Stumble It!
...We can hope...T
Republicans have lost the last two presidential elections, but not much else over the past six years. They’ve captured the House and Senate. They now hold 31 governorships and 69 of the 99 state legislative chambers. What this means is pretty simple: There’s an emerging Republican majority.
The GOP still has significant emerging to do before reaching majority status. It may never get there. The rise this year may be Republicans’ peak for now. They may have achieved nothing more than what University of Virginia professor Larry Sabato calls “the emerging outline of possible GOP victory in 2016.”
At the very least, a Republican must win the White House in 2016 while maintaining control of Congress. Republicans need to attract more votes from minorities, particularly Hispanics. They must continue to improve their appeal to women. Most of all, Republicans must avoid self-inflicted wounds such as prompting another government shutdown or nominating a poor presidential candidate.
That’s a lot to pull off. But Republicans have advantages they lacked in the presidential years of 2008 and 2012. One is the eight-year itch. That’s the tendency of voters to change parties in the White House after a two-term presidency. The only exception in the last seven instances of such a presidency was the election of George H. W. Bush in 1988 after Reagan’s two terms.
And President Obama is likely to make things worse for the Democratic candidate in 2016. He is not only unpopular but also appears committed to an unpopular agenda. Every poll shows Americans want compromise in Washington. Obama’s preference is for confrontation.
Then there’s the ideological direction of the Democratic party. It’s tilting left.
All the energy and passion is on the left. The party is being McGovernized. Moderates have about as much influence as liberals do in the Republican party. The Democratic agenda—bigger government, higher taxes, increased spending, and cultural nihilism—isn’t a winning combination for 2016.
Midterm elections are not predictive of presidential outcomes. We know that from recent history: After winning in a landslide in the 2010 midterm, Republicans lost the presidential race two years later. Still, the 2014 election offers some clues about political trends. For instance, it suggests the Obama coalition is not the same as the Democratic coalition.
Obama was a great presidential candidate. He maximized the Democratic vote. But when he wasn’t on the ballot in 2010 and 2014, Democrats lost badly. Their turnout machine didn’t work as effectively without him on the ticket. So the Democratic coalition will probably be less broad in 2016.
Democrats think they have a number of current issues on their side. But issues that poll well don’t always cause voters to back candidates of the party associated with those issues. Raising the minimum wage is a good example. It’s clearly a Democratic issue. In November, voters in Arkansas, Nebraska, South Dakota, and Alaska backed increases in the minimum wage. At the same time, they elected Republicans to the Senate—and by large margins except in Alaska.
Among the major Democratic issues today are global warming, same-sex marriage, abortion, and voter ID. Global warming is so far down the list of issues that voters care about, it has dropped out of sight. The fight over gay marriage is over. Democrats benefited in two election cycles from blaming Republicans for a “war on women” involving abortion and contraception. That issue died in 2014. Opposing voter ID laws may galvanize African Americans and the party base, but that’s it. Besides, there’s no evidence such laws prevent voting.
Immigration is different. It divides the country. It’s a problem for Republicans, who need 40 percent or more of Hispanic voters to win the presidency. It is one of the few issues that actually may help Democrats. Even so, Republicans fared better with Hispanic voters in 2014 than in 2012. In Texas, Republican Greg Abbott got 44 percent of the Hispanic vote in winning the governor’s race.
The Hispanic vote is growing, but it’s voters over 65 who are increasing the fastest as a share of the electorate. According to one estimate, seniors will be 30 percent of voters in 2030, Hispanics only 15 percent. And older voters tend to be more conservative, thus inclined to vote for Republicans.
The youngest voters, 18 to 29, are beginning to slip away from Democrats, too. Exit polls showed House Democrats had “half the advantage” with voters under 30 this year than they did in 2006. “The party’s grip on the young may be loosening,” wrote Mark Bauerlein in the New York Times.
Virginia governor Terry McAuliffe said Democrats ought to have touted aggressively the economy in the 2014 campaign. He should know better. Employment has improved, especially if you’re happy with a part-time job. But the recovery from the 2008-2009 recession is the slowest in many decades as average middle-class income stagnates and the exodus of Americans from the job market continues.
Assuming Obama sticks to his unimaginative Keynesian policies, it’s doubtful the economy will be any better in 2016. And a mediocre or worse economy won’t boost Democratic candidates, quite the contrary.
Finally, it’s worth looking at the Democratic presidential candidates. They’re old. Hillary Clinton will be 69 in 2016, Vermont senator Bernie Sanders a ripe old 75, and Jim Webb, the former Virginia senator, 70. Outgoing governor Martin O’Malley of Maryland will be a mere 53, but the main feature of his governorship—tax hike after tax hike—was repudiated in this year’s election. True, younger candidates may jump in.
The Republican presidential race, in contrast, is brimming with potential candidates in their 40s or early 50s. A partial list includes Bobby Jindal, Paul Ryan, Marco Rubio, Chris Christie, Rand Paul, Scott Walker, and Ted Cruz. Who’s likely to be a more exciting candidate in 2016, Hillary Clinton or Marco Rubio?
Favorable trends guarantee nothing in politics. But if they didn’t exist, Republicans wouldn’t have emerged in 2014. Should they continue in 2016, Republicans will emerge again. And in the not too distant future, they’ll be the majority party.
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Saturday, December 06, 2014
On a Roll: Suddenly, things look up for the GOP
Friday, October 31, 2014
Voters Are Ready For Sweeping Change
Not only are all the political prognosticators forecasting that the GOP will take control of the Senate, they're also predicting the Republicans will strengthen their majority in the House, hold the majority of state governorships and win a record number of state legislative chambers across the country.
WASHINGTON -- It's almost a foregone conclusion that President Obama and the Democrats are going to suffer a humiliating defeat in next week's midterm elections.
But what would that mean for the last two years of his deeply unpopular presidency, the outcome of the 2015-16 presidential election cycle and the Republicans' chances of winning back the White House?
Certainly, a huge, game-changing win for Republicans on Nov. 4 will dramatically reorder the political dynamics of the next two years. And this election is shaping up as a very big victory for the GOP across the nation.
Not only are all the political prognosticators forecasting that the GOP will take control of the Senate, they're also predicting the Republicans will strengthen their majority in the House, hold the majority of state governorships and win a record number of state legislative chambers across the country.
When you look at the number of major elective offices across the nation, you discover that the GOP -- whatever the polls say about it in Congress -- now controls a hefty chunk of the nation's political power structure.
The Republicans already have a tight hold on the House, are within six seats of taking the Senate, control 29 of the nation's 50 state governorships and rule 59 of the country's 98 partisan legislative chambers. Democrats hold only 39.
A Washington Post survey of the 6,049 state legislative races in 46 states says a "record number of statehouses could go Republican" in next week's elections.
After looking at these lopsided GOP numbers, all the stories from the liberal news media about how unpopular the Republican brand has become now seem positively laughable. If the GOP is that unpopular, why are the voters putting it in charge of the lion's share of the country?
