Obama’s Lincoln

Obama will be under pressure from progressives to push the big-ticket items in the Democratic platform, like universal health care. The new president will have a basic choice, says William Galston, former policy adviser in the Clinton administration: "Do you put the pedal to the metal or do you say, 'We've had a big victory, sure we could push anything through, but we're not going to do that for the sake of unity'?" He cautions against option A. "If you go for broke, you may go broke," he says. A shrewder course would be to win some easy victories early on and build momentum for the hard choices later. Obama will certainly have to back a big stimulus package to counter the deepening recession. Since lawmakers like to spend money, and even conservatives see a need to boost the economy, this should not be hard to get through Congress (it will be harder to make it smart spending—getting the money to people who can spend it quickly—rather than pet pork-barrel projects that take too much time or spending programs that can't be turned off when the recession ends).

Obama has taken a few early steps to show that he is above partisanship and score-settling. In the Senate, the Democratic leadership has threatened to boot Sen. Joe Lieberman out of his chairmanship of the homeland-security committee. Nominally a Democrat, Lieberman is such a close friend of McCain's that he spoke at the Republican convention. Obama has communicated to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid that he wants to let bygones be bygones and allow Lieberman to keep his chairmanship. (A Lieberman aide, not authorized to go on the record with the press, describes the situation as "fluid.")

Obama has made clear that he wants a bipartisan look and cast to his administration. The transition team has been told to hire Republicans at all levels of government, not just as token cabinet appointments. " 'Team of Rivals' has become a term of art here," says a senior Obama staffer, who refused to be identified discussing strategy. "It's less about Lincoln than a reinforcement of his theme that we need to move forward and get beyond the old partisan politics." This staffer says that Obama and his top aides are wary of over-hyping the Lincoln comparison. He also says that Obama believes he can—by force of character—bring Republicans into the fold without sacrificing Democratic principles. "I don't think he looks at this and says, 'Because I appoint Republicans, I have to compromise my positions'," says the aide.

Maybe so, but he will have to broker compromises to take on really tough challenges, like dependence on foreign oil. For instance, he may have to go along with drilling for oil off America's shores as part of a deal to limit consumption of carbon fuels. One of these days, a president is going to have to tackle the cost of entitlement programs like Medicare and Social Security. Obama may be the one, if he is ever to keep the federal deficit from spiraling so far out of control that debt payments jerk up interest rates.

If Obama can establish some momentum—if he can restore public trust in government, a very tall order—he'll have more luck asking for sacrifice later on. Of course, any strategy or timetable is likely to run up against unexpected events. A foreign crisis or a terrorist attack would absorb Obama's energies and perhaps even change his basic course (think of President Bush's transformation after 9/11).

When history is written, advisers like to play up their roles. But in truth, the American presidency is a lonely job; the really big decisions must be made by the president alone. Though Obama likes to model himself on Lincoln, or perhaps FDR, another close comparison can be made to Lyndon Johnson. Like Obama, LBJ closely questioned his aides and wanted to hear the truth. "He would cross-examine you," recalls Francis Bator, LBJ's deputy national-security adviser. But then it was very hard to tell what LBJ was really thinking or what he'd ultimately do. Some Obama advisers have noticed the same trait in the president-elect. He can be hard to read; he is, in the end, a very self-contained and rather solitary figure. With luck, he will not be confronted with lose-lose decisions like LBJ, who had to choose between the Great Society and the war in Vietnam and ultimately lost both. Obama will surely face some hard choices, and possibly all at once. He may not wind up as a tragic figure like LBJ, but he may also disappoint the expectations of his vast legions of believers. He will not be "the One"; he will be human like the rest of us.

Still, when the 44th president is inaugurated on Jan. 20, and he mounts a platform that looks west, down the Mall and toward the Lincoln Memorial honoring the 16th president, he could do worse than ask himself: what would Lincoln do?

With Holly Bailey, Sarah Kliff and Katie Connolly

© 2008