Who Will Be the Best President for Cities?
Posted on Thursday, January 31 2008 by Heather Brandon
While the New York Times City Room blog asks if Connecticut is becoming a battleground state (it is), a two-question survey has cropped up, created by CEOs for Cities, asking initially, who will be the best president for cities. The second question asks users to vote for the most pressing urban issue the next president needs to address: global warming, transportation infrastructure, K-12 education, crime, the global economy and competitiveness, or bankruptcies and foreclosures.
Of the remaining presidential candidates, who has the best urban agenda for cities?
Link via CEOs for Cities
Bill D.
January 31st, 2008 at 6:33 pmI picked: 1.) Mitt Romney; and 2.) Global economy and competitiveness.
Heather Brandon http://urbancompass.net
January 31st, 2008 at 6:59 pmBill, I wonder what you think Romney will do to help cities in particular. Any thoughts you’d like to share?
NoPolitician
February 1st, 2008 at 1:13 pmI’ve been wondering this myself. I had been supporting John Edwards until his withdrawal, so now I’m faced to choose between Obama and Clinton.
I don’t agree with Bill’s assessment that “Global economy and competitiveness” is good for cities. It is in fact horrible for cities because urban workers are directly competing with workers in other countries, countries that do not have the same rules or standards that we do.
For example, if you want to manufacture a product in the US, you have to be sure that you don’t release toxins into the immediate area; you have to make sure you don’t employ children. You can’t force workers to work more than 40 hours per week. While those “regulations” have a cost, they are a cost that is very worthwhile.
You can do that all in China though. Those “costs” aren’t there. So when our workers are competing with global workers, we are at a significant disadvantage.
In my mind, that rules out “small government” Republicans, because “small government” is being pursued to decrease government intervention in things like pollution, labor issues, safety standards, etc.
So getting back to Clinton or Obama, I don’t know the answer. I’ve heard it said that Bill Clinton was the “president for the suburbs”, and that his policies were actually more conservative than not. I feel like Hilary Clinton is more corporatist than Obama.
But I’ve heard a lot of criticism of Obama responding to Republican frames, such as how “social security is going to evaporate” (it won’t — it may have to pay out reduced benefits in 30 years, but the money isn’t going to “run out”). I’ve heard some people say he is the more conservative of the two candidates.
I also think that the fact that Hilary Clinton has been through the most right-wing abuse of either candidate is a positive for her. Obama hasn’t been vetted very heavily yet.
Then you get into the issue of “electability”. How many people won’t vote for Hilary Clinton because she is somewhat of a polarizing figure? How many people won’t vote for Obama because he is Black, even people who consider themselves Democrats?
So I don’t know who I’m going to vote for. It’s coming down to the wire.
NoPolitician
February 1st, 2008 at 10:43 pmIn doing research, I came across this article by Trenton mayor Doug Palmer.
I found this article on Obama’s urban agenda
I also found this article from the San Francisco Chronicle discussing the urban positions of Clinton, Edwards, and Obama. This article characterized Clinton as focusing on middle-class, suburban America at the expense of urban America.
Springfield has benefited in the past from a Democratic presidency, and has suffered under Republican presidencies, particularly with loss of community development block grant monies. I think that either Clinton or Obama would be far, far better than any Republican candidate, but I’m getting the sense that Obama would tackle urban issues economically, and Clinton would tackle them with assistance. I believe the former is a much better strategy because it allows people to help themselves by making it easier to succeed.
NoPolitician
February 1st, 2008 at 10:55 pmI stumbled across another article, this one from the Boston Globe, talking about urban policy and the presidential election. This too characterizes Clinton as the least helpful to urban America.
I was reading the article and came across this line which made me do a double-take:
Sure enough, it was penned by none other than Edward L. Glaeser. See, he has a fetish about shrinking cities…
NoPolitician
February 1st, 2008 at 10:56 pmWhoops. I forgot the closing tag on the link. This thing needs a “preview” feature…
Heather Brandon http://urbancompass.net
February 1st, 2008 at 11:08 pmThanks for those links. I have some reading to do. I’ll look into adding a preview plugin feature too by the way.
The survey seems to have expired, unfortunately; I guess it was just a 24 hour thing.
Becca
February 2nd, 2008 at 5:52 amThere was also an interesting article in this week’s New Yorker on Cory Booker, the young upstart mayor of Newark, New Jersey (if you think Springfield is bad…we’re still not quite to where Newark is) that talks about Booker’s support for Obama. While it approaches it from more of a “we’re both young black politicians who has risen through the ranks quickly” angle, I think it is also important to note that Mr. Booker seems to see Mr. Obama as connected with urban issues because of Mr. Obama’s time as a Chicago community organizer. It certainly can’t hurt cities to have someone like that in office!