It should be clear by now that it's the Democrats who are unpopular, or at least the Democrats who have been in lockstep with Obama's agenda to move the country in a sharply leftward direction -- one where more government, more spending and still more regulations are the answers to every problem.
So how will all of this play out over the next two years?
It's certainly going to have a profound impact on the 2015-16 presidential campaign, which will officially begin the day after Tuesday's results.
Hardly a day goes by, it seems, that some news story doesn't appear in one of the nation's major newspapers, usually on the front page, extolling Hillary Clinton as the savior of the Democratic Party, and who is on a fast track to follow Obama into the White House.
That she appears to be the overwhelming choice of her party is unarguable. But she also faces a hornet's nest of political obstacles that no one wants to mention.
First and foremost is that the nation's electorate has grown tired of the Democrats' botched, mismanaged handling of the economy and has turned bitterly against them.
A majority of voters now say the government's ability to address the nation's biggest problems has declined in the last several years. And by an overwhelming 3-to-1 ratio, far more voters blame Obama and the Democrats than the GOP, according to a recent Washington Post-ABC News poll.
Clinton is certainly not immune from this deep hostility toward Obama's big-government, anti-business approach to domestic issues, as well as his bungled handling of national security/foreign policy matters, which she oversaw and carried out as the president's secretary of state. She coldly turned a deaf ear to the desperate pleas for added security from the doomed embassy officials who lost their lives in a fiery terrorist attack in Benghazi, Libya.
One does not have to be politically clairvoyant to know that the GOP's campaign cry in 2016 will be "it's time for a change," and that means putting the Republicans back in charge of the government.
Meantime, what can we expect from the White House if the Republicans end up in charge of Congress in the last two years of Obama's presidency?
It's hard to see him signing any of the economic reforms the GOP wants enacted to accelerate growth, significantly boost new business formation, job creation and higher middle-class incomes, which have remained flat.
But GOP congressional leaders will want to show the American people the kind of changes that are needed to turn the country around, especially in the run-up to the 2016 presidential election.
To do that, they will have to pass pro-growth legislation to reform the tax code by cleansing it of costly corporate tax exemptions and other loopholes, and lowering the tax rates on business, families, individuals and investors.
They will have to tackle a common-sense replacement for Obamacare that lowers health care costs, including the rising cost of medical insurance premiums.
They should dare Obama to veto their pro-growth agenda and, if he does, it will become the virulent issue of the 2016 race for the White House. Then, let's see what Hillary does with that.
It is more than likely that Obama will not give an inch on any of the issues he has steadfastly opposed over his rocky years in office. Not on badly needed budget cuts to slow the growth in spending, tame the deficit and shrink an $18 trillion debt. Certainly not on junking Obamacare, or expanding trade and angering his party's union bosses.
Thus, we're most likely in store for two more years of gridlock in preparation for the presidential election battle to come.
The Republicans better choose their standard-bearer carefully, someone who, unlike Obama or Hillary, as been in charge of running a government and getting an agenda enacted.
The voters are clearly ready for sweeping change, and that's the midterm message they are going to deliver loud and clear on Tuesday.
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Tuesday, November 29, 2011
Retirements Confound Democratic House Quest
How does that song go, again? Let's see: "Happy Days are Here Agaiinnn!"
Massachusetts Rep. Barney Frank’s announcement Monday that he won’t run for re-election marks the 17th Democratic departure from the House this year, compared with only six Republicans. Those numbers don’t bode well for Democrats in their effort to take back control of the House in next year’s elections, Politico and The Hill report.
Democrats and Republicans alike see tough times ahead for House Democrats. “Members of the House don’t focus on their own politics. They focus on whether they are going to be in the majority and can push an agenda,” former Democratic Alabama Rep. Artur Davis told Politico.
“There are very few Democrats who see the prospect of the House shifting. I predict there will be five to 10 other senior Democrats that will announce their retirements in the coming months.”
The Democratic retirements fit a historical pattern. When either party loses a majority, its representatives get discouraged — and some hang it up. After the GOP ceded its House control in 2006, 27 Republicans opted for retirement, compared with six Democrats.
“Members of Congress don’t retire when things are good. They just don’t,” Republican strategist Matt Mackowiak told The Hill. “I think they’re looking at it right now and saying, ‘It’s unlikely we’re going to win the House back. If anything, it’s likely we won’t have the Senate, and the White House is a 50-50 shot, at best.’”
Democrats also may be worried that it will be many years before their party returns to power in the House, especially with the economy looking like it won’t recover anytime soon, Chris Perkins, a GOP pollster in Texas, told The Hill.
“What it does is allow the Republicans to build a narrative,” he said. “It makes the recruiting efforts for the DCCC [Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee]that much harder, when potential candidates see a lot of senior members bailing.”
Democrats also are fearful of the recent redistricting moves that will make some of their races a lot more difficult. Frank cited changes in his district’s boundaries as a reason for retirement.
California Rep. Dennis Cardoza, whose district was greatly reshaped, put the problem bluntly, telling Politico: “You have to represent people [who] you’ve never represented before. To represent nearly half of new voters . . . well, that’s not my idea of a good time.”
Some of the retirees aren’t too happy with their party leaders. Four of the nine Democrats who are departing and not seeking another office in 2012 voted against Nancy Pelosi as House minority leader.
Cardoza is upset with the White House, saying he is “dismayed by the administration’s failure to understand and effectively address the current housing foreclosure crisis.
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Tuesday, June 07, 2011
Baroque Obama
Obama Tunes Out, and Business Goes on Hiring Strike
By Michael Barone
Last week, I noted that various forms of the word "unexpected" almost inevitably appeared in news stories about unfavorable economic developments.
You can find them again in stories about Friday's shocking news, that only 54,000 net new jobs were created in the month of May and that unemployment rose to 9.1 percent.
But with news that bad, maybe bad economic numbers will no longer be "unexpected." You can only expect a robust economic recovery for so long before you figure out, as Herbert Hoover eventually did, that it is not around the corner.
Exogenous factors explain some part of the current economic stagnation. The earthquake and tsunami in Japan caused a slowdown in manufacturing. Horrendous tornados did not help. Nor did bad weather, though only a few still bitterly cling to the theory that it's caused by manmade global warming.
But poor public policy is surely one reason why the American economy has not rebounded from recession as it has in the past. And political posturing has also played a major role.
Barack Obama and the Democratic congressional supermajorities of 2009-10 raised federal spending from 21 percent to 25 percent of gross domestic product. Their stimulus package stopped layoffs of public employees for a while, even as private sector payrolls plummeted.
And the Obama Democrats piled further burdens on would-be employers in the private sector. Obamacare and the Dodd-Frank financial regulation bill are scheduled to be followed by thousands of regulations that will impose impossible-to-estimate costs on the economy.
