Election fever takes hold

Though New York, the “Blue” state where I live, is expected to vote heavily for Obama I am in the “definite maybe” camp – an undecided voter. It’s worth sharing some thoughts as I try to make a sensible voting choice.

The Republicans are the party of business; their candidate is a mogul in every sense. A lot of things come down to money; Obama has talked a great deal about infrastructure and his administration has pushed money in the direction of projects with quick returns. Baby steps have been taken in the direction of marine highways. But, again, my thoughts come back to the nature of ships and ports – with the payoffs happening (or not) over long time horizons.

From a business perspective, a Romney victory would likely give the stock markets a temporary bump upward, though earnings reports have a funny way of tamping down fiery enthusiasm. Romney has also talked about infrastructure, needed to support the healthier economy that he would hope to shepherd, but I have difficulties thinking about government getting out of the way when many maritime and related investments require at least some involvement, for jump starting, and sometimes beyond the initial construction phases.

Perhaps a pro-business administration could put a stronger emphasis on public-private partnerships. Of course, the danger here is that private investors might not like the prospects where long cycles are involved. Or, they might see the need to cut costs as a means of moving towards positive cash flows, if revenues aren’t projected to grow.

As noted in here before, I worry about the industry’s tendencies of fragmentation mixed in with politics, where one component of a bigger project might fight for resources at the expense of others. My friends on the ground, inside the government, are indeed taking an all encompassing multimodal view, aimed at showing benefits of a project. The top people, who must champion projects (rather than crunch the numbers without any glory), are political appointees, and that’s always a worry (to me). Some good names are floating around – John Mica and Bob McDonnell, for example.

Let’s hope that the winners- whether it’s a reinvigorated Obama team, or an eager and enthusiastic Romney team – can recognise the importance of infrastructure and fight for the needed resources.