Election 2010: The Aftermath

Yes, another political blog.  Tis the season.  This will be more of an "implications" kind of post, and probably less Republican rhetoric (no, there's still some).  Either way, fair warning, if you do not want to get into or read anything political right now, I'm giving you the chance to skip this one and move on to the next blog post!

This year's midterm elections were pretty historic.  There was a record change of power in the House of Representatives at this midterm election.  Republicans, as of now, have picked up 60 new seats in the House from Democrats...and the final number is expected to sit in the 63-67 range.  That's unprecidented.  The big shift in the 90s when Newt Gingrich and his Contract With America stormed to power was only a 54 seat change.  Only one race has seen a bigger shift in power in the House:  In 1938, the party gained 80 seats during the second term of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt.  Combine that with 6 seats being picked up in the Senate and 9 governor pickups, this was a wildly successful election cycle for the Republicans.

So starting in January, there will be new leaders in the House of Representatives.  Rep. John Boehner of Ohio is expected to become the next Speaker of the House.  Also, Rep. Eric Cantor of Virginia will be majority leader and Rep. Kevin McCarty of California will become majority whip.  These three men will be charged with coming through on Republicans' campaign promises of taking America in a new direction.  With a clear majority in the House, they will be able to pass legislation curtailing tax increases, repealing the Obamacare bill, and trying their darndest to make the government smaller.  However, anything they pass will have to head to the Senate...which is still controlled by the Democrats.  So, how much this newly Republican House will be able to accomplish is still up in the air.  We could very well be headed for political gridlock over the next two years.

Which brings me to an interesting question:  will gaining control of the House while NOT gaining control of the Senate actually be a good thing for Republicans heading into 2012?  In control of the House, Republicans will be able to pretty much pass whatever bill they want to out of there and send it up to the Senate.  These bills will most likely be very conservative in nature, and go pretty much against everything the Democrats have been trying to do over the last two years.  Then the Senate will have a choice to make.  In the shadow of the most recent election, will the Senate continue to try and push its ultra-left agenda, will it bow to Republicans in the House to prove to the electorate that they were listening, or will they try to find some middle ground?  And if the Senate tries to find some middle ground, will the House Republicans listen, or will they be emboldened by their perceived "mandate" after this election and take an all or nothing approach?  And if the Senate caves and passes Republican House bills, then Obama will have choices to make.

Ultimately, the Republicans will have Democrats backed into a corner.  If they go along with Republican changes, they can run on the fact that they did what they said they were going to do, now its time to keep voting in Republicans so real changes can be made.  If Democrats push back against Republicans, and things do not get any better (which is likely no matter what Congress does), Republicans can sit back saying "hey, we tried to change things, but the Dems blocked us again.  Give us the Senate and the White House."  It's a win-win for the Republicans with an eye towards 2012.  Having the Senate still be Democrat gives Republicans a strategic advantage in 2012...and the ability to keep feeding the negative public sentiment currently being felt towards a Democratically controlled Congress.

Moving on, as happens in times of changes of power, while someone enters a position of power, someone is also leaving a position of power.  And in this case, that person is Nancy Pelosi.  Pelosi's reign as the Speaker was, um, turbulent.  You see, Pelosi is an extremely unlikable person.  She grates on you.  When you hear her speak, you can't help but feel like she's alienating you.  Every time she speaks it's a very abrasive tone.  She's extremely partisan, and became the face of the new liberal "super majority" in 2008.  So when Republicans geared up for the midterm elections, Pelosi was turned into the face of the evil opposition.  It was her that the Republicans wanted to "fire."  So, this begs the question...is this giant power swing Nancy Pelosi's fault?  If the Democrats had picked a less partisan, more likable, more reasonable Speaker (one who could think for themselves rather than be a super liberal mouthpiece), might the Democrats still be in power for the next two years?

I'm not sure it's that simple, but it probably had something to do with the huge swing in power.  Every quote that ever came out of Pelosi's mouth was uber liberal, anti-Republican, and condescending.  This made for very easy attacking by Republicans running against Democrats who were in HER congress.  Pelosi couldn't be voted out (she's the rep from San Francisco...no way someone that liberal would ever lose in SF), but they could take her out of the Speaker's chair by winning enough other races.  So they ran against her.  People's hatred of Pelosi, however, was indicative of a much larger shift in the electorate.  One that really is different that any other political climate that I can recall.

Never before can I remember the electorate shifting in such an extreme way in the span of just a few years.  Two years ago, the Democrats swept to power in the House, Senate, and Presidency...and in big numbers.  The Democrats had a fillibuster-proof majority in the Senate.  They had a large majority in the House.  Obama destroyed McCain in the electoral college.  They basically had free reign to do whatever they wanted.  And now, two years later, the House has swung all the way back to the Republicans in large numbers.  The Senate is almost split down the middle.  Obama, for the first time, has a larger "unfavorable" score than "favorable."  Two years!  Usually it takes at least a decade to swing the electorate in those numbers.  But just two years after the Democrats took over Washington, and the Republican party was declared dead for the forseeable future, the Republicans are back in power in one house and gaining support very quickly every where else.  What happened?

