For Democrats, be careful what you wish for? | George Korda
Political preferences can do strange things to people, such as, making them believe what is, isn’t, because they don’t want to accept that what is, is.
My last two columns have been on the subjects of the country’s political hue becoming similar to Tennessee’s transition from blue to red. The first column, “Politically, America is looking increasingly like Tennessee,” focused on the Democratic debacle that was the 2020 congressional elections. Projected to win up to 15 House seats, Democrats lost 13 seats.
Among the headlines about those elections:
· ‘Dumpster fire’: House Democrats trade blame after Tuesday’s damage” – Politico
· “Amid Tears and Anger, House Democrats Promise ‘Deep Dive’ on Election Losses” – New York Times
· “The 2020 Election Has Brought Progressives to the Brink of Catastrophe” – New Yorker magazine
The second column centered on Tennessee Republican U.S. Rep. Tim Burchett’s statement to me that the election setbacks “absolutely shook” House Democrats, and that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi was taking heat for the defeats.
That isn’t true, some commenters said. To summarize their reaction: Joe Biden won the presidency. Look at the popular vote totals. Biden got seven million more votes than Trump. The Democratic Party is doing just fine, thank you. Republicans are going down!
But saying something isn’t what it is doesn’t transform it into what you want it to be. The “is,” is that Republicans, for decades essentially back-benchers at the state and federal levels, have been on something of a tear for a quarter-century.
This isn’t saying that the U.S. will make Tennessee’s transition from majority Democrat to supermajority Republican; however, since 1994, Republicans have been on a generally upward trajectory in terms of American voting patterns. Not constantly, but generally.
At the presidential level, the political parties have engaged in alternating presidencies: Clinton, George W. Bush, Barack Obama, Donald Trump, and, unless something titanic and unexpected occurs, Biden.
The federal and state-level election swing toward Republicans began in earnest with Bill Clinton’s 1994 mid-term elections. Republicans won their first House majority in 40 years. Forty. Four-zero. Not since President Dwight Eisenhower’s first term had Republicans held more House seats than Democrats.
Democratic majorities had been a given: The sun rises and sets, the Earth revolves around the sun, and Democrats will be in the House majority. Until Clinton arrived. The 104th Congress, with a Republican majority, took its seats in 1995; since then, Republicans have held the majority in 10 congressional sessions, the Democrats, three.
In the U.S. Senate, Democrats held a constant majority between 1955 and 1981. Things shifted a bit to Republicans under President Ronald Reagan, but since 1994, Republicans have held the Senate eight times, while Democrats have had majorities five (twice Democrats had majorities only because independent senators caucused with Democrats).
If Clinton was a boost to Republicans, Obama was a gift from heaven.
At the state level, Chris Cillizza, in a 2015 Washington Post column, pointed out the problem for Democrats after 2012, the second Obama mid-term: “In 2009, Republicans controlled both chambers in just 14 state legislatures. Six years later, they had total control in more than double that number. And that's not even the full, bad story for Democrats. Look at their numbers. In 2009, Democrats had full control in 27 state legislatures; by 2015 that number was down to 11, the lowest ebb for total Democratic control since, at least, 1978.”
As for the 2020 elections, the Vox website reported: “According to the NCSL (National Conference of State Legislatures), this means that out of 98 chambers (not counting Nebraska’s unicameral and facially nonpartisan body), ‘59 are held by Republicans, 37 by Democrats.’ And when it comes to unified control — meaning one party controls both the legislature and the governorship — Republicans have the edge holding 23 states to Democrats’ 15.”
There are Democrats who believe fervently that the party’s lost dynastic success against Republicans is because it hasn’t gone far enough to the left. However, ballot box results indicate that since 1994, the more liberal the Democratic Party is seen to be, the better it is for Republicans, generally.
With Biden in the White House, given the positions he’s taken to keep the Democratic left in his corner, the theory about more liberalism being the key to Democratic victory will be tested, and could mean happy days will continue to be here again – for the GOP. The much-read political website FiveThirtyEight.com says Republicans are on track to win back the House in 2022.
For liberal Democrats, it may well be a case of be careful what you wish for.
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