Ryan Streeter
We conservatives used to talk a lot about how reform bubbled up from states and localities. We would cite Wisconsin’s heroic welfare reform leadership in the 1990s, which was also the Decade of the Mayor with reformers Rudy Giuliani, Steve Goldsmith, and others leading the way at the municipal level.
But since then, there hasn’t been much interesting state-level innovation to provide policy roadmaps for Washington – until now. This is for two reasons: state finances are a politically-created mess, and the recent election affirmed the direction reformist governors were already going.
It's time to start paying attention to what the nation can learn from its leading states.
As Dan Balz writes in today’s Washington Post, Republicans picked up 675 seats in state legislatures on November 2, the biggest gain since 1938. They’ve gone from controlling 14 legislatures to 26, while Democrats dropped from 27 to 17. Alabama went Republican for the first time since Reconstruction.
The gains are astounding. They also make a lot of sense, given where we are as a country. State finances are a wreck and could be the next big fiscal crisis in America. The “mad as hell” animus behind voter turn-out this year wasn’t just about Washington. It was about states, and given what what Michael Gerson recently called the “teetering finances of blue America,” it hit Democratically-controlled states especially hard. The nation is hungry for reform not just in Washington, but in states that have, well, gone statist themselves.
Voters want what reformist governors are doing. If we could gather the three leading gubernatorial innovators together to build one big laboratory of democracy to spin off ideas for the nation, these would top my list:
Chris Christie (NJ) and the fight against special interests – we need to confront the built-in waste and economic drag of entrenched interests, from their effect on bloated public payrolls to needless spending to earmarks. He’s gaining a lot of national attention for his combative approach to entrenched interests, and the joy he seems to get from it is contagious. Now it's time to figure out how to do this nationally.
Mitch Daniels (IN) and the politics of fiscal innovation – before it was sexy to talk of austerity as a virtue, “Mitch,” as he is known to everyone in Indiana, was putting pennies on the tires of government vehicles to see which were not being driven so he could sell them. He has shown that finances can be brought under control in difficult times through competitive outsourcing and cutting spending, and that enterprise and investment respond favorably.
Rick Perry (TX) and growth-based governance – he has presided over a booming economy by making Texas a low-tax, business-friendly destination for people from everywhere, spawning regular comparisons with California, which is driving people away (a lot to Texas). Texas's record alone in job creation recommends Perry for the list.
An honorable mention goes to Bobby Jindal (LA), who - the regular critique of being untested notwithstanding - has a firm grasp on healthcare reform policy and is articulate on education reform in a state that is notoriously low-performing. He performed well in the gulf oil spill, though I'm not sure I'd like to read his new book about this as I would like to hear him continue to advocate the policies we need.
We have a habit of hoping we can send people to Washington to fix our problems. But Washington itself is a hollow arsenal when it comes to the tools of reform. It's time to re-start an energetic debate about what our states are teaching America as a whole.
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