Gideon http://apublicdefender.com
February 2nd, 2008 at 2:42 pmI can’t take the survey
Anyway, I would have voted for HRC and “k-12 education”, for what it’s worth.
NoPolitician
February 2nd, 2008 at 4:13 pmI question whether “more education” is a rational answer. Poor inner-city children aren’t accepting the education they’re getting. While the conservatives think it’s because they’re lazy, and just need a kick in the pants, I think that the problems run much deeper than that, and stem from a lack of economic opportunity.
If your chance of landing a job was 33%, would you attend college? I don’t think I would. But that’s the reality for many poor, inner city minority children. They know the game is too stacked against them, so they choose not to play. That’s not altogether that irrational.
I’m sick of hearing the “get more skills” argument when faced with economic destruction. Apparently Alan Greenspan was interested in everyone getting more education, not because he thought that we’d benefit from a smarter workplace, but because he thought it would flood the higher end job market with potential workers, lessening wages.
Heather Brandon http://urbancompass.net
February 3rd, 2008 at 1:25 pmPolicy wonks Bruce Katz and David Jackson of the Brookings Institution have a piece in today’s Courant asking who will be the best candidate for cities, and urging the discourse to center more fully on the way policy impacts metropolitan areas. From the article:
Paul Sheehan AIA
February 4th, 2008 at 11:03 amAny Democrat is best- Obama, Clinton, … any of them.
And Romney? Can’t say I am positively impressed with how Springfield deteriorated on his watch, if that is any indication. And look at his home state of Michigan. Can’t say much for the Romney family in that reagard either.
NoPolitician
February 4th, 2008 at 11:18 amI am amazed at how the Democratic party has managed to come up with two candidates who have such strong negatives at a time when Democrats should easily take the White House due to the utter failure of Republican policies.
I have spoken to people who *will not* vote for a Black candidate, particularly Barack Obama. Some are purely racist, they do not believe a Black person can or should be president. Others are buying into this email going around that claims that Obama is really a radical Muslim in disguise, and that we can’t trust him.
There are others who *will not* vote for Hillary Clinton. They have a genuine hatred for her. They are buying into the caricature of her as mean-spirited, hostile, bitchy, and corrupt.
I suspect that the candidate chosen *will matter* in terms of electability. Problem is, I can’t figure out who is more electable between Clinton and Obama!
NoPolitician
February 4th, 2008 at 1:33 pmI just came across this blog post analyzing the choice between Obama and Clinton.
It’s a bit of a tough read, but from other articles, I find the author’s point of view to be downright amazing at times. This one is definitely a point of view I haven’t heard before in this way, that Obama represents the “new America”, one that is feeling the effects of the “old America”, the America that glorified the 1950′s, which is what Clinton represents.
Heather Brandon http://urbancompass.net
February 4th, 2008 at 9:38 pmI enjoyed reading that piece and contemplating the ways things have changed since Facebook opened up to the broader public.
So much of my network on Facebook is charged up about Obama, joining various groups that have cropped up to support him, and “becoming a supporter” of his official campaign group. When I went to the Obama rally in downtown Hartford this evening, I shared it with my Facebook network first, and my Flickr contacts second by uploading a photo. It’s a new way of operating.
WTIC AM http://www.wtic.com/pages/5645.php
February 5th, 2008 at 11:53 amWTIC-AM’s morning show hosts Ray and Diane talk with Bill Clinton, Former U.S. President re: Hillary’s Presidential Campaign and the Super Tuesday Primaries.
http://www.wtic.com/pages/5645.php
Heather Brandon http://urbancompass.net
February 5th, 2008 at 1:45 pmThanks WTIC.
Heather Brandon http://urbancompass.net
February 7th, 2008 at 10:16 amVancouver-based Wendy Waters, who has dual US-Canadian citizenship, wrote yesterday in a post on her blog, All About Cities, that none of the presidential candidates appears to have an urban policy, and that this is a problem. From the post:
She asks for input if any readers find anything from the candidates indicating an urban platform.
Earlier in the week, searching for relevant urban policy stances, New York City-based Streetsblog had a post detailing candidates’ positions on transportation.
Heather Brandon http://urbancompass.net
February 19th, 2008 at 4:03 pmThe NYTimes has an editorial in today’s paper about the “search of a real urban policy.”
Richard Layman links to it and adds further thoughts about cities can help themselves.