Statehouse to White House: 10 hot policy ideas for the governor who would be president.

By The Editors

For of our last five presidents, and seven of the last 14 party nominees, have been governors. There's a good reason for that. Unlike, say, senators, who debate and vote for a living, governors are executives who create and manage real programs. Voters can judge the effectiveness of those programs and use them as proxies for what the candidate might do as president. In 1992, Bill Clinton touted his state's job growth and welfare-to-work initiatives as proof that he really would get the national economy moving again and end welfare as we know it. In 2000, George W. Bush bragged that his state's use of faith-based groups to deliver social services marked the kind of "compassionate conservatism" he would bring to Washington.

It's a good bet, then, that the 2008 presidential race will include more than a few governors. In fact, with no president and, in all likelihood, no vice president on the ticket--the first time that's happened in modern history--the campaign could be so crowded with statehouse chief executives it'll look like a meeting of the National Governors Association. The Republican primary might include Mitt Romney, Jeb Bush, George Pataki, and even (given a little constitutional rejiggering) Arnold Schwarzenegger. On the Democratic side, Bill Richardson, Ed Rendell, Mark Warner, Phil Bredesen, Kathleen Sebelius, and Tom Vilsack are just some of the governors who could jump into the race.

In such a crowded field, it'll be more important than ever for a would-be president to have a standout record of achievements--especially programs addressing the big national issues that will likely define the 2008 race. To that end, we've scoured the states to assemble our Top 10 List of good ideas that any Democratic (or enlightened Republican) governor could implement to build a White House-worthy resume.

National security

Problem: Questions of war and peace might not dominate the 2008 elections to quite the extent they did in 2004. But any presidential candidate who completely lacks national security experience will face a major credibility gap with voters. That's the big disadvantage of running as a governor: Defending the country just isn't in their job description. The one exception is that governors oversee National Guard units, the area of the military that is having the hardest time recruiting new members now that extended tours of duty are part of the job. Grueling deployments aren't the only troubles Guard members face today. Upon coming home, 20 percent of them lack health-care coverage because their military health benefits end when their tours of duty are over. That's a lousy way to treat our troops. And with enlistment and reenlistment rates plummeting, it's also a national security risk.

Solution: Let guardsmen and their families buy into state employee health-care systems that provide discounted coverage.

Where it's been tried: Nowhere yet, though health experts see no major reason why it couldn't be done.

Campaign sound bite: Guard members face the same dangers as full-time soldiers; they deserve full-time healthcare.

Possible downside: Some members of the Guard will still not be able to afford the coverage absent significant state subsidies, and rising health-care costs are already straining state budgets.

Abortion

Problem: The majority of voters support abortion rights in some form. Yet pro-choice politicians have been knocked around on the abortion issue ever since the words "partial-birth" entered the political lexicon. They fight campaigns with their backs against the ropes, offering the single defense of "choice" against countless attacks over which abortion procedures they support, why parents shouldn't be notified when their teenagers seek abortions, and...