Well, first off, our elected politicians have shifted towards the extremes.  The primary system promotes extreme candidates to win their primaries, because its usually only the hard liners who pay attention to the primaries. So then, in the general election, you are tasked with picking a far-left Democrat or a far-right Republican.  No fun.  Over the past two elections, we've seen this born out.  In 2008, it was moderate Republican incumbants losing to extreme Democrats.  In 2010, there were a lot of blue dog moderate Democrats losing to extreme (Tea Party) Republicans.  Thus, an extreme and devided government.  The country, though, is a center-right country.  Moderate with slight conservative leanings as a whole.  An extreme stable of politicians, on either side, will irritate the majority of the electorate.  This will lead to mass turnovers.  But I think there's something more than that going on here.

This country has become a very reactionary, me-first, always angry country.  The populace is encouraged to be enraged by whatever party is not in power.  When people are angry, they vote to kick out whoever's in power, because dammit, they want change are just aren't happy at all with who's in power.  People also have become very impatient.  This is a feeling also driven by the politicians not in power.  Yes, we're in some rough financial waters lately.  Economies are cyclical...it happens.  And it takes time for things to cycle back, no matter what you do.  Now, there are bad policies (like blindly spending as much money as humanly possible during a recession), but even good policies will take time to help the economy.  But if things don't get better for people immediately, then its a massive failure of the government, and dammit, those people have to go.  Once again, this is encouraged by the party not in power, because its a quick way to get back in power (as seen by the Dems in 08, and the Repubs in 10). 

So with a riled up public that's encouraged to be as impatient and reactionary as possible, combined with a government that's gone more and more to the extremes in a moderate electorate...you're going to see loads of turnover, and quickly too.  And we saw that this election, with Republicans getting the populace riled up because things weren't instantly better, and they swept back into a share of the power structure in Washington.

California seemed to buck this trend, though.  In an election where the maps in most states swung from blue to red, California stayed blue.  Not only did they stay blue, they became even more blue.  Surprise, surprise.  California became even more liberal, despite popular national sentiment in the opposite direction.  Every single statewide office went Democrat.  The governor went from red to blue.  The Senator stayed blue, despite being pretty unpopular.  The State House and Senate stayed very blue.  Everything seemingly turned up blue in my home state (not that I minded too much...I hated the Republican choices for governor and senate as much as I hated the Democrat choices).  Although there was one loss in California that displeased me greatly.

The liberal populace of California, in their unfailing wisdom (sarcasm), decided against legalizing recreational marijuana.  Prop 19 failed to pass, by a decently wide margin, too.  I'm going to leave my own thoughts on using the magical herb aside on this one.  I want to look at this from a few other angles than if I want to smoke the ganj or not.  Basically, Prop 19 would legalize marijuana at the state level (it'd still be illegal at the federal level), and open it up to be taxed by the state.  That last part is the biggest reason why I wished it had passed.  Like it or not, legal marijuana would be pretty popular.  The state could have made some real money legalizing it and taking in tax revenues off of it.  For a state in the budgetary state we are in, that sounds like an awesome idea to help pay back our debts!

But Patrick, weed is bad, its a druuuuuuug.  You can't have people toking up all the time.  Wait, why the hell not?  Time to drop some knowledge on yall.  Marijuana is not physically addictive (unlike the very legal and very taxes cigarettes filled with nicotine).  It's major bad side-effects include: delayed reaction times, some imparement in hand-eye coordination and motor capacities, laziness, and, yes, respiratory problems (although without the tars and toxins that cigarettes have, much less so).  Marijuana also has some pretty awesome benefits too.  It can help ease many chronic pains (back pain being most prevalent).  It can help ease one's anxiety, depression, hypertension, or insomnia.  Basically, it's an herb that can treat pain as well as emotional and mental conditions without the risk of dependency.  Yup, sounds super dangerous to me.  It's far less of a bad thing than cigarettes, and has some of the same effects as alcohol, and should be regulated as such (no driving while high).  But, really, it's not a narcotic.  It's a plant, that when smoked, can make one light headed and lazy...and sometimes give you the spins.

So we're throwing thousands upon thousands of people in jail for this?  We're tolerating extreme border violence along the Mexican border for this?  We're spending millions upon millions of dollars to fight this?  Seems like a waste of money to me.  An extreme waste of money.  Especially when smoking this harmless little plant could be regulated and taxed, thus making us money, clearing out our prisons which will save us money, and removing one source of violence from our border regions.  Why is this such a bad thing?  Not passing Prop 19 seems like a decision rife with unawareness and a lack of knowledge on the topic.  So, basically, the country went red, except for California, which went bluer, except in the arena of marijuana use, when it went socially red (seemingly out out of nowhere).  Awesome.  Well played California. :-/

So when all is said and done, there's one question that rises to the top over all the others:  what does this all mean?  And you know what?  I have no idea.  With a reactionary populace being fueled by anger, things are prone to change.  Lots and lots of change.  Although, maybe the populace just really, really doesn't want a large liberal government.  The 2008-2010 American government was really, really far left.  In a center-right country, that won't bode well for politicans keeping their jobs.  So the next decade or so will be very interesting.  Will things calm down?  Will cooler heads prevail?  Will we see more moderates creeping back into the government?  Or will the government stay on the fringes?  Will the electorate stay angry?  Will we see huge swings between Republican and Democrat every four years for the forseeable future?  I literally have no idea, but it should be interesting to watch...even though it's probably not what's best for the country.