That seems to have led to a hiring freeze. The Obama Democrats can reasonably claim not to be responsible for the huge number of layoffs that occurred in the months following the financial crisis of fall 2008. And Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke did manage to help stabilize financial markets.
But while the number of layoffs is now vastly less than in the first half of 2009, the number of new hires has not increased appreciably. Many more people have been unemployed for longer periods than in previous recessions, and many more have stopped looking for work altogether.
It's hard to avoid the conclusion that the threat of tax increases and increased regulatory burdens have produced something in the nature of a hiring strike.
And then there is the political posturing. On April 13, Barack Obama delivered a ballyhooed speech at George Washington University. The man who conservatives as well as liberal pundits told us was a combination of Edmund Burke and Reinhold Niebuhr was widely expected to present a serious plan to address the budget deficits and entitlement spending.
Instead, the man who can call on talented career professionals at the Office of Management and Budget to produce detailed blueprints gave us something in the nature of a few numbers scrawled on a paper napkin.
The man depicted as pragmatic and free of ideological cant indulged in cheap political rhetoric, accusing Republicans, including House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan, who was in the audience, of pushing old ladies in wheelchairs down the hill and starving autistic children.
The signal was clear. Obama had already ignored his own deficit reduction commission in preparing his annual budget, which was later rejected 97-0 in the Senate. Now he was signaling that the time for governing was over and that he was entering campaign mode 19 months before the November 2012 election.
People took notice, especially those people who decide whether to hire or not. Goldman Sachs' Current Activity Indicator stood at 4.2 percent in March. In April -- in the middle of which came Obama's GW speech -- it was 1.6 percent. For May, it is 1.0 percent.
"That is a major drop in no time at all," wrote Business Insider's Joe Weisenthal.
After April 13, Obama Democrats went into campaign mode. They staged a poll-driven Senate vote to increase taxes on oil companies.
They launched a Mediscare campaign against Ryan's budget resolution that all but four House Republicans had voted for. That seemed to pay off with a special election victory in the New York 26th congressional district.
The message to job creators was clear. Hire at your own risk. Higher taxes, more burdensome regulation and crony capitalism may be here for some time to come.
One possible upside is that economic bad news may no longer be "unexpected." Another is that voters may figure out what is going on.
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Related articles
- Why Barack Obama may be heading for electoral disaster in 2012 (navitor.blogspot.com)
- Americans fed up with Obama's ineffective leadership (capitolhillblue.com)
- Obama's biggest deficit is time (politico.com)
- 59% of Americans disapprove of Obama's economy (americablog.com)
- Barack Obama is floundering in a sea of bad news, as White House chief economist jumps ship (blogs.telegraph.co.uk)
Tuesday, December 21, 2010
Reid and Pelosi Finally Get Mugged by Public Opinion
Dead meat! Due to the fact that the demothug congress passed ZERO appropriation bills (to avoid accountability in the recent elections) this year, the incoming conservative majority will have unprecedented authority to restrain comrade Osama and enforce it's will...T
Elections have consequences. The consequences of the November 2010 elections -- and one might add the November 2009 elections in New Jersey and Virginia and the January 2010 special Senate election in Massachusetts -- became clear as lights shined over the snow at both ends of the Capitol on Thursday night.
At the north end of the Capitol, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid abruptly withdrew the 1,924-page omnibus spending bill he had submitted two days before. Reid had hoped that the $8 billion worth of earmarks, including some for Republicans, would provide the Republican votes to pass a bill that financed Obamacare and otherwise furthered Democratic policy goals well into the next calendar year.
But Minority Leader Mitch McConnell was able to persuade Republican appropriators not to swallow the bait. Democrats might have gotten their pet provisions through if they had submitted and passed appropriations bills earlier in the year.
But having failed to follow regular legislative order, they were caught defying the will of the voters so clearly expressed in November. Reid's ploy collapsed.
At the south end of the Capitol, Speaker Nancy Pelosi was forced to watch gloomily as her Democrats failed to rally majorities to alter -- and probably sidetrack -- the deal reached between Barack Obama and Republican congressional leaders extending the Bush tax cuts for two years.
Instead, the House voted 277-148 for a measure that the Senate had passed 81-19 earlier in the week. "If someone had told me, the day after Election Day 2008, that the tax rates on income and capital would not increase for the next four years," wrote Bush White House staffer Keith Hennessey in his blog, "I would have laughed."
Plenty of time for laughter now, for Hennessey and for the couple of million people who in some way, shape or form took part in the protests symbolized by but not limited to the tea party movement.
It is a source of continuing fascination for me to watch the interaction between public opinion, as measured in polls and election results, and the actions of members of Congress, elected in one political environment and looking in most cases to be re-elected in one that may be quite different.
Eleven months ago, after the Massachusetts Senate election, I was convinced that Democrats could not jam their health care bill through because voters had so clearly demanded they not do so. But Pelosi proved more determined and resourceful than I had imagined, and found enough House Democrats who were willing to risk electoral defeat to achieve what Democrats proclaimed was a historic accomplishment.
Pelosi and Barack Obama predicted that Obamacare would become more popular as voters learned more about it. Those predictions were based on the theory that in times of economic distress, Americans would be more supportive of or amenable to big government policies.
That theory has been disproved about as conclusively as any theory can be in the real world, and most of the Democrats who provided the key votes for Obamacare were defeated on Election Day.
Democratic congressional leaders did take note of the unpopularity of their policies when they chose not to pass budget resolutions last spring. Presumably they did so because they would have had a hard time rounding up the votes for the high spending and large deficits that would have ensued.
But had the House and Senate passed a budget resolution, Democrats might have been able to pass their preferred tax policy, raising taxes on high earners, under the budget reconciliation process. So the House vote Thursday night was a delayed consequence of the public's long-apparent rejection of their policies.
Obama told Joe the Plumber that he wanted to "spread the wealth around." November's vote, presaged by more than a year of polls, was, as political scientist James Ceasar has written, "the Great Repudiation" of that policy.
Republicans, having succeeded in holding down tax rates, clearly have a mandate to hack away at spending, and to defund and derail Obamacare, which is at or near new lows in the ABC/Washington Post and Rasmussen polls. And there does seem an opening, as Clinton White House staffer William Galston argues, for a 1986-style tax reform that eliminates tax preferences and cuts tax rates.
How effectively the 112th Congress will respond is unclear. But the outgoing 111th Congress, despite its big Democratic majorities, responded pretty clearly Thursday night.
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Saturday, November 13, 2010
GOP Freshmen Will Hold Boehner to His Big Promises
Just what we've been wanting to hear! This will be a very conservative congress!...T
For political junkies of a certain age, it was a given that the House of Representatives would always be controlled by Democrats. They won the chamber in 1954 and held on for 40 years -- more than twice as long as any party in American history had before.
