Washington — This mid-term election is about atmosphere. It is
about how the voters feel. Objective considerations have been
fading from electoral politics for a long time. Precisely why that
is I cannot say in my allotted 800 or so words here, but atmosphere
transcends objective considerations nowadays in politics. This
might be because today’s politicians are better seducers than in
the past. Whatever the reason, politicians now play more to voters’
“feelings” than to their objective conditions.
In the 1992 presidential race the political wizard of the hour
played upon the voters’ feeling that the economy was in a dreadful
state, though it had already emerged from a mild and brief
recession. He played on the voters’ yearning for “change” and
invoked the term metronomically like a preacher at a country
revival. Objective conditions did not matter. He won, beating a far
more distinguished public servant and replacing good government,
prosperity and peace with what has come to be known as the Clinton
Scandals.
So it is today. Atmosphere matters more than objective
conditions. Thus the party leaders’ optimism waxes and wanes, for
over the past few months the country’s mood has been changeable. A
few weeks back the Republicans anticipated winning both houses of
Congress on November 5. Then the Democrats were in a state of
frustrated confusion. Now both parties are pessimistic. It all has
to do with the mood of the country, and the party leaders are
uncertain as to that mood.
Historically speaking, the Democrats should be buoyant. The
Republicans should be in mulligrubs. Owing to the presence of a
Republican in the White House, this mid-term election ought to be
in the bag for the Democrats. They should be confident of picking
up a seat or two in the Senate and enough in the House to grain
control of it — they need to pick up just six seats. In the last
century, on only three occasions has the President’s party gained
congressional seats during his first mid-term election. Yet the
Democrats and the Republicans are both in doubt of their chances.
The Washington Prowler, my favorite political source who reports
regularly online at theamericanprowler.org, says
Republican Senate staffers are not expecting to move up into the
leadership and some are expecting to see themselves and their
bosses unemployed. The Democrats are bluer still, feeling
frustrated that they have not presented a resonant national message
to the electorate.
The real reason they will not take the House and may lose the
Senate is, as I say, “atmospherics.” The Democrats’ inability to
make the economy an issue reflects the essential good sense of the
American electorate. The economy is not as bad as Democrats have
claimed. Despite the costs of September 11, the corporate
corruption (which is clearly not the Republicans’ doing) and the
burden on the federal budget of gearing up for war, the economy has
done okay. It has not gone into recession and is in fact growing,
probably at better than 4% in the last quarter. Thus the Democrats’
hope of a return to a 1992 yearning for “change” has not been
reprised.
The atmospherics are not working for the Democrats. They are
working for the Republicans. That is because the threat against
America posed by September 11 and the administration’s focus on
Iraq’s potential for mass destruction have provoked an instinct
fundamental to Americans: the instinct for vigilance. Americans
feel the first order of business is to protect the nation and that
means they will stand by the President and his party. They will
return a Republican majority in the House and may by one vote tip
the balance towards the Republicans in the Senate.
The Washington sniper’s brutality has heightened the American
instinct for vigilance. Voters want action taken. This too favors
the President’s party. The Senate will be decided in Arkansas,
Colorado, Georgia, Minnesota, Missouri, New Hampshire, South Dakota
and Texas. With the exception perhaps of Minnesota, all of those
states are states where the instinct for vigilance is high. Right
now the polls suggests a wash, with Republicans and Democrats
returning to the Senate in the same numbers as in the last Senate,
though with different states. My hunch is that enough seats will
actually go to the Republicans to give them a one-seat majority in
the Senate. The reason is American concern for security. It all
depends on the atmospherics, and I say the mood will favor the
Republicans with majorities in both houses.
