Does "Anti-Incumbency" Make Any Sense?

In his daily links yesterday (we just can't seem to get off the subject of socialism, can we?), Stephen highlighted the most recent news out of France, where opposition candidate Francois Hollande defeated outgoing French President Nicholas Sarkozy in a runoff election this weekend.  Hollande's victory, in addition to parliamentary elections in Greece that saw the rejection of both major parties, were spun by the media as a sign of a vast, anti-incumbent wave beginning to sweep Europe, and Stephen, citing the latest Gallup Poll results (Obama 47/Romney 45 in a poll of 12 swing states), wondered aloud whether that wave could hit home in time to make Willard Mitt Romney our next president in November.

Of course, the irony to the "anti-incumbency" argument is that the very same austerity policies voters just rejected in Europe are the policies that Romney, together with a House GOP majority that is probably safe, would be compelled to pursue should Barack Obama himself fall prey to anti-incumbent sentiment in November. 

Pages of pixellated and non-pixellated ink alike have been spilled over whether voters always understand the implications of their decisions, especially in America, where our two-party system lends credence to the visceral sense that if things aren't going as well as we would like under one guy, we should give the other guy a chance.  This might make sense on a gut level, but any glance across the pond at Europe tells us it would be a disaster if anti-incumbency wins the day here in America.

After all, did voters reject Sarkozy and Greece's two major parties simply because they were in power? Or perhaps because the austerity policies they have enacted there have held back economic recovery, frustrating scores of French and Greek citizens?  Do American voters understand that our own recovery, while weak, would likely be slowed if not stalled entirely if we enacted the cuts to health care, neighborhood block grants, and child tax credits currently favored by Republicans?  Or if cuts in federal aid forced state and local governments to lay off even more police officers, teachers, and firefighters?

Most mainstream economists agree that deficits, while a problem, will be best conquered by economic growth and rising tax receipts, which will come from short-term stimulus.  And while no one would accuse the American economy of booming right now, Germany, probably the strongest economy left standing in Europe, has slipped into negative growth from its austerity program, and the UK, which has also embraced deep spending cuts, has slipped back into outright recession.  Is this really the road we want to go down?

Voters in battleground states are right not to be entirely satisfied with where we are as a country.  But when given a choice between policies that will continue to pull us on the long slog to full recovery, and policies that will cause more economic pain for the middle class, can't we look past the irrational appeals to "throw the bums out" and decide which path actually makes more sense?

For more on the ramifications of this weekend's European elections, see today's article from the Washington Post: ["Europe's elections offer economic, political risks for Obama," 5/8/12]