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Presidents Can't Offer Quick Fixes

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By Marsha Mercer

The Tampa Tribune

Published: July 21, 2008

WASHINGTON - President Bush says he doesn't have a magic wand, so he "can't just say, 'low gas.'"

Now he tells us.

"There is no immediate fix," he said a news conference last Tuesday. "This took us a while to get in this problem; there is no short-term solution."

This is a moment worth remembering as we prepare to choose the next president. Presidential candidates are all can-do; they seldom see a problem they can't solve. They rarely acknowledge that their campaign promises are just plans. The reality is that we can't rely on them to solve our problems.

Bush is hardly the specimen of a president who accomplished what he promised as a candidate. Events out of the president's hands often dictate policy changes.

And then there's that pesky legislative branch - Congress.

Still, if we elect oil men to the White House, we should not be surprised if their solutions to an energy crisis involve drilling for more oil. Oil men are unlikely to champion solar and wind power, alternative fuels and conservation.

Bush's solution to skyrocketing gas prices is drilling off-shore, which even he concedes would take seven years - others say 10 - to bring down gas prices. And there's no guarantee it would happen even that fast.

But John McCain and Barack Obama make it seem easy. If you'll just give them your vote, you can sit back while they fix the energy crisis, solve the mortgage mess, put people back to work and shore up the banking system. If you want a dazzling smile or whiter whites in the laundry, that can probably be arranged as well.

The reality is different. Economists warn that voters should not expect too much of a president. Even though presidents get the credit when the economy is sailing and the blame when it's rocky, they really don't have much control. People laughed when Jimmy Carter turned down the thermostat and put on a sweater back in the 1970s to spur conservation, but even a symbolic conservation gesture would be welcome as gasoline inches toward $5 a gallon.

But Bush has not yet made such a gesture.

"People can figure out whether they need to drive more or less; they can balance their own checkbook," he said.

But what about the federal fleet, which has about 650,000 vehicles? Bush could order a cutback on travel. And he could listen to Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, who offered a simple solution to idling guzzlers: Turn off the ignition.

"I point out something that is just irrational, irrational right here on Capitol Hill," Grassley said on the Senate floor this week. He has seen, as everyone has in Washington, the lines of black SUVs, parked and idling.

"Why can't we have an ethic on Capitol Hill, whether it is ambassadors who are coming up here, whether it is the vice president coming up here, or whether it is our own elected leaders who have chauffeur-driven cars, to turn off the cars?" Grassley said.

It's the kind of simple, doable promise that presidential candidates rarely make: I will turn off the car - starting today.

Marsha Mercer is the Washington bureau chief for Media General News Service.

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