Every political landslide carries the seeds of its own destruction

Every political landslide carries the seeds of its own destruction

You can’t govern the United States from Capitol Hill. Republicans learned that after they took over Congress in 1994. House Speaker Newt Gingrich claimed a mandate to enforce his “Contract with America.”  What he had was a mandate to make deals with President Bill Clinton.
Senator Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), the likely new majority leader, understands that. “The American people have spoken,” McConnell said on Wednesday.  “They’ve given us divided government.  The question for the president and my members is what are we going to do with it? I want to look first for areas we can agree on.”
Before he can do that, however, McConnell has to worry about finding an approach his own party can agree on.
McConnell and House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) are already talking about passing measures President Barack Obama can sign. They want to make deals with the president on relatively small-bore things, like the Keystone XL pipeline, trade and the Affordable Care Act’s tax on medical devices.
But the newly elected Republicans, in both chambers, include a lot of Tea Party conservatives.  They believe their mandate is to oppose and obstruct Obama on everything.  They don’t trust establishment figures like Boehner and McConnell.  After all, Republicans won with a negative campaign.  The party’s final get-out-the-vote message on Election Day said, “If you’re not a voter, you can’t stop Obama.”

Tea Party Republicans in Congress have their own leader: Senator Ted Cruz of Texas. Cruz is the new Gingrich.
Cruz has not even pledged to support McConnell as Republican leader. Instead, Cruz is claiming a mandate “to do everything possible to repeal Obamacare . . . to stand up to the president and say, ‘No more amnesty’ ” for illegal immigrants.
Those are not small-bore policies.
“Republicans must govern as they campaigned,” a spokesman for Heritage Action for America told Politico. Conservative activist Brent Bozell warned, “The GOP owes its victory to its base, and breaking any promises now will put their majority and any chance for the presidency in 2016 in jeopardy.”
This looming split in the Republican Party is likely to be the big political story going into 2016. The party establishment sees 2014 as its victory. The establishment used its influence, and especially its money, to keep many radical-right candidates from winning Republican nominations. But the Tea Party also sees 2014 as its victory. They supplied the troops and the message of defiance.
The showdown will come in the 2016 Republican presidential primaries. The field of potential contenders was already unwieldy. Now it’s even bigger, with a lot of new faces in key battleground states: Senators Joni Ernst of Iowa and Cory Gardner of Colorado, Governors Scott Walker of Wisconsin and John Kasich of Ohio.

What does 2014 mean for 2016? The same thing the 1994 midterm meant for 1996: nothing.  After 1994, it looked like Clinton was finished. He had to plead at a press conference, “I am relevant.  The Constitution gives me relevance.” In 1996, Clinton was easily reelected.
The three factors that drove this week’s big Republican victory will not loom as large in 2016. One was territory. The Senate seats that were up this year were in states that Obama called “probably theworst possible group of states for Democrats since Dwight Eisenhower.” Democratic Senate seats were up in seven states carried by GOP presidential nominee Mitt Romney in 2012.  In 2016, the tables will turn.  Two years from now, Republican Senate seats will be up in seven Obama states.
The second factor was timing. The Senate seats that were up this year were last on the ballot in 2008 — when Democrats did extremely well. Every landslide carries with it the seeds of its own destruction.  This year, Democrats had to defend gains from 2008 in places like Alaska, South Dakota and North Carolina.  In 2016, Republicans will have to defend gains from 2010 in places like Pennsylvania, Illinois and Wisconsin.
The third factor is the temper of the times: widespread exasperation with Obama’s leadership. Obama will still be president in 2016. But he will not be the central figure in the campaign.
Nonetheless, Democrats have reason to worry. They don’t have the House of Representatives. They just lost the Senate. If they lose the White House in 2016, Republicans will control everything. If Republicans take over, the first thing they will do is obliterate all traces of the legacies of Obama and Clinton.
No one has a greater stake in preserving both of those legacies than Hillary Clinton. She’s probably the only Democrat with a good chance to win in 2016. If Clinton doesn’t run, the party will likely nominate Vice President Joe Biden. To vote for Biden would be to vote for a third term for Obama. That’s why Democrats are desperate for Hillary to declare herself a candidate.
One more takeaway from the 2014 campaign: Local issues got swept aside. Every campaign was about Obama. How else could unpopular Republican governors like Paul LePage in Maine and Sam Brownback in Kansas get reelected? How else could Republican governors win in deep-blue states like Massachusetts and Maryland? How else could Republican David Perdue — a businessman who acknowledged outsourcing jobs — beat Michelle Nunn, a Democrat with a famous name in Georgia?
The 2014 election has firmly established a new rule: All politics is national.