When Sam Rayburn died at 79, more than 20 years after first becoming speaker, he was succeeded by John McCormack, 70, who was followed by Carl Albert, 68, and Tip O'Neill, an energetic 64. Every House elected from 1958 to 1992 had at least 242 Democrats, well above the 218 votes needed for a majority.
Now things are different. The Republicans won a majority in the House in 1994 and held on until 2006, the third longest period of Republican control in history; Democrats won two thumping victories in 2006 and 2008, but lost all their gains and more in the election last week. Alternation in power seems to be the new norm.
When John Boehner is elected speaker early in January, there will be more Republicans -- the exact number is not yet known, so let's say 240-plus -- than in any House since the one elected in 1946, before Boehner and most other members were born.
For a speaker, having a majority in the 240s or (as Nancy Pelosi has in the outgoing Congress) 250s is a sweet spot.
If you have 235 or fewer, as Republican Speakers Newt Gingrich and Denny Hastert did, it's hard to hold everyone in line on partisan roll calls -- some members will have districts or convictions that require them to dissent. And if you have more than 260, then just about everyone assumes he or she can go off the reservation, and without even letting the leadership know.
As Sam Rayburn said to Lyndon Johnson on election night 1958, when his party gained 50 seats: "Too many Democrats. Too many Democrats."
After the initial glow of the Gingrich revolution dimmed, the glue that Gingrich and Hastert used to hold their members together was money. They let Appropriations Committee members channel money to favored projects and members of Transportation and Infrastructure (the largest committee in Congress) earmark projects for their districts.
The bill came due in 2006. Disillusioned conservatives stayed home or voted Democratic. Most of the freshmen this year ran decrying the spending of Republican as well as Democratic Congresses and promising to do better. Boehner, who has never had an earmark, says the same thing.
Boehner has promised to do things differently, and the freshmen -- who make up one-third of Republican members -- will surely hold him to it. The size of his majority will strengthen his hand against the appropriators.
Boehner and incoming Majority Leader Eric Cantor also sound grimly determined to cut government spending, and they have an able ally in incoming Budget Chairman Paul Ryan. And they don't seem to be backing off their promise to do whatever they can to repeal and hobble Obamacare.
That won't be easy, with Barack Obama's veto pen poised to strike. But Obamacare is not a self-propelling vehicle. It needs fuel and funding and fiddling from Congress. Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius and Medicare agency head Donald Berwick had better plan on spending a lot of time on the south side of Capitol Hill over the next two years.
Boehner seems likely to prevail, in the lame duck session or as speaker next year, on extension of all the George W. Bush tax cuts, including those for high earners. Pelosi lacked the votes to let the latter expire before the election, and Obama seemed to be conceding the issue in his post-election press conference.
But Boehner will have his headaches when he has to rally votes to raise the national debt ceiling early next year. Freshmen don't want to vote for that, but it's irresponsible to let the government go without funding.
There's a tension as well between Boehner's hard line on issues and his pledge, in a pre-election speech at the American Enterprise Institute, to allow more open votes on amendments and to encourage committees to operate bipartisanly (as Boehner did on the 2001 education bill). We'll see how that goes.
Boehner is not likely to become as prominent a figure as Gingrich or Pelosi. But he'll start off with a larger majority than either of them did.
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Tuesday, October 19, 2010
Republicans put 99 Democrat-held House seats in danger
“It’s thermonuclear,” ...this is from a democrat congressman in New York...New York! Where republicans may gain up to 9 seats. Dick Morris may be correct after all that republicans could conceivably gain as many as 100 house seats and with them, an veto proof majority. Believe me, everyone, if we gain over 50 seats the Senate WILL fall as well. It always has, when a wave election of such magnitude has occurred historically. HEIL OSAMA!
With two weeks remaining until Election Day, the political map has expanded to put Democrats on the run across the country — with 99 Democratic-held House seats now in play, according to a POLITICO analysis, and Republicans well in reach of retaking the House.
It’s a dramatic departure from the outlook one year ago — and a broader landscape than even just prior to the summer congressional recess. As recently as early September, many Republicans were hesitant to talk about winning a majority for fear of overreaching.
Today, however, the nonpartisan Cook Political Report predicts a GOP net gain of at least 40 House seats, with 90 Democratic seats in total rated as competitive or likely Republican.
"When Chairman [Pete] Sessions and Leader [John] Boehner said that 100 House seats were in play, Democrats scoffed,” said Ken Spain, the National Republican Congressional Committee’s communications director. “Today, they aren't laughing anymore."
The number of Democrats in danger is more than double the 39 seats Republicans need to seize control of the House. It reflects an elastic electoral environment that favors the GOP by every measure: money, momentum and mood of the country — in this case, sour on Democratic incumbents.
For Democrats, a deteriorating political environment — unemployment high, President Barack Obama’s approval ratings low — has been exacerbated by the presence of cash-flush, independent conservative groups that have poured huge sums of money into races.
The groups, including American Crossroads, have combined with the National Republican Congressional Committee to stretch the boundaries of the 2010 map into races where there’s even a scent of Democratic vulnerability.
“This year is shaping up to be something of a repeat of the 52-seat House and eight-seat Senate rout of Democrats in 1994,” handicapper Charlie Cook wrote last week. “Sure, the circumstances and dynamics are different from then, but the outcome seems to be shaping up along the same lines.”
At one time, there was serious doubt the GOP would have the financial resources to compete effectively for the House majority. The thinking was that scores of potential opportunities could go unexplored due to the cash disparity between the NRCC and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.
While the NRCC still trails in cash on hand, its fundraising has picked up — the September total was the committee’s largest one-month take since 2006 — and independent groups have helped fill the void. And with anti-incumbent, anti-Obama and anti-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi sentiment running so high in many districts, even a relative pittance has been enough to push a few Democrats onto thin ice.
The assessment by POLITICO is based on a review of TV media-buy information from those independent groups and the party committees in more than 80 districts; internal and public polling in individual races; Federal Election Commission fundraising data for incumbents and challengers; and reporting on the districts. ( See: More photos from the campaign trail)
While the level of competitiveness among the 99 seats varies widely, they share a common denominator: all of them show some serious sign of vulnerability to takeover by the GOP. Factors included a Democratic incumbent’s unpopular legislative votes, the quality of opposition, the partisan breakdown of the districts or the huge sums of money dedicated to Democratic defeat — or some combination of all those factors — to place them “in play” ahead of Nov. 2. (See: Candidates take the debate stage)
The subjectivity of those factors have led to varying interpretations of just how many seats are actually at risk for Democrats. The Rothenberg Report, another political handicapper, lists 91 Democratic-held seats as in play, and predicts the “extremely large field of competitive races” will produce a “likely Republican gain of 40-50 seats, with 60 seats possible.”
POLITICO’s list of 99 seats — some of which have only recently emerged — places GOP pickup opportunities across the political map, stretching from regions of Republican strength such as the South to Democratic states such as California, where three incumbent Democrats face competitive challengers.
