Moving to the Center

Going into their respective conventions this year, neither presidential nominee enjoyed the full support and faith of their parties. Normally, by the time of the convention, nominees turn from appealing to their parties to appealing to the electorate as a whole. In short, they move toward the center.

Yet, as the Antiplanner observed last week, Obama’s acceptance speech was an appeal primarily to the left wing of the Democratic Party, not to the nation as a whole. Similarly, McCain’s selection of Sarah Palin as his running mate was an appeal to the right wing of the Republican Party (though Palin also appealed to McCain as a maverick who stood up to Alaska’s political establishment and won).

Both appeals were successful, but they raise the question of how the candidates can win without broader support. Of course, someone has to win, but usually the winner is the one who gains the support of the “independents” and other swing voters.

Perhaps Senator McCain’s acceptance speech, then, was the first effort to win that broader support. Although his speech contained policy proposals, it was mainly an expression of McCain’s philosophy and ideals. He also spent as much time congratulating Obama as criticizing him; it is clear that he intends Palin to be the attack dog in this campaign.

What were McCain’s specific policy proposals?

Tax cuts: McCain proposes to cut “the second highest business tax rate in the world” and to double child income tax exemptions.

Jobs: McCain promises to update government assistance for the unemployed, including job retraining.

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Energy: McCain supports nuclear power, clean coal, offshore oil drilling, and more renewable energy.

Foreign policy: McCain sounds belligerent towards Iran, supportive of Georgia.

Pork barrel: I seem to remember that he also promised to veto pork-laden appropriations bills — but it must have been an ad lib as I can’t find it in the written speech.

That’s pretty thin. McCain’s energy policy is only superficially different from Obama’s. While his education policy is different, he still supports a strong federal role in education, not to mention unemployment programs. Many fiscal conservatives simply want to get the federal government out of these areas. Both candidates promise to reduce taxes; McCain’s focus on business taxes is laudable from a productivity view but leaves him vulnerable to charges that his policies will mainly benefit the rich.

If elected, McCain promises to be the most fiscally conservative president since Reagan. But in today’s world, that doesn’t mean very much. Nearly everyone inside the beltway accepts that the federal government can and ought to be involved in education, transportation, job creation, conservation, and all sorts of other things that, 110 years ago, were left exclusively to the states. McCain doesn’t seem to be much different. While he challenges how the federal government does things, he doesn’t seem to question whether it should do those things.

While that is intended to be critical, ironically the Antiplanner is much the same way. For pragmatic reasons, if nothing else, I don’t argue that anything less than shutting down the U.S. Department of Transportation is a sellout of federalist principles. Similarly, McCain’s proposals may be his way of being the centrist that Obama is not.

Despite one recent poll that shows McCain and Obama to be tied, this still seems to be Obama’s race to lose. Torn between a fiscal conservative and a social liberal, the Antiplanner is glad to have another eight weeks before having to decide how to vote.