All elections are important. And most elections are tough. But this one has could destroy them. That should motivate us to fight harder.
Posted on 10/25/2006 8:12:42 PM PDT by neverdem
NEWHOUSE NEWS SERVICE
If there's one thing pundits agree on, it's that the Republican Party has more to lose in this year's midterm election. An understandable conclusion since the GOP controls everything in Washington but the weather. But it's dead wrong. It's the Democrats who are more at risk.
Look at it this way: If Democrats can't capture either the Senate or the House of Representatives in a climate this toxic for Republicans — incompetent conduct of a needless war abroad and mounting evidence of congressional corruption at home — they'll be a national laughingstock.
It won't be easy, especially capturing the Senate, where Democrats need to win at least six of the seven or eight seats rated toss-ups while retaining the seat they already hold in New Jersey that's considered up for grabs. The House, where Democrats need a net gain of 15 seats among the 40 to 45 deemed competitive, looks more doable. But no sure thing. Still, should they blow it, Democrats can expect a popular demand that they do the right thing and file for bankruptcy. Go the way of the Whigs, as it were.
Political success is measured as much by perception and expectations as by reality, maybe more. And the perception today, as measured by the polls and signs of flagging enthusiasm among some conservatives, is that President Bush's Republican Party has lost its way — it's not even very conservative anymore — and has forfeited its right to rule.
The polls everywhere outside the hard-core South are dismal for the president and discouraging for GOP candidates who can't escape his shadow. But they have created a great expectations test for Democrats in the bargain. If they can't win now, when can they ever?
Russ Hemenway of the liberal National Committee for an Effective Congress in New York has been working in national electoral politics for more than 50 years and says he has seen few years as promising for Democrats as this one — but the risk that goes with that promise is great.
The impact of another Democratic failure Nov. 7, he said, "would be a terrible psychological blow." On a more practical level, it would be disastrous for Democratic efforts to recruit attractive candidates in the years immediately ahead and for raising money, he said.
Democrats have enjoyed one of their best years in memory in the search for top-tier candidates for the Senate and House, Hemenway said. But it wasn't easy and it required an extravagant promise.
"We told them they'll be in the majority in the next Congress, that these were the best conditions for Democrats in years," Hemenway said. "We told them they will be able to get things done."
Majority-party status is particularly important in the House. With it go chairmanships of subcommittees, even for freshmen, plus patronage, influence or even control over legislation and spending and, most important, the power to hold hearings that draw the press and attract usually favorable attention back home.
Minority members of the House, on the other hand, are usually as conspicuous in the congressional legislative process as the wallpaper. Only on extremely close issues do their votes matter at all — something majorities ordinarily take care to avoid. Why give the opposition a chance to be heard?
It's not quite that bad for senators in the minority. Senators have stature and are more visible personalities in Washington as well as at home. Even in the minority, they're pampered and sought after as talking heads on television. And the more collegial, less partisan atmosphere of the Senate offers even minority members an occasional chance to be heard. But even in the Senate, members of the minority chafe at their limitations.
For Democrats, perhaps the worst fallout from failure in the November elections is that it would allow Republicans to justifiably cite the results as a vindication for the Bush record and a rejection of Democrats as a credible alternative.
"If that happens," Hemenway said, "Democrats will be out of power for at least another decade."
That thinking may have worked 20 years ago, not today. The Democratic party is too dangerous to our liberty.
Yes, you are correct about that. :-)
They have absolutely no basic idea on how to defend the country or how to increase the nation's prosperity. This is a party that actually believes crippling business and industry is good for the country. They believe that talking nice to killer terrorists will make them like us. In short, this is a party that lives in a land of make believe and false promises.
For the last forty years Big Lib Media has been telling Americans how awful life is in the U.S. Vast amounts of gullible, poorly educated Americans believe that. I have Dem friends who have far more wealth than I do who believe that. Big Media is the worst enemy of the average American.
No, no no. They've ALREADY got a built in excuse. I swear, I was talking to a very liberal friend, and s/he was so certain of Democrat wins this year...and then I said something like, "But what if the Democrat party loses? You already have an excuse--Diebold!"
And s/he says "That's right!"
I had to bust a gut...their "we was robbed!" action line is already written. :)
If the socialists don't win this time, I believe, the dems are going to, at long last, have to reassess how they are ever going to be creditable again. It goes, without saying, the clintons are the epitome of the far left and represent the ideology of socialism.
It won't be an easy decision for democrats because once they sold their soul for the socialist money banks and the media heads, they will lose all that support which has kept them in office. They will, finally, see the reality that this country for what it is and, to survive as a party, move into the real mainstream, albeit, kicking and screaming.
Excellent reply.
And if that doesn't work, it may end up on the streets.
Yea,BUT it was his turn!
A good Republican canidate would have won that election.
What's the 30% you need to work on?
1 more judge and we win in Iraq and we can start throwing out the RINOS. We have to keep guys like Talent, Santorum, Tancredo and such in the majority now for the sake of humanity. Remember who confirms the judges. Remember who stopped McCain's amnesty plan. Hold your nose for now, FRiend.
.....Then we nominated Bob Dole......
I am a conspiricist. The Dole nomination had to be part of some grand conspiricy.
41 bowed out by not campaigning to allow Clinton. Dole was nominated to allow the second term and the 43 ascendency that will allow The beast and then Jeb.
..
They (the dems) already ARE a national laughingstock. The only question now is exactly WHEN they become an EXTINCT laughing stock.
All elections are important. And most elections are tough. But this one has could destroy them. That should motivate us to fight harder.
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