A growing list of conservatives, including National
Review’s Ramesh Ponnuru and an impressive group writing
in the Washington Monthly, are openly hoping
the GOP loses the House of Representatives this November. This
brings to mind the old adage of being careful about what you wish
for.
Those pundits posit that a GOP loss may be the only way to save
conservatism. Should Republicans win, it will only reinforce to GOP
lawmakers that their big-spending ways got them reelected. If they
lose, they will have to reconnect with their base — which they
have alienated by increasing the size of government — by becoming
true conservatives again.
Other alleged benefits of losing include: A House led by the
not-ready-for-prime-time Nancy Pelosi, John Murtha, John Conyers,
Henry Waxman, and the rest of the girls, and backed up by the
Netroots, will help President Bush’s popularity and provide an
excellent foil for the GOP in 2008. Instead of having to worry
about running the House and cobbling together majorities for
watered-down legislation, Republican House members could actually
stand for things that appeal to conservatives. Finally, a divided
government is much better for fiscal discipline.
It seems a bit troubling that these otherwise sanguine pundits
are viewing the prospect of losing through rose-colored lenses.
First, we should never underestimate politicians’ ability to glean
the wrong lesson from an election. Recall that one reason
Republicans won both chambers of Congress in 1994 was that
Democrats fervently believed that the lesson of the 1992 election
was that Americans longed for nationalized health care. While the
GOP might learn the pitfalls of overspending, they might also
conclude that it was their belt-tightening going into the 2006
elections that led to electoral loss. With the likes of Jerry Lewis
and Don Young sure to be whispering in their colleagues’ ears that
they need to spend more on their constituents to win, it’s a
possibility we should be wary of. Members might also “learn,” as
Philip
Klein has suggested, that what cost them the election was the
War in Iraq. If that happens, Democrats can sit back for the next
two years while the White House and House Republicans spar over
national security issues.
Speaking of Democrats, is anyone at all worried that
conservatives might be underestimating Nancy Pelosi? Sure, she
comes across as feckless on TV, but she would hardly be the first
politician to look bad on the tube and still be effective. She has
not done all that badly in keeping her caucus together. Presumably
she was responsible, at least in part, for getting John Conyers to
backtrack on his impeachment crazy-talk. With a few exceptions such
as John Murtha, she has kept the Democrats from talking about what
they would specifically do policy-wise should they win control of
the House. This has left campaigning Republicans with few easy
targets. In other words, her leadership is at least partially
responsible for bringing the Democrats to the brink of
majority-status in the House. It is far from a foregone conclusion
that a Speaker Pelosi would be ineffective.
In addition to underestimating Pelosi, we should also be very
wary of some of her lieutenants, many of whom have considerable
experience making life miserable for the GOP and conservatives.
Most notable among her underlings is Henry Waxman, who is not only
creative at using committee hearings to embarrass the opposition,
but also adept at using the legislative process to slip in little
bits of legislation that advance liberalism. Giving Waxman two
years at the helm of the Government Reform Committee is a risky
prospect at best.
Next, the loss of the House may cause Republican members to
stand for the wrong something — infighting. Rather than having a
unified opposition, House Republicans are likely to be mired in
recriminations over who lost the House and why. There will likely
be challenges and possibly “coup attempts” against House GOP
leaders. While the long-term fallout of losing in 2006 may be
positive, the short run losses could be very ugly.
Underlying the it-would-be-better-to-lose arguments is the
breezy sense that the GOP would have little trouble quickly
reclaiming the House. After all, the logic goes, the Democrats will
only have the slimmest of majorities — a few seats at best. But as
House Republicans have already proven, it is difficult to dislodge
the majority party, even one that holds power by a slim margin.
During these last 12 years, the GOP has held on to the House
despite never having more than 232 members, and at one point
dropping to as few as 221. Incumbency provides the majority party
with considerable advantages that enable them to beat back
challengers. Indeed, it has taken an increasingly unpopular war,
lobbying scandals and high gas prices to bring the Democrats to the
brink of power. Should Republicans lose the House, they will likely
have to wait for a similar aligning of the stars and planets before
they can gain it back.
Finally, the contention that divided government leads to fiscal
restraint is unconvincing. It rests heavily on the Reagan and
Clinton years, but a look at the year-to-year percentage change of the government portion of gross
domestic product suggests that fiscal restraint is far more
contingent on the political climate. Most of Reagan’s fiscal
restraint came in his first two years in office, after his smashing
1980 victory. As the years wore on, and Democrats in the House got
better at fighting Reagan, spending began to increase. In the early
1990s, the emergence of the Perot voter — who was very concerned
about the federal budget deficit — and the scramble of both
Clinton and the GOP to woo those voters, led to spending restraint.
However, when the deficit became a surplus in 1998, Washington
politicians forgot their frugal ways. This resulted in spending
increases in 1999 and 2000 that were the highest since 1990 and set
the stage for the spending orgy of the Bush years.
Would Bush and a Democrat-controlled House be an improvement
over recent years? Doubtful. Bush is, at best, a squish on fiscal
restraint (and that’s being charitable). Last week, House Democrats
voted overwhelmingly, 147-45, against a modest earmark reform bill.
Sure, Bush might get serious about spending once the Democrats took
over, but what would his argument be — that the Democrats were
trying to undo all the fiscal restraint he imposed? Indeed, the
press would portray him as a cynic, only caring about spending now
that the opposition is in power. Since the White House doesn’t seem
to have the stomach for such a fight, a more likely scenario is
Bush and the House Democrats cutting budget deals resulting in
spending increases as bad, if not worse, than what we have now.
There are other areas where the Bush Administration could cut
deals with House Democrats that should disturb conservatives. With
the Democrats in charge, a Senate-style immigration bill — i.e.,
amnesty — is far more likely to pass the House. From there it is a
quick trip through the Senate to Bush’s signing pen.
Yes, conservatives, myself included, are rightly disgusted with
Congressional Republicans’ profligacy. But that disgust is
beginning to get through, with Congress recently approving an
online database to track spending and the House passing the
aforementioned earmark reform. Such efforts will surely stall
should Democrats win control of the House. The answer is to keep up
the pressure through the grassroots and blogosphere efforts like
Porkbusters. A GOP loss of the House in November is
just as likely to create more problems for conservatives than it is
likely to solve, proving once again that, in politics, there is
little virtue in losing.
