Matt Yglesias brings up a good point in disagreement with Jindal’s prospects for the coming political cycles:
[T]he next few years aren’t shaping up to be an especially promising time to be a governor. A governor presiding over an economic boom can cut taxes while increasing spending, and thus develop a reputation as a popular can-do pragmatist. Think of George W. Bush, George Voinovich, Christie Todd Whitman, and other classics of the 1990s…[R]ight now [Jindal]’s looking at the need to cut $1 billion in spending. Not his fault (though the decision to make up the budget shortfall with a mix of 100% service cuts and 0% tax cuts reflects the intellectually and morally bankrupt nature of contemporary conservatism) any more than the “free money for everyone” governors of the nineties were really geniuses, but it’s going to make it difficult for him to rack up the sort of Record Of Accomplishments that you’re usually looking for in a presidential candidate.
2 replies on “Jindal 2012 or 2016 (cont.)”
Well, then the same can be said for Obama who will sit in the White House. He’ll be dealing with the same economy.
Plus, the Country has proven they will elect someone without proven experience….our current Pres Elect.
Jindal should probably just do nothing for the next 4 years. He’ll be a shoe-in for 2012. 😉
I don’t think it’s quite that simple.
Obama was elected in a large part because people considered the current course disastrous. That made his lack of experience less important than a change of course. But if people continue to believe things are improving under Obama – which may or may end up being true – then Jindal will need to prove that he will be better, rather than just different.
Also – I think you missed Yglesias’s point about governors being held responsible for the state of their state. Although this rule has exceptions, it’s generally true that when times are good, governors are popular; when times aren’t good, they aren’t popular. A Senator can more easily distance himself from the state of his or her state.
But if Jindal isn’t popular in Louisiana because – through factors mainly out of his control – things suck, then it’s hard to imagine him as a national candidate. At the same time a former governor or a sitting or former senator can become popular by railing against the status quo without offering specific alternatives.
This gives them an advantage in trying times.