In deep-blue New York, Republicans have a shot at as many as nine Democrats. “It’s thermonuclear,” said two-term Rep. Michael Arcuri, in describing the campaign against him to The New York Times.
The list doesn’t include several Republican-oriented seats that Democrats have all but ceded to Republicans, including districts in southeastern Louisiana, Upstate New York and Middle Tennessee.
Some Democrats are clearly facing more difficult challenges than others. The DCCC, which is charged with protecting the party’s 39-seat majority, has already pulled TV ad reservations in at least six contests — a sign that Democratic hopes of retaining those seats are diminishing.
There are dramatic differences in the competitiveness of races even within states. In California, Reps. Jim Costa and Loretta Sanchez appear to have easier paths to reelection than fellow Democratic Rep. Jerry McNerney. In New York, Upstate Rep. Bill Owens has a higher degree of reelection difficulty than Long Island-based Rep. Carolyn McCarthy. In Texas, Rep. Solomon Ortiz — who typically wins by wide margins —- is far likelier to win than Rep. Chet Edwards, who is regularly faces stiff opposition in his solidly Republican district.
What does an endangered Democrat look like? Take your pick.
Freshman Democrats make up a large share — more than a quarter — of those facing competitive races. Of the 38 Democrats serving their first full terms in the House, POLITICO rates 29 as at-risk. Some — such as Reps. Bobby Bright of Alabama, Betsy Markey of Colorado, Alan Grayson of Florida and Frank Kratovil Jr. of Maryland — hail from GOP-friendly districts, where they have been in the cross hairs almost since the moment they were elected.
But legislative vets are under fire too. Nine-term New York Rep. Maurice Hinchey and four-term Arizona Rep. Raul Grijalva until recently were considered near-locks to win, before their campaigns hit unexpected turbulence. Hinchey attracted unflattering attention this weekend after a videotaped confrontation with a reporter at the same time American Crossroads and other GOP groups are pouring hundreds of thousands of dollars into ads in his district.
Grijalva, who called for an economic boycott of his own state amid a housing crisis and record unemployment, has also been hit by outside spending right after an automated poll unexpectedly showed him in a dead heat with his GOP opponent.
The list also includes a handful of veteran Democrats who typically enjoy the benefits of seniority on Capitol Hill and cruise to reelection but this year find themselves locked in competitive races. Among those Democrats are Armed Services Committee Chairman Ike Skelton of Missouri and Budget Committee Chairman John Spratt of South Carolina. (Join Arena debate: Which candidates should Dems try to save using limited resources?)
Getting outhustled in fundraising is another way for candidates to find themselves on the bubble.
In a sign of GOP momentum — and of the breadth of the competitive landscape — at least 40 Democratic incumbents were outraised by their GOP challengers in the most recent quarter, according to FEC filings. Reps. Ron Klein of Florida and Stephanie Herseth Sandlin of South Dakota, both stellar fundraisers, were among those outraised in the latest reporting period.
Not all Democratic districts in play are held by incumbents: The party is trying to retain open seats in states including Pennsylvania, Indiana and Washington.
If there is a particular trouble spot for Democrats, it is the Midwest, where 31 seats are at risk. Democrats are trying to defend incumbents including Reps. Steve Kagen of Wisconsin, Bill Foster of Illinois and Leonard Boswell of Iowa, as well as several open seats.
In the South, where many Democrats occupy conservative-oriented districts, Republicans are making a play for 24 seats.
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Tuesday, October 12, 2010
Republicans Widen Targets for Picking Up House Seats...
Following up on the most recent post: go ahead and not take into consideration the opinion of Dick Morris. This is from the op-ed page of Pravda! (er, the New York Times) ... and it's concurring opinion of the widening killing fields for the democrats this fall (it even uses the term "triage"!) should terrify the few remaining Obamites who continue to "fiddle while Rome burns"..T
ST. CLAIRSVILLE, Ohio — Republicans are expanding the battle for the House into districts that Democrats had once considered relatively safe, while Democrats began a strategy of triage on Monday to fortify candidates who they believe stand the best chance of survival.
As Republicans made new investments in at least 10 races across the country, including two Democratic seats here in eastern Ohio, Democratic leaders took steps to pull out of some races entirely or significantly cut their financial commitment in several districts that the party won in the last two election cycles.
Representatives Steve Driehaus of Ohio, Suzanne M. Kosmas of Florida and Kathy Dahlkemper of Pennsylvania were among the Democrats who learned that they would no longer receive the same infusion of television advertising that party leaders had promised. Party strategists conceded that these races and several others were slipping out of reach.
With three weeks remaining to save its majority, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee has increased its spending on two New York races, along with at-risk seats in Colorado, Georgia, Illinois, Kentucky and Massachusetts, setting up a map of competitive districts that is starkly different from when the campaign began.
The strategic decisions unfolded at a feverish pace on Monday over an unusually wide playing field of nearly 75 Congressional districts, including here in Ohio, a main battleground in the fight for the House and the Senate. The developments resembled pieces being moved on a giant chess board, with Republicans trying to keep Democrats on the defensive in as many places as possible, while outside groups provided substantial reinforcements for Republicans.
The National Republican Congressional Committee, the party’s election arm in the House, can afford to make the new investments because the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and a host of newly formed political organizations have come to the aid of Republican candidates who have far less money than the Democratic incumbents.
Here in St. Clairsville, an Appalachian town on the eastern edge of Ohio, the new investments by Republican groups have become apparent in recent days. Television and radio advertisements are aimed at Representatives Charlie Wilson and Zack Space, both Democrats who were elected in 2006, while new pieces of literature tying the men to President Obama and the House speaker, Nancy Pelosi, are arriving in the mail.
The two districts, which come together like long and jagged pieces of a puzzle, are among Ohio’s most rural and conservative. Yet even though Senator John McCain carried the region over Mr. Obama in the 2008 presidential race, Republican leaders had initially decided against making major investments because they believed there were greater opportunities elsewhere in the state and because both congressmen had strong connections to the area.
But polls taken for their Republican candidates showed steady signs of promise, party officials said, so over the weekend the national party made an initial expenditure of $350,000 on television commercials in both districts. Democratic strategists believe that the spending is either designed to be a head fake, so they are drawn into spending money on the races, or a signal to outside groups, who are prohibited from coordinating with the party, to begin making their own forays into the contests.
For months, Bill Johnson, the Republican challenger to Mr. Wilson, has drawn little notice and has struggled to raise money. But last week, things began to change.
He was invited to be the guest speaker at a weekly meeting of conservative leaders in Washington that is organized by Grover Norquist, the president of Americans for Tax Reform. Then he appeared on G. Gordon Liddy’s radio show, which he said helped his fund-raising efforts, as did an endorsement from Sarah Palin.
