’ So that ‘Southern States’ Can ‘Maintain Power’
KLEIN: “Let me get at that piece of it, too. So, I cover the Affordable Care Act pretty closely, I think it’s fair to say. And I thought a lot about its political afterlife. Like, it survived the Republican attempts to get it, it did become popular —“
OBAMA: “Yeah, I thought it was going to happen a little bit quicker, but it did happen.”
KLEIN: “That’s actually what I want to get at here, which is that, at the same time, the thing that is striking to me is it didn’t convert many voters over to the Democratic side, including Republican voters — Sarah Kliff did a great piece on this at Vox at one point — including Republican voters who relied on it, who would have lost it if the folks they were voting for got their way. Do you think, given how intense political identities are now, that policy can persuade people to vote differently? Or is partisanship now almost immune to the material consequences of governance?”
OBAMA: “I think over time it does. I think it’s not as immediate. And look, I think it’s important to remember that when we came into office, the economy was in a free fall. We had to scramble and do a bunch of stuff, some of which was inherited, some of which we initiated to stabilize the financial system. People hated it. You know, I describe in the book, it’s hard to underscore how much the bank bailouts just angered everyone, including me. And then you have this long, slow recovery. Although the economy recovers technically quickly, it’s another five years before we’re really back to people feeling like, OK, the economy is moving and working for me. And the truth is that if Donald Trump doesn’t get elected — let’s say, a Joe Biden, or person who was running, Hillary Clinton had immediately succeeded me, and the economy suddenly has 3 percent unemployment, I think we would have consolidated the sense that, oh, actually these policies that Obama put in place worked. The fact that Trump interrupts essentially the continuation of our policies, but still benefits from the economic stability and growth that we had initiated, means people aren’t sure. Well, gosh, unemployment’s 3.5 percent under Donald Trump. Now I would argue, and I think a lot of economists that you know and I know would suggest, that mostly that had nothing to do with Donald Trump’s policies, and mostly had to do with we had put the economy on a footing where he essentially just continued the longest peacetime recovery in American history and sustained job growth in American history. But if you’re the average voter you’re kind of thinking, well, you know, looks like Republican policies are working for me to some degree, which probably explains why Trump was able to make some inroads — modest, overstated but real inroads — among non-white voters who were feeling like, you know what, I’m working and making decent money, and things feel pretty good. So that clouds what I think would have been a more impactful shift in political views towards Democrats as a result of my presidency. And I think that what we’re seeing now, is Joe Biden and the administration are essentially finishing the job. And I think it’ll be an interesting test. Ninety percent of the folks who were there in my administration, they are continuing and building on the policies we talked about, whether it’s the Affordable Care Act, or our climate change agenda, and the Paris Accords, and figuring out how do we improve the ladders to mobility through things like community colleges. And if, as I think they will be, they’re successful over the next four years, I think that will have an impact. Does it override the identity politics that has come to dominate Twitter, and the media, and that has seeped into how people think about politics? Probably not completely. But at the margins, if you’re changing 5 percent of the electorate, that makes a difference. Most importantly, I think it does have an impact for young people as they are forming their ideas about politics and who they are. I was both a manifestation of the more progressive views that young people brought to politics in 2008, and 2009, 2010, and I think my presidency helped to solidify a huge tilt in the direction of progressive politics among young people that is now continuing into their 30s as the millennials, and even the Gen Zers, are starting to marry and have families, who know their political identity has been shaped and changed in pretty significant ways.”
(Via The New York Times)
