Tough Pars

Nate Silver writes (actually, tweets, but it is a form of writing, after all!):

Obama has a lot of pars on a tough course. Certainly could be much worse. But very few birdies.

This is part of an argument with Matt Yglesias structured around the difference between Andrew Cuomo's ability to exert effort and reap praise in the simple-majority NY Senate versus Obama's apparently more low-key leadership in the filibustered US Senate. They're sort of arguing over whether Obama has any particularly challenging and credit-worthy accomplishments that seem as much like an act of leadership as Cuomo's. I think it's actually a very apt metaphor. Roughly speaking, Nate's saying that Obama's playing the U.S. Open.
At the U.S. Open, par is typically considered a very good score. Many Opens are won over par, and those that aren't are typically won only a handful of strokes under par. You'd never see the kind of fireworks from something like the Masters, or an ordinary PGA Tour event, at a U.S. Open, or someone winning at something like 16 under par while shooting all four rounds in the sixties. (Right?) Now, "par" is defined as the score that a "scratch" player ought to make on a given hole. And championship golfers are a fair bit better than scratch; if they had handicaps, which they don't, they would all be plus. So the tendency would be to think that it wouldn't be very hard for your average championship golfer to go around a course in even par or better. After all, what's so hard about a tee shot down the middle, an iron onto the green, and two putts?

But, of course, in the U.S. Open there's plenty that's hard about that. Every component of a par is difficult. The fairways are narrow (and if you miss them, you will not be making an easy par). The greens are rock-hard with the pin positions tucked in corners and surrounded by deep rough and treacherous bunkers. Even if you do get safely into the middle of the green in regulation, the lightning-fast putting surfaces make a two-putt a lot harder than it, perhaps, should be. So while making seventy-two nice simple pars sounds easy on paper, in reality it is anything but.

Similarly, Obama started his term in office with 59% majorities in both Houses of Congress, riding a pair of landslide elections and a wave of public opinion. And hell, even a few of the Senate Republicans were moderates like Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins. Plenty of Republicans were from states Obama had just won decisively. Passing health-care reform with a public option should've been a breeze. Likewise cap-and-trade, maybe immigration reform, some nice strong financial regulations, etc. Big majorities, inspiring leader, popular agenda, what's not to love?

But, just like at the U.S. Open, it was a lot harder than it should've been to get fairly simple things done. For starters (and, really, the crux of the issue), the U.S. Senate is an idiotic place, where you need a 60% majority to get anything done. That made Obama's seemingly massive majorities much less meaningful. Then you had a cadre of moderate/conservative Democrats in both Houses of Congress, reluctant to vote for legislation they feared was too liberal for their districts. Then you had the lousy economy, which led Scott Brown to win an upset special election after Ted Kennedy's death in early 2010, destroying Obama's filibuster-proof majority and seeming to sap his momentum.

And yet, Obama got health-care reform, financial regulation, the repeal of DADT, and the START treaty (which required quite a few Republicans on board, despite their strategy of total opposition), all after losing his actual governing majority. Maybe those were just pars, and not birdies; it's not like he got cap-and-trade, or single-payer. Hell, he didn't get a public option. But a lot of pars on a tough course wins you championships, just like a lot of birdies on easier courses wins you tournaments. And it's not typically considered a less impressive accomplishment if you win with an unimpressive raw score at the toughest test in golf, rather than going on a birdie barrage at TPC Soft Greens. It's typically considered more impressive.