“It is a good year to be running as a Republican,” Mr. Johnson said in an interview on Monday as he drove across the sprawling Sixth District, which stretches 325 miles across 12 counties. “People are concerned about rising unemployment, spending and the overreaching of the federal government.”
Mr. Johnson, a businessman and retired Air Force officer, has been largely ignored by Mr. Wilson. He has criticized Mr. Wilson for declining to agree to debates. But the race gained attention over the weekend when the Republican committee’s advertisements began appearing on television, calling Mr. Wilson “party line Charlie” and highlighting his votes in favor of the economic stimulus and health care measures.
The message was amplified in a radio advertisement playing on a country music station here, with Mr. Johnson saying in a chipper voice: “On Election Day, it’s time we say, ‘So long, Charlie!’ ”
The race is springing to life here just as early voting is entering its second full week. Campaign signs for Mr. Johnson and Mr. Wilson can be found in equal measure in Ohio River towns from Bridgeport to Brilliant to Bellaire.
Mr. Wilson, who through a spokeswoman declined an interview on Monday because he was meeting with newspaper editorial boards in his district, has begun striking back. He argues in his own television advertisements that he stood up to Democratic Party leaders on climate change legislation, which he calls an “energy tax,” before closing with a line, “I’m Charlie Wilson, and I’m fed up.”
The outcome of these Ohio races, along with other contests in the newly expanded Republican battleground, will help determine whether projections of a Republican wave are realized. Democrats dismissed the notion that Republicans were actually expanding the playing field, suggesting that they were looking for new opportunities because efforts to knock out Democratic incumbents have proved difficult.
Ed Good, the chairman of the Belmont County Democratic Party here in St. Clairsville, said voters were angry and frustrated and eager to “shoot the messenger, if you will.” A Tea Party rally is scheduled for Thursday on the steps of the courthouse, the latest in a string of events that suggests the political forces may be different for Democrats this year.
“They are going to try to pick off what they think is low-hanging fruit,” Mr. Good said. “But the only way Charlie or Zack can lose is if our party does not get out and vote.”
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REPUBLICAN TREND GROWS
"A landslide without precedent appears to be in the making"
These sentiments appear to be largely accurate, according to all the polling and electoral history that we have been able to ascertain. The greatest landslide in history was in the post reconstruction period of the late 19th century. Are we approaching that level of "hope and change"? We shall soon see...T
The mainstream media is peddling the line that the Democrats are staging a comeback, slicing Republican leads. It is absolute nonsense. A close review of polling in every close House race in the nation indicates that Republicans now lead in 53 seats currently held by Democrats and are within five points in 20 more.
And the trend is Republican, not Democrat. Of the races where comparative data over the past few weeks is available, Republicans have gained in 33 while Democrats have gained in only 10.
On the Senate level, Republicans now lead in all ten states that are necessary for GOP control of the Senate, the smallest margin coming in Nevada where the Rasmussen Poll has the Republican, Sharron Angle, four points ahead. In West Virginia, Wisconsin, Washington State, and Illinois, the Republican has surged ahead dramatically in recent days and only in Colorado and California has there been slippage. The ten states which are now represented by Democrats where Republicans have the lead are:
North Dakota = +45
Indiana = +18
Arkansas = +18
Wisconsin = +12
Pennsylvania = + 7
West Virginia = + 6
Colorado = + 5
Washington State = + 5
Illinois = + 4
Nevada = + 4
Republican gains should be even greater than this polling indicates. The trend lines are decidedly in the GOP’s favor and Gallup Poll indicates that Republicans are twice as likely to be enthusiastic about voting as Democrats are.
The only note of caution for Republicans is that their leads in Democratic House seats are not substantial. In only 14 seats does the Republican candidate lead by more than ten points and most of those are open Democratic seats. But the Republican turnout machine – animated by Tea Party activists — will likely outperform its Democratic rivals.
And the Democratic Party has no message. Its campaigns are a hodgepodge of personal negatives and fabricated issues. No Democratic candidate is even trying to defend Obama’s health care legislation or argue that his stimulus program is working. Cap and trade is never mentioned by Democrats on the campaign trail. We have the spectacle of the most substantive legislative program in generations having been passed by Congress and now finding that it has no defenders in the election campaign, only Democrats scurrying to prove their independence.
All signs point to a growing Republican landslide.
The gigantic Republican gains of the past week indicate that party trend is now beginning to kick in big time. The Republican leads until this past week are largely due to the voting decisions of people who closely follow the process. The surge in Republican support in the past seven to ten days indicates that the less educated voters who do not follow politics as closely are breaking for the Republicans. Normally, these downscale voters are Democrats, but the economy and the alienating values of the Obama Administration (e.g. Ground Zero Mosque) seem to be driving them to the GOP.
Also boosting Republican prospects is the absence of social issues in the national debate. These elections are turning on unemployment, deficits, the economy, health care, and the national debt, not on gay rights or abortion. So, social liberals and libertarians see no reason not to vote Republican. Only in California are these traditional issues working in driving voters to the Democrats.
A landslide without precedent appears to be in the making.
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Friday, October 01, 2010
Dems Retreat to Coast as GOP Rules Vast Interior
Here's an exercise for some evening when you're curious about big nationwide trends in this year's elections.
Get an outline map showing the 50 states, and take a look at the latest poll averages in pollster.com in each race for senator and governor. Color in the percentage (rounded off; no need for tenths) by which either the Republican or Democratic candidate is leading (I use blue for Republicans, red for Democrats) in each state.
The map of the Senate races shows Republicans leading over almost all the landmass of America. Democrats are ahead in the three West Coast states and Hawaii (though not by much in California and Washington) and by 1 point in Nevada. They're also ahead in four states along the Atlantic Coast -- Maryland, Delaware, New York, Connecticut -- plus Vermont.
Republicans lead in all the other Senate races, from Philadelphia to Phoenix and Boca Raton to Boise. True, their candidate leads by only 1 point in Barack Obama's home state of Illinois. And they've got narrow leads in some mountain states (West Virginia, Colorado, Kentucky).
The map of governors' races is not much different. Democrats lead in New York, all the New England states except Maine, plus Maryland. They lead in Arkansas, where they've got a popular one-term incumbent, and in Colorado, where the party's nominee has severe resume flaws and former Republican Rep. Tom Tancredo is running as an independent. Democrats lead in Hawaii and Minnesota, normally Democratic states where Republicans have held the governorship for the last two years.
Two other big states have close races: In California, Republican Meg Whitman barely leads septuagenarian Democrat Jerry Brown, and in Florida, the race is tied.
But overall, Republicans are doing very well indeed, with statistically significant leads in every other state with a governor contest this year.
It would be more difficult to draw a map showing the party margins in the 435 House districts. For one thing, there are no publicly available polls in many districts. But if you could draw such a map, I think you'd see Democrats holding onto districts dominated by their core constituencies (blacks, Hispanics and the affluent voters Joel Kotkin calls gentry liberals) and struggling just about everywhere else, from factory towns to high-income suburbs.
