Pawlenty: Running to the Right and into Trouble
The Wall Street Journal yesterday reported on Tim Pawlenty's advocacy of constitutional spending limits.
Mr. Pawlenty has proposed an amendment to the Minnesota constitution that would limit spending during any two-year budget period to the amount of revenue collected during the previous budget cycle. At a Republican fund-raiser in New Hampshire on Dec. 16, the governor also pushed the idea of an amendment to the U.S. Constitution that would force Congress to pass, and the president to sign, a balanced budget.
Pawlenty's campaign strategy is now coming into focus. With his interview in Newsweek last week, the governor reached out to religious conservatives, nodding to anti-evolution ideas and readjusting his record on gay rights. The governor's speech in New Hampshire seeks to appeal to Tea Party activists and the economic conservative base.
This may seem business as usual for a Republican candidate, reassembling at least two legs of what Mitt Romney called the three legged stool of the GOP: social, economic, and national security conservatives.
Yet this basic approach carries risks. As a less-known candidate, Pawlenty must try harder to gain attention - arguably too hard. The artful phrasing of his Newsweek interview suggested -- without stating -- that he personally doubted the truth of evolution. And his announced economic policy would rule out most government actions to counter-act recession -- indeed, might well have forced the federal government to raise taxes in 2009, to catastrophic effect. Pawlenty's base-pleasing moves in 2009 could emerge as real vulnerabilities if he gains ground after 2010.