It's What Governors Say, Not What They Do

Gov. Schwarzenegger largely punted in describing the state of the state. So others have picked up the slack. The Sacramento Bee's Dan Weintraub explains how we're doing. There's a little good news, and some bad. 

Even more interesting is this extraordinary piece by New America's Micah Weinberg. He puts Schwarzenegger's speech in context, comparing it to the rhetoric of  other governors. This is part of an extensively analysis Weinberg did of the words governors across the country use. The results are startling: it's what you say, not what you do.

I conducted an analysis of the rhetoric of 97 governors that compared the language in their speeches to that of national party platforms. It showed that approval ratings were higher, chances of re-election greater and margins of victory larger if governors used partisan language that appealed to the political majority in their states. On the other hand, the actual fiscal policy changes they presided over had no discernable effect on their political fortunes.

So if you're a governor in a Republican state, it is not necessary to actually cut taxes in order to be successful, but you'd better talk about cutting taxes as frequently as you can. And in a Democratic state, you need not succeed in expanding state programs, but you had better say that you're planning on doing so.

This reminded me of a passage from Lou Cannon's book, Governor Reagan:

Through tax increases and sundyr compromises, Ronald Reagan retained his high standing with mainstream conservatives, some of whom began boosting him as the next president even before he learned the ropes as governor. Conservatives were not blind to Reagan's pragmatism. They liked what he said, even when it required ignoring what he did, because Reagan had a perspective that William F. Buckley described as "essentially undoubting."

This begs the question: Would Schwarzenegger have been more effective if he had shut up about post-partisanship and instead simply practiced it silently, while keeping up conservative, red-meat rhetoric in public? The answer might be yes.