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Popular incumbent has advantage, but TennCare a worry

by Frank Cagle

Since the constitution was changed to allow a Tennessee governor to succeed himself, the voters have given the chief executive two terms (Guvs Lamar Alexander, Ned McWherter and Don Sundquist). For that reason alone incumbent Gov. Phil Bredesen would appear to be a shoo-in for re-election.

Add to that presumption, polls show that Bredesen has a 70 percent approval rating and you would assume anyone with designs on the governor’s office might as well start planning for 2010, rather than 2006.

Since a lot can happen in politics in two years, is there any hope for gubernatorial hopefuls?

The irony in this fairly conservative George Bush-voting state is that there is plenty of room to run to Bredesen’s left. Traditional democrats must sometimes grind their teeth as Bredesen governs like a republican. He pushed through a business friendly workman’s comp bill, turning his back on union and trial lawyer constituents. He has cut budgets and he is poised to eliminate TennCare.

But it is unlikely that Bredesen will have a democrat challenge. There aren’t enough well-heeled democrats to fund a serious challenge, and the democratic bench is thin.

What about a liberal republican? In Tennessee? Surely, you jest.

A republican trying to run to Bredesen’s right would find himself falling off the end of the earth. To be able to run to Bredesen’s right, you would have to be a member of the flat earth society.

So is there any ground for a serious republican to stand on?

The TennCare issue and how it plays out is the biggest danger the young Bredesen administration has faced. Bredesen ran for governor as a health care executive that can fix TennCare. His fix of late has been to eliminate it and return to Medicaid. Not a lot of health care expertise in that.

Blame for the situation can be shifted to advocates like Gordon Bonnyman, at the Tennessee Justice Center, or to U.S. Judge John Nixon. But we should remember that Bonnyman’s lawsuits and Nixon’s rulings gave Sundquist fits and they were part of the equation when Bredesen went around the state announcing that he could fix TennCare. Nixon and Bonnyman are two of the things about TennCare that needed fixing.

Obviously Bonnyman is not convinced that health care expert Bredesen has fixed TennCare. And until Bonnyman is convinced, neither is Nixon.

So the danger for Bredesen in returning to Medicaid is the calamity and the wailing and gnashing of teeth across the state as the media documents sample cases from 400,000 people losing their insurance. The television satellite trucks will be parked in front of hospital emergency rooms for interviews.

If Bredesen backs off returning to Medicaid and is not able to enact meaningful TennCare reform the state is back to TennCare eating the budget. A governor presiding over a budget in which the prospect of increased taxes is nonexistent while all growth in state revenue goes into the maw of TennCare spending, is no longer a governor with 70 percent approval ratings.

If Bredesen muddles through the TennCare mess and comes out the other side, he will be more popular than ever and cruise to re-election.

But do the republicans have a candidate that would have any more credibility on the issue than Bredesen? A more basic question than whether a republican can win against Bredesen is whether there is a candidate, period. Most potential statewide republican candidates seem more interested in the Senate seat being vacated by Sen. Majority Leader Bill Frist.

Former House Minority Leader Jim Henry, who ran for governor in the republican primary in 2002 against Van Hilleary is often mentioned. Henry is well thought of in republican circles and enjoys wide respect. He got into the race in 2002 late and was chronically under-funded. Whether he can raise the money needed to challenge an incumbent in 2006 is the question.

The problem for any Republican challenger is that Bredesen’s actions thus far have made him more popular among republicans than democrats.

For any republican to have a chance Bredesen will have to do something that changes the dynamic radically. Suppose Bredesen can’t reform TennCare and thus proposes an income tax? The field of potential republican candidates might swell at that point.

But the smart money, half way through Bredesen’s first term, is that he will somehow escape the TennCare morass and cruise to re-election with little or no opposition. It will require an earthquake in the present political landscape to change it.

Frank Cagle is a political analyst and the host of Sound Off on WIVK FM107.7, WNOX AM990, FM99.1 and FM99.3 each Sunday 8-9:30 a.m.

November 24, 2004 • Vol. 14, No. 48 © 2004 Metro Pulse