Mr. Show--Meet Mr. Go

Back in June of last year, I wrote an article about a potential future Republican presidential candidate who nobody (including myself) outside the Midwest had heard much about. But at that time, some savvy political insiders had written pieces about his future potential, so it tweaked my interest enough to do some research. That resulted in Who's In Charge Here?. The subject of the article was Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels.

No doubt you're wondering why I didn't show a more traditional official photo of the governor. Stick with me, there's method to my madness. The picture was taken in the rotunda of the Indiana state capitol where Daniels displayed a New Orleans Saints flag for a week after losing a bet with Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal over the Super Bowl. Both Republican governors have been among the early mentions for the presidency in 2012, but neither has yet captured the attention of the general public. I have a certain fondness for potential candidates who are mentioned early but don't have much of a following nationwide because they are too busy doing their jobs in their home states. Jindal and Daniels have both been doing exactly that.

Before continuing, I should mention that after complying with the terms of the bet, Daniels could have simply tossed the enemy banner into the trash. Being a waste-not, want-not type, Daniels instead is auctioning the enemy flag off on e-bay, with a starting bid of $100, proceeds to go to charity.

In recent weeks, Daniels seems to have picked up some speed. He has received honorable mention in The Washington Times, The New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, US News and World Report, The Washington Post, The New Republic and National Review. None of those have been about some sort of landslide looming in Daniels's future, or puff pieces about the hot new kid on the block. All have been workmanlike studies of a workmanlike governor in a state that desperately needed to get its house in order. Though Daniels has strongly denied that he has presidential aspirations since winning a substantial victory in Indiana at the same time Obama was sweeping the nation, his name has been kicked around by insiders ever since that day.

Daniels is not a big time showman like Obama. His reticence to make grandiloquent speeches and join in rallies may have cost him some support when he called the recent CPAC get-together "a bunch of rowdies," but it's probably not a serious bump in the road for him. After all, the same convention conducted a straw poll which showed Ron Paul as the most desired Republican candidate for 2010. How much is that going to mean three years from now? Not much, I suspect.

Daniels first took office in 2005. At that time Indiana had been governed by Democrats in the executive mansion for sixteen years. The state was in an $800 million dollar deficit. When he ran for re-election in the year of The One, the state had a $1.3 billion surplus. And he didn't accomplish that by raising taxes, since he is a student of the Laffer Curve. One way he did it was to cut waste and get money back into the state economy by targeting the top-heavy and inefficient State Board of Education while at the same time repaying $760 million directly to schools and local governments. Those funds had been appropriated to finance the state's deficit spending under Democrats.

Daniels managed to hire 800 new child protective caseworkers and 250 badly-needed state troopers while still cutting the rate of increase of state spending from 5.9% to 2.8%, just over the rate of inflation. He worked feverishly to bring new business into the state, and succeeded in getting two Toyota plants, a Honda factory, a gigantic Nestle chocolate facility, and a BP (British Petroleum) project, which combined are expected to bring $3.8 billion dollars into the state economy. But he's not just a big business kinda guy. He has made the business climate vastly better with incentives for start-up businesses and tax breaks for small to medium size businesses.

As tame and mild as Daniels is, he won re-election by 18 points, including 51% of the under 25 age group that we covered on Friday. He captured 24% of Democrats, and 20% of African-Americans (and remember, this was the year of Obama). He received a predictable 67% of the senior citizen vote, but also 57% of independents in a year when independents were voting their disapproval of the Bush administration in most other states.

Daniels doesn't have to talk about conservative governance. He's enacted it, and has the track record to show for it. Those in the conservative Republican king-making corner have not only discovered him, but are starting to make sure his name gets out to the people. Before a conservative potential candidate can get a nomination, people need to know who he is. Sometimes they hire campaign consultants, or public relations people. But in some cases, they let their record speak for itself and if it gets the attention of those who can get their name in front of the public, they aren't going to throw the opportunity away. This is the stuff of which dark horse candidates are made.

Daniels has the common touch, in some ways like new Senator Scott Brown. When he first ran for election for governor, he traversed the state in a motor home when he wasn't on his motorcycle. He became noted for a great sense of humor, generally pointed at himself. His travels on the campaign trail were compiled into a YouTube presentation called "MitchTV." It was an instant hit.

In an article published at National Review entitled The Anti-Obama?, Mona Charen explains that the sobriquet has been used for Daniels before, but explains it as follows: "The contrast with Obama is not in style. Both are poised, intelligent, and well-spoken. The most glaring contrast aside from philosophy is Daniels's wealth of experience and record of governing success." Daniels believes that any Republican who runs against Obama in 2012 must be someone who knows how to reduce a deficit with serious economic programs that don't include seeding the clouds so they'll rain money. The candidate must be "prepared to govern, not just to win," says Daniels.

Daniels has said that he will serve out his term, working for the people of Indiana. He tends to be a man of his word, and tending to business is as natural to him as breathing. Unlike Obama, he does not have the addict's taste for the ultimate power-fix. Still, his broad experience in government, innate intelligence combined with wisdom, track record, and general affability may eventually put him in the spotlight he would rather not be in. If he chooses to rise to the challenge, he could be a very effective candidate. The next time we hear the name of Mitch Daniels, we owe it to ourselves to do better than say "who?"