What are the prospects for bipartisanship in the next President's term?

Despite the political leanings of the greater Houston metropolitan area in which it's sold and from which it draws its advertisers, it wasn't a certainty that the Houston Chronicle would again endorse George W. Bush for President, as it did in 2000.  But it has.  I rarely pay serious attention to newspaper endorsements, at least for top-of-the-ticket candidates.  (I do more often pay attention to them on contested down-ballot races, propositions, amendments, etc. — at least for the purpose of alerting me to issues or controversies that I might otherwise have missed.)  But the Chron's endorsement of Dubya has a paragraph near the end that intrigues me:

The Chronicle believes Bush, if granted a second term and freed of the need to appeal to the extreme factions of his party, will regain his bipartisan effectiveness at solving problems. That is not an idle hope but rests on the experience of an earlier Texan who occupied the White House, Lyndon B. Johnson. As long as he was a U.S. representative and senator elected by Texans, he never strayed far from the conventional wisdom of his constituents. In the White House, Johnson remained true to his populist roots but, freed from the common prejudice of that era, became one of the nation's foremost champions of civil rights and opportunity for all.

I very much hope this prediction comes true, but unfortunately, I'm afraid I'm not convinced by the Chronicle's reasoning.  Yet I have hopes of somewhat similar results, for other reasons. 

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Probably the single best book on politics and political history that I've ever read is the third volume of Robert A. Caro's LBJ biography, Master of the Senate — which, while part of a fine (and still incomplete) series on LBJ (whom I find fascinating of his own accord), also makes a great stand-alone read for anyone interested in how the Senate, Congress, and entire government did work and could work.  Caro vividly reveals how during his legislative career, LBJ had been as actively involved in blocking civil rights legislation as in promoting it — sometimes on the same day and in the same Senate cloakroom doorway. 

It's true enough that once he was no longer dependent solely on Texas votes to maintain his political position, LBJ had less reason to worry about backlash from championing civil rights.  But the major social legislation that LBJ rammed through Congress during his unelected partial term from November 1963 through January 1965, and even moreso during the first part of his elected term beginning in January 1965, had been gathering bipartisan steam and momentum for a long time; and the South was changing due to factors that had nothing to do with LBJ.  Johnson's compelling political sledgehammer in these fights was to portray himself as upholding the martyred John Kennedy's legacy (never mind that JFK's own civil rights record and commitment were not terribly consistent or heroic).  And finally, in terms of effectively stroking and twisting and caressing and jerking the levers of congressional politics and politicians, LBJ was a political genius, a cowboy-executive savant, of the sort Karl Rove, Tom DeLay, or even Bill Clinton could only dream of being.

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A re-elected Dubya will be freed from some of the pressures that probably resulted in first-term miscues.  I don't expect, for example, to see a second Bush administration wobble off the free-trade course the way the first one did with steel tariffs.  And I'm hopeful that presidential vetoes in a second term, or threats thereof, will bring more restraint to the Congressional pork factory.  (I'll agree that, as with those who believe John Kerry will be tough on terrorists and support our military, my belief here must be largely a matter of faith, not something based on recent past performance.)

But bipartisanship is a tango that requires two.  When he was the governor of Texas, Dubya had willing dance partners from the left side of the Legislative aisle, including powerful and self-confident Democrats like then-Lieutenant Governor Bob Bullock, who weren't hypnotized by or beholden to hard-left interests.  Alas, I see no such leaders among the current crop of prominent national Democrats.  Perhaps some would emerge from the smoking ashes of a Kerry loss.  The most obvious candidate — much as it pains me to type these words — is Hillary Clinton, but there may be others.

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Nevertheless, although not for the reasons the Chronicle postulates, I do see hope for bipartisan progress during a second Bush term in two key areas:

• First, and most important, is on foreign policy/domestic security matters.  I expect Democrats to continue to carp and criticize on Iraq.  But once the campaign rhetoric on that topic — the retrospective "Bush lied!"/"No WMDs" memes — have faded, and focus shifts more definitively to  forward-looking "What's the best way to finish the job?" substantive issues, there ought to be room for bipartisan compromise.  Where there's not, one hopes that the partisanship will take the form of genuinely constructive criticism of forward-looking proposals.  One thing Dubya showed as governor was a willingness to coopt creative ideas that arose from the other side of the aisle; it could happen again.  And if freed from the need to take an opposite position to create political campaign separation — the need to scream "Anybody but Bush!" and "I'm against it because he's for it and I'd do everything differently than Dubya!" — then perhaps some Democratic leaders will see fit to actually consider, for example, whether it makes good sense to continue to insist on the six-way talks with North Korea.  Perhaps we can ratchet up the international pressure on Iran and Syria without having roughly half the Congress in effect urging our allies and our enemies not to cooperate with us.
• Second, just as Clinton coopted and made political hay with originally-Republican domestic themes like welfare reform, I have some modest hopes that some Democrats may get on board with at least parts of Dubya's genuinely revolutionary "ownership society" initiatives.  Social Security may still be the third rail.  But there is vast potential for reform of, and controlling costs in, our bloated and incentive-confused health care system.  Ownership stakes in the medical decisions and consequences can introduce market rationality and cost-effectiveness considerations that are completely missing now; and if excessive tests and procedures are to be curtailed through consumer economic choices, there must be tort law reforms that reapportion responsibility between patients and their potential malpractice targets.  A Democrat willing to embrace individual choice, personal responsibility, and market capitalism ought to be able to find common ground with Republicans here — and those ought not be disqualifying themes for neo-New Democrats to run on in two or four years.  Immigration reform is another area in which there could conceivably be room for creative bipartisanship.  Radical tax simplification and reform?  Goliath lurks there; but damn, he needs to be slain, and the same Dubya who took the outrageous political risk of invading Iraq may indeed have the courage to take him on.  If so, there's risk and glory enough for ambitious Dems to share, if they will.

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There will be some bipartisanship if there's a second Bush term.  On some issues, Bush will be able to continue to peel off enough "conservative Democrats" to fashion filibuster-proof majorities.  But whether there will be genuinely broad bipartisan coalitions after a Kerry loss depends, frankly, more on what the Democratic Party's leaders do to reform their party, and/or whether new leaders step forward,  than on anything Dubya can do.

There will likewise be some bipartisan agreement if Kerry wins, if Kerry's not just paying lip service about fighting the Global War on Terror.  But such agreements are likely to be few and far between.  And they'd require a President Kerry to stand firm against the Michael Moore wing of his party.  Color me skeptical; in fact, photoshop me and ramp up the color saturation until your monitor resembles a steel furnace at full blast.

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Update (Sun Oct 24 @ 1:20pm):  The Austin American-Statesman — hometown paper for what many of us UT alums fondly refer to as "Sodom on the Colorado" or "Berkeley East," and unquestionably the basion of Texas liberalism and populism — has also endorsed Dubya.  Amazing first three and last two paragraphs:

A country so deeply divided over such an array of issues should pause a moment and take a serious, sober look around.

Americans should ask themselves whether they really believe that European nations critical of the war effort will intervene in Iraq if Sen. John F. Kerry is elected president. They won't.

Further, we should ask whether they really believe that anything less than a fundamental change in the way Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid programs are funded is adequate to meet future demands....

This president is not a conservative in either foreign or fiscal policy. In some ways, he is radically changing the course of government — and that might be just what we need to face foreign threats and a rapidly changing global economy. We certainly hope so.

We do not make this endorsement lightly or without reservation, and we ask that the president return our faith by acknowledging his failures and acting to correct them.

Knock me over with a feather!