About Tonight

Ah, the First Tuesday in November, E-Day. A few thoughts and predictions about this evening's outcome:
- GOP picks up between 35 and 38 seats in the House.
- Joe Sestak and Patrick Murphy win in PA
- Harry Reid hangs onto his seat.

One overarching comment directed to the Obama Administration: a mid-term defeat does not 1994 (nor, ultimately, 1996) make. The Republican Congressmen and women elected tonight are not interested in legislating and, therefore, are not interested in compromise. I would stop looking at the post-1994 Clinton White House as a model.

GOP: All the Benefits of Anti-Bailout Populism . . .

. . . none of the downsides.

That Town Hall Analogy

A few months ago, while discussing the impact of Citizen's United, I used an analogy (that I stole from a colleague) centered on Norman Rockwell's famous Four Freedoms series. Specifically: imagine a New England town hall meeting. Now, instead of the banker waiting for the mechanic to finish speaking before the banker gets to speak, imagine the room filled--every seat filled--with someone wearing the same colored t-shirt, sponsored by Corporation X, to repeat X's talking points. Now imagine that when you walk up to the town hall meeting, every seat has already been filled by people paid by X and there's a line out the door of people paid by X. That's the potential impact of Citizen's United: the drowning out of all other points of view in a race.

Here's one exhibit: 60 Plus has spent 83 percent as much as Kapanke has spent on his entire campaign.

A Shot Across the Bow

Anne Applebaum, a columnist with whom I infrequently agree, fires a shot across the bow of Republicans suddenly consumed with deficit spending and small government.

[Y]ou cannot start from scratch. You cannot forget history. You cannot pretend that the Republican Party has not supported big and wasteful spending programs—energy subsidies, farm subsidies, unnecessary homeland security projects, profligate defense contracts, you name it—for the last decade. Before the Republican Party can have any credibility on any spending issues whatsoever, Republican leaders need to speak frankly about the mistakes of the past.

They also must be extremely specific about which policies and which programs they are planning to cut in the future. What will it be? Social Security or the military budget? Medicare or the TSA? Vague "anti-government" rhetoric just doesn't cut it anymore: If you want a smaller government, you have to tell us how you will create one.

Quite right.

On Tuesday Night: Against the Grain

In the days leading up to Tuesday’s primary and special elections, the convention wisdom coalesced around the notion that incumbent defeats would be proof of an anti-incumbent mood in the country. According to this reasoning, the anti-incumbent attacks would harm both parties but pose a greater danger to the Democrats because they currently hold the majority. It is easy to look at the surface of Arlen Specter’s defeat in the Pennsylvania Democratic Primary, Rand Paul’s victory in the Kentucky Republican Primary, and Blanche Lincoln’s forced run-off in the Arkansas Democratic Primary as evidence of just such an anti-incumbent mood. A closer look at these and other races should cause us to question this line of conventional wisdom.

In Pennsylvania, 5 term Senator Arlen Specter was defeated by 2 term Congressman Joe Sestak for the Democratic nomination for United States Senate. Specter notoriously enjoyed a 30 point lead over Joe Sestak a year before the primary only to lose by nearly 8 points. Many were quick to highlight the Democratic Party’s endorsement of Specter, his longtime incumbent status, and his moderate stances in exclaiming his defeat as emblematic of a year dangerous to the establishment, incumbency, and moderates. Yet, Specter’s defeat by Sestak is more readily explained by Pennsylvania Democratic voters rejecting a Democrat-cum-lately. Specter served all but one year of his 5 terms in the United States Senate as a Republican. Rather than run as an anti-incumbent, or anti-establishment, retired US Navy Admiral and 2 term Congressman Joe Sestak painted Specter as Republican, embraced by (and embracing of) the Bush Administration. You might point to the seeming rise of an anti-incumbent sentiment and Sestak’s closing a 30 point gap as cause and effect—but a likelier cause is that Sestak was little known state-wide a year ago and Specter, having served 5 terms as a Senator, had incredible name recognition.

Also in Pennsylvania, the special election for CD-12—to fill the late John Murtha’s seat—was a clear example of the establishment candidate pitted against the anti-establishment candidate. Mark Critz, John Murtha’s District Manager and a close aide, ran explicitly as the candidate to carry-on Murtha’s legacy, he worked for Murtha for 22 years, and he was endorsed by John Murtha’s widow. Critz ran as if he were an incumbent and struck a blow for the establishment by defeating Tim Burns by almost 8 points.