Taken together, all these maps show a Democratic Party shrinking back to its bicoastal base and a Republican Party spreading to take in most of the vast expanse of the continent.
Now the geography can be a little misleading. The Democrats' Northeast and Pacific Coast bases are heavily populated, and the states where they're leading in Senate races cast 136 electoral votes in 2008. But the states where Republicans are leading cast 274.
These 2010 maps are quite a contrast with the maps you might have drawn just after the 2008 election.
Then, liberal pundits especially, but also more neutral commentators, were arguing that the Republican Party had receded to its base -- most of the South, all of the Great Plains and some of the Rocky Mountains. The Democrats were expanding to the New South (Virginia and North Carolina), the old Midwest (Indiana) and the Rocky Mountains (Colorado, New Mexico and Nevada).
Extrapolating from the 2008 election results, some Democrats foresaw a 40-year period of Democratic dominance. It turned out to last about 40 weeks, as Republicans passed Democrats in polls on the popular vote for the House in August 2009.
Now we see Obama campaigning at the University of Wisconsin at Madison, in Dane County, where he won 73 percent of the vote in 2008, chiding students for their apparent apathy. After reportedly planning to skip the rally, as he did when Obama visited Wisconsin on Labor Day, Sen. Russ Feingold made a last-minute appearance.
Republicans shouldn't get too giddy. The election has not been held yet (though early voting has begun in a few states), and Obama may indeed whip up some enthusiasm in the Democratic base. Republican candidates' flaws may prove fatal in some states and districts.
Moreover, as the political turnaround of the last 22 months has shown, voters stand ready to punish a party that passes bills they hate or fails to stay true to stands they love.
But for the moment anyway, the vast expanse of America is hospitable to Republicans, while Democrats seem appreciated only in their coastal and campus redoubts.
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Thursday, September 09, 2010
The Outlook Dims for Democrats
A stunning update from Mr. Rove, who until this week had predicted that the democrats would likely hold onto control of both houses. The left's stunning arrogance has a precedent: Let's see, who was it that was quoted originally as commenting; "Let them eat cake"?...T
With the midterm election less than two months away, all signs point to a punishing defeat for Democrats in the House of Representatives.
Since July 1, there have been 111 polls released on U.S. House races in 79 districts. Some were commissioned by news organizations; others came from the campaigns themselves or political groups (a detailed list is posted at Rove.com). Ninety-seven polls were conducted in seats held by Democrats while 14 were in Republican districts.
They show that Democratic incumbents trail GOP challengers in 30 districts and are behind in seven of nine open Democratic seats. By comparison, GOP incumbents are ahead in seven of the eight contests polled and Republican hopefuls lead in four of the six races for GOP open seats. If Republicans prevailed in these fights, they would net 34 of the 39 seats they need to win the House.
It could get worse. Of the 36 polls in which Democratic incumbents led, Republican challengers were within three points in 12 contests and within five points in 18 others. By contrast, in the 55 polls in which the GOP leads, the Republican is ahead by more than five points in 36. And in all but two instances in which data are available, the Democrat incumbents are significantly better known than their GOP challengers. As these challengers become better known, they're likely to rise in the polls.
Indiana's second district is a good example. Republican State Rep. Jackie Walorski trails Democratic Congressman Joe Donnelly by only 44% to 46%, according to an August American Action Forum poll. But Ms. Walorski is known by 78% of voters while Mr. Donnelly's name ID is a near-saturation 97%. This is a very winnable seat for the GOP.
On the money front—and despite the Republican National Committee's considerable fund-raising and spending difficulties—the Republican Governors Association has almost twice as much cash as the Democratic Governors Association. In addition, the GOP's Senate campaign committee has achieved parity with its Democratic counterpart and, as Josh Kraushaar pointed out in a perceptive piece in Politico, the GOP's Congressional Campaign Committee has outraised its Democratic competitor over the last four months and is spending more wisely. This led Speaker Nancy Pelosi to write Democratic congressmen who hadn't contributed to their party's election fund, telling them to call her within 72 hours to discuss their plans to give . . . or else.
The Democratic financial advantage is also offset by outside center-right groups. Some (including American Crossroads and Crossroads GPS, organizations I'm helping) are raising impressive sums and, as importantly, are working together to expand the battlefield to the GOP's advantage.
Republicans don't necessarily need to match the Democrats' money. Democrats, after all, were outspent in 2006 when they won control of the House. What matters is sufficiency—whether GOP challengers have adequate funds to get out their message.
Democrats are saddled with two signature initiatives—the stimulus package and health-care reform—that are manifestly unpopular. Opponents of these laws are energized while supporters are lethargic.
No Democratic incumbent has run a single ad this summer heralding health-care reform, while several have run ads emphasizing their opposition to it. Praise for the stimulus is rare even from the lips of Democratic candidates. Democrats have passed a lot of legislation but don't want to claim public credit for it.
No wonder. Consider what voters call the election's three most important issues. Republicans are leading Democrats on the economy by 11 points, jobs by five, and federal spending by 15, according to the Sept. 1 Gallup/USA Today survey.
This week, the president is trying to regain the initiative by championing $50 billion in new stimulus spending, temporary business tax breaks, and an R&D tax credit. It won't matter. After Labor Day, voters tend to be highly suspicious, rightly seeing such new proposals as election eve shenanigans. While the surging party wins most of the toss-up contests in a year like this, some Democratic incumbents will survive by spending every dollar they have to make their Republican challengers appear radioactive.
It's not too early to assess the damage done by America's 44th president. He squandered his mandate and the public's enormous good will. He alienated voters and dropped a heavy yoke on his party with useless spending and a shockingly unpopular health-care bill. With pressure mounting and a potentially epic loss looming, Mr. Obama has gone from a commanding, engaging candidate to an arrogant, self-pitying president. It is not pretty to witness.
The first people to pay the political price for Mr. Obama's mistakes will be congressional Democrats, who likely will be swept out of their House majority this November.
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Sinking With Obama, Democrats Plan Political Triage
Michael Barone implies (rather blatantly) that the Democrats could lose up to 80 seats in the elections coming a few weeks from now. Barone is perhaps the single most respected election prognosticator in America today. He compares today's Democrats to the antebellum democrats who were wiped out in 1856 after they shoved the Kansas-Nebraska act down the collective throats of Americans, believing that they could "explain" to the electorate the expansion of slavery to the territories "after" the bill had passed...sound familiar?!...T
When you spot the word "triage" in a political news story, you know someone is in trouble.
Triage is the procedure by which medical personnel screening people injured in combat or disasters separate those who can be saved from those who can't. The first group is given immediate surgery in hopes of recovery. The second is given painkillers to make the end bearable.
So it was startling to read last weekend in The New York Times that House Democratic leaders "are preparing a brutal triage of their own members in hopes of saving enough seats to keep a slim grip on the majority."
