1. TODAY:
1. "What Happened to Bill Clinton"
2. Limits on presidential power



2. EXPLANATIONS OF PRESIDENTIAL PERFORMANCE:
1. Example: "What Happened to Bill Clinton" attempts to explain the president's accomplishment and lack of accomplishment mainly with references to personal traits such as character weakness.
2. Notes:
1. As has happened so often in the past hope and expectation rapidly turns to disappointment, frustration, and anger.
2. Abandonment of reform: The outsider quickly becomes an insider on campaign finance reform issue.
3. Explanations (notice what gets mentioned):
1. Clinton's losses and determination to do what it takes to avoid losing
4. "Gays in the military" issue and reputation.



3. LIMITATIONS ON PRESIDENTIAL POWER:
1. This film attempts to demonstrate that Clinton's problems in his first term stemmed largely from his own character weaknesses that began in childhood and have continued to plague him ever since.
1. Hence, the reporters mentioned such factors as his political defeats, his susceptibility to persuasion, his refusal to confront powerful foes, his need for adulation, and the like.
2. We would be justified in concluding then that a better person would, under the same circumstances, have greater success.
2. But consider the graph mentioned on Friday:
1. Consider these questions, for example: in the last 40 years how many presidents have a) served two full terms and/or b) left office more popular than when they entered?
2. The data suggest that other constraints on success have been operating.



4. INSTITUTIONAL AND CONTEXTUAL CONSTRAINTS:
1. So, what are these limitations?
2. The nature of the problems people expect presidents to solve
1. Economic transformations and dislocation, behavior of foreign governments, transnational entities, and non-governmental groups
3. "Control" of the bureaucracy does not give presidents the power one might think.
1. The limitations include:
1. Bureaucratic permanence and inertia
2. Bureaucratic politics
3. "Subgovernments" or "iron triangles"
4. "Group think" and advisors
1. Example: LBJ and Vietnam?
4. Separation and fragmentation of power
1. Congress, the Federal Reserve (FED), the Supreme Court, state governments, and so forth fragment power.
5. The absence of mechanisms to create and sustain a governing message
1. Note how frequently current political commentary bemoans the lack of "vision" on the part of presidents and presidential candidates: Bush, Clinton, Dole,...have all been accused of not having or articulating a clear idea of what they want to do.
2. In point of fact, their message is "elect me and I'll deal with programs and policy specifics later."
3. This situation stems in part from the way we elect presidents and the lack of party policy formation and discipline.
6. Weakness of the party system
7. "Fishbowl" phenomenon: intense media scrutiny
8. The contradictions of general-welfare liberalism
1. Liberalism versus the "positive state"
9. The bottom line is that the political system and popular culture places enormous burdens on presidents but does not give them the "tools" (e.g., strong party leadership) to carry them.



5. NEXT TIME:
1. Presidential politics and Congressional decision making.
2. Reading:
1. Squire and others, Dynamics of Democracy, Chapter 11, pages 402 to end.
2. The discussion of the "permanent crisis" (p. 416) parallels my analysis of the weaknesses inherent in the office. We will, however, examine these constraints in more detail than the book does.
3. You should be reading There Are No Children Here

Go to notes page

Go to Political Science 105 main page