In Arkansas, Senator Blanche Lincoln has been forced into a run-off by Lt. Governor Bill Halter. Lincoln, a 2 term Senator, actually won the primary but failed to meet the 50% of the vote threshold to avoid a run-off. Lincoln won 45% of the vote despite having approval ratings hovering in the high-20s/low-30s. Moreover, Halter, though having spent a long-time outside of the state is not an anti-incumbent populist. Halter worked for the Clinton administration, is the current Lt. Governor, and receives a tremendous amount of support from unions—not a particularly popular stripe of organization in Arkansas. Halter’s having forced Lincoln into a run-off may represent a victory for “party activists” but, given the general dissatisfaction with Lincoln in the state of Arkansas, it can just as easily be explained as folks voting against a Senator they regard as below average.

Finally, in what was perhaps the clearest anti-establishment victory of the night, the Republican Primary in Kentucky says nothing about Democrats or even politics writ-large in the United States. It may serve as a warning to the Republican Party that the fissures between the core of the Party and the populist wing are quite deep—something that Bennett’s earlier defeat in Utah would seem to bear out. Or, it may indicate that Republican voters in Kentucky viewed the Party’s candidate as too close to the much maligned and retiring Jim Bunning—famous for becoming a deficit hawk only when it caused millions of Americans to lose unemployment insurance, and then complaining about missing a basketball game while doing so.

Is there an anti-incumbency mood in the nation? Well, there is no question that people are dissatisfied with Congressional performance. But the American people have been dissatisfied with Congressional performance for a very long time—in fact, the level currently is substantially the same as it was when the current Congress took over in January 2009. I do not think that Tuesday gave us a clear indication as to whether the American people are in revolt against the establishment. Instead, it appears that broad generalizations did not carry the day despite the nice anti-incumbent narrative the bulk of reporters have subscribed to.

Again with the Doing Stuff

Nate Silver has a good post over at FiveThirtyEight that looks at slight boosts Democrats received after passing the House and Senate versions of Healthcare reform last year. Polling disclaimers aside, I think this goes to a point I was trying to make a couple weeks ago in the comments in a debate with Colin (here and here). It was my contention that Democrats will pay a political price in the autumn for Healthcare reform regardless of whether they pass a bill or not. I further argued that, on balance, getting something done was of greater political value than not getting anything done.

More HC Process versus HC Substance Evidence

From the Massachusetts Special.

Win, Lose, or Draw: Lessons from the MA Special Election

Massachusetts goes to the polls today in a special election to fill Sen. Ted Kennedy’s seat. To the great surprise of, well, everyone, this election is actually competitive. Scott Brown, a little known Republican State Senator—that phrase has been used so frequently in recent weeks that it can longer possibly be true—has given Martha Coakley a run for her money. Though at one time polls had Coakley up 30 points over Brown, FiveThirtyEight’s model now gives Brown 3:1 odds to be the victor.

Win or lose, Coakley’s campaign—like Deed’s campaign in Virginia last year—offers important lessons for the Democrats going into the midterm election. Unfortunately, without exit polls, it will be difficult to construct an extensive post-mortem on the campaign. However, it seems that we can already draw two lessons: 1) don’t take elections for granted; 2) Congress must get something done.

As to the first point, lest we forget Coakley is running to fill Ted Kennedy’s seat. In Massachusetts. And there is a very real possibility that she will lose. I don’t think it’s possible to overstate the importance of this point. The lack of intensity, the lack of campaigning, and the lack of focus on this race has let Scott Brown become the favorite to win. Clearly, if Democrats are vulnerable in Massachusetts, they are vulnerable anywhere. Were I the RNC, I would throw money at every Congressional race in the country coming out of today.

As to the second point, Democrats, it’s clear that we are going to sink or swim together. The last year has been a terrible example of our party’s inability to control the message. The American people appear to be frustrated with Congress’s performance and its seeming inability to get anything done. Stop playing to the Republican’s message that Democrats can’t be trusted to govern: put a healthcare bill on President Obama’s desk; confirm the outstanding administration appointees; speak in consonance as a caucus about the issues confronting the nation. Without both tangible results and a coherent defense of Congressional action for the next 10 months, the midterm election will be a disaster. We may be nostalgic for 1994 at the end of this cycle.