House Democratic campaign chairman Chris Van Hollen quickly pooh-poohed the story, as any politically savvy person would. But I bet he's already done his triage and that some of the names mentioned in the Times story are to get painkillers only.
For in the last week the bad news has been flooding in on congressional Democrats. On the generic ballot question, the realclearpolitics.com average of recent polls showed that 49 percent said they would vote for the Republican candidate for the House and 41 percent said they would vote for the Democrat.
To put these results in perspective, consider that before last month Gallup had never shown Republicans leading by more than 6 percent since it began asking the question in 1942. Now they lead by as much as 13 percent in some polls.
And consider also that the generic ballot question has tended to under-predict actual Republican performance in five of the last six House elections.
Republicans need to gain 39 seats for a House majority. The professional analysts see it happening: Larry Sabato puts the number at 47, Stuart Rothenberg at 37 to 42, Charlie Cook at 40. Cook notes that Democratic incumbents are trailing Republican challengers in polls in 32 districts.
These are cautious prognosticators who evaluate candidates for every seat. No wonder Politico's Mike Allen wrote yesterday that "the sky is falling" for the Democrats.
The signs are that Democratic candidates are getting the same message in their polls. Joe Donnelly in Indiana 2 runs an ad criticizing Barack Obama. Travis Childers in Mississippi 1 boasts of voting against the budget. Steve Driehaus in Ohio 1 runs a spot identifying his opponent as a congressman, even though he's an ex-congressman, while positioning himself as the challenger.
At least five House Democrats are running ads bragging about their votes against Obamacare. Surveys of ads run by candidates indicate that no Democrat has run an ad bragging about the health care bill since Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid did in April. More recently, he's been concentrating on depicting his opponent, Sharron Angle, as a wacko.
Is all this just a response to a sputtering economy? Political scientist Alan Abramowitz, on a panel with Sabato and me at the American Political Science Association conference last weekend, said he thought so. I disagreed.
I think what we're seeing is a rejection of the Obama Democrats' big-government policies. The president and his party thought that in times of economic distress most voters would be supportive of or at least amenable to a vast expansion of the size and scope of government.
They jammed the Senate version of their health care bill through the House in March, in the face of the clear opposition signaled by the voters of Massachusetts as well as every public opinion poll. I can't think of a more unpopular major measure passed by Congress since the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854.
Back then, the Democrats also had supermajorities in both houses of Congress and a young, previously little known president who had defeated an aging war hero by a decisive margin. They realized that the Kansas-Nebraska Act promoting slavery in the territories would raise some hackles, but expressed confidence that voters would accept it when it was properly explained to them.
They didn't. Voters reduced the number of Democratic House members from 159 to 83, nearly eliminating the party in much of the North. Democrats didn't win a House majority for the next 20 years.
Today, House Democrats have more money than their opponents and, unlike 1994, they've known for months that they might be in peril. They know that Republicans remain unpopular and hoped their own numbers would improve. But instead they're plunging to historic depths. Time for triage.
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Thursday, September 02, 2010
The last refuge of a liberal
Liberalism under siege is an ugly sight indeed. Just yesterday it was all hope and change and returning power to the people. But the people have proved so disappointing. Their recalcitrance has, in only 19 months, turned the predicted 40-year liberal ascendancy (James Carville) into a full retreat. Ah, the people, the little people, the small-town people, the "bitter" people, as Barack Obama in an unguarded moment once memorably called them, clinging "to guns or religion or" -- this part is less remembered -- "antipathy toward people who aren't like them."
That's a polite way of saying: clinging to bigotry. And promiscuous charges of bigotry are precisely how our current rulers and their vast media auxiliary react to an obstreperous citizenry that insists on incorrect thinking.
-- Resistance to the vast expansion of government power, intrusiveness and debt, as represented by the Tea Party movement? Why, racist resentment toward a black president.
-- Disgust and alarm with the federal government's unwillingness to curb illegal immigration, as crystallized in the Arizona law? Nativism.
-- Opposition to the most radical redefinition of marriage in human history, as expressed in Proposition 8 in California? Homophobia.
-- Opposition to a 15-story Islamic center and mosque near Ground Zero? Islamophobia.
Now we know why the country has become "ungovernable," last year's excuse for the Democrats' failure of governance: Who can possibly govern a nation of racist, nativist, homophobic Islamophobes?
Note what connects these issues. In every one, liberals have lost the argument in the court of public opinion. Majorities -- often lopsided majorities -- oppose President Obama's social-democratic agenda (e.g., the stimulus, Obamacare), support the Arizona law, oppose gay marriage and reject a mosque near Ground Zero.
What's a liberal to do? Pull out the bigotry charge, the trump that preempts debate and gives no credit to the seriousness and substance of the contrary argument. The most venerable of these trumps is, of course, the race card. When the Tea Party arose, a spontaneous, leaderless and perfectly natural (and traditionally American) reaction to the vast expansion of government intrinsic to the president's proudly proclaimed transformational agenda, the liberal commentariat cast it as a mob of angry white yahoos disguising their antipathy to a black president by cleverly speaking in economic terms.
Then came Arizona and S.B. 1070. It seems impossible for the left to believe that people of good will could hold that: (a) illegal immigration should be illegal, (b) the federal government should not hold border enforcement hostage to comprehensive reform, i.e., amnesty, (c) every country has the right to determine the composition of its immigrant population.
As for Proposition 8, is it so hard to see why people might believe that a single judge overturning the will of 7 million voters is an affront to democracy? And that seeing merit in retaining the structure of the most ancient and fundamental of all social institutions is something other than an alleged hatred of gays -- particularly since the opposite-gender requirement has characterized virtually every society in all the millennia until just a few years ago?
And now the mosque near Ground Zero. The intelligentsia is near unanimous that the only possible grounds for opposition is bigotry toward Muslims. This smug attribution of bigotry to two-thirds of the population hinges on the insistence on a complete lack of connection between Islam and radical Islam, a proposition that dovetails perfectly with the Obama administration's pretense that we are at war with nothing more than "violent extremists" of inscrutable motive and indiscernible belief. Those who reject this as both ridiculous and politically correct (an admitted redundancy) are declared Islamophobes, the ad hominem du jour.
It is a measure of the corruption of liberal thought and the collapse of its self-confidence that, finding itself so widely repudiated, it resorts reflexively to the cheapest race-baiting (in a colorful variety of forms). Indeed, how can one reason with a nation of pitchfork-wielding mobs brimming with "antipathy toward people who aren't like them" -- blacks, Hispanics, gays and Muslims -- a nation that is, as Michelle Obama once put it succinctly, "just downright mean"?
The Democrats are going to get beaten badly in November. Not just because the economy is ailing. And not just because Obama over-read his mandate in governing too far left. But because a comeuppance is due the arrogant elites whose undisguised contempt for the great unwashed prevents them from conceding a modicum of serious thought to those who dare oppose them.
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