Last week’s big story was President Barack Obama’s ambitious and
expertly delivered address to Congress. However, the subplot —
the nation’s first prime-time taste of Louisiana Governor Bobby
Jindal, attracted its own share of attention.
Conventional wisdom, on both the left and right, is that the
Republican rebuttal from Jindal (who many conservatives see as a
savior) was an unqualified flop. Democrats loudly claim his
address paled in comparison to the president’s. They are right.
Many Republicans sadly whisper that Louisiana’s young governor is
no Ronald Reagan. They are also right.
When he emerged in 1980 to deliver the country from Jimmy
Carter’s era of malaise, Ronald Reagan was 69 years old and
entering the twilight of his political calling. His career had
spanned decades from two terms in California’s Statehouse to the
Screen Actor’s Guild. The future president spent this time
formulating his beliefs ideas and putting them into practice.
That experience, coupled with his exceptional charisma and the
confluence of the political stars created the revolution which
bears his name.
That, to borrow a phrase form historian Doris Kearns Goodwin, was
no ordinary time. The GOP’s endless longing to re-create it is
fruitless and futile. Yet, Republicans would be foolish to
jettison Jindal and his enormous promise.
At age 37, he is the youngest governor in the country. Small and
slim, he is not possessed of movie star charisma. Where Reagan
masterfully communicated transcendental themes, Jindal is an
enthusiastic wonk, seemingly comfortable discussing and engaging
in the minutia of policy debates. In many ways, at least
superficially, Jindal is the opposite of Reagan. And going
forward, that might be exactly what the Republican Party needs.
The past several national elections have seen the GOP, chasing
after the Gipper’s ghost, nominate candidates with some of the
right core convictions and the ability to communicate broad
themes. Yet they often seemed paralyzed when it came to
explaining their own policy prescriptions and incapable of
actually articulating the distinction between conservatism and
liberalism. Accordingly, inarticulate Republicans have been
defined downward by their opposition — a recipe for almost
certain defeat at the polls.
Last Tuesday’s response to the president made it abundantly clear
that Jindal is not yet in the rhetorical league of Presidents
Reagan or Obama. He is, however, already their equal in terms of
intellect and policy expertise. Not yet 40, Jindal, a Rhodes
Scholar, has already helped salvage Louisiana’s Medicare as
secretary of Louisiana’s Department of Health and Hospitals,
served as president of his state’s university system, served as
an assistant secretary at the U.S. Department of Health and Human
Services and been twice elected to the U.S. House of
Representatives. Only in the second year of his first term as the
Pelican state’s governor, there is plenty of time for his
rhetorical skills to catch up to his policy expertise.
In this sense, he is reminiscent of a past president from a
nearby state. In 1978, at age 32, William Jefferson Clinton was
elected governor of Arkansas. The “Boy Governor” as Clinton was
known, was, like Jindal a highly ambitious Rhodes Scholar who
seemed most comfortable digging through the weeds of arcane
policy debates.
Because of his intellect, youth and ambition, by the end of the
1980s, Arkansas’ governor was touted as a prospective future
leader of the Democratic Party. In July 1988, Clinton delivered
the nominating speech at the Democratic National convention for
presidential candidate Michael Dukakis. The plodding 32 minute
speech which only roused its audience when Clinton uttered “In
conclusion…,” was considered a failure. And yet, a little more
than four years later, Clinton was addressing another audience
from the steps of the West portico of the U.S. Capitol.
Like Clinton’s nominating speech in 1988, last Tuesday’s rebuttal
to President Obama was not Jindal’s finest moment. But, just as
it would have been foolish to bet against the “Boy Governor,” it
would be just as unwise to think that we will not be hearing from
Louisiana’s young chief executive again.
