All right. So President Obama was re-elected, the Democrats kept the Senate and the Republicans kept the House. If you're a Democrat/of the liberal persuasion, then you're probably still recovering from the hangover today and will be washing the champagne out of your clothes for a good week or so yet. If you're a Republicans/of the Conservative persuasion, well, there's still no joy in Mudville today and probably won't be for awhile now. All of which begs the question: what happens now?
In the short term, my gut says they work out a deal to avoid fiscal catastrophe. Republicans were dealt a severe setback in Congress yesterday. They might still control the House but they lost two Senate seats that they had genuine shots at in Missouri and Indiana and the world looks a lot colder and crueler than it did on Monday morning. It's advantage: Democrats/President Obama right now and everybody knows it. I don't know if I'd go so far as to embrace Vice President Biden's proclamations of a mandate for higher taxes but if the Republicans insist on holding the line against any new tax increases, it's going to rebound on them badly. All the Democrats/President Obama have to do is sit on their hands: all the Bush tax cuts expire at the end of the year. The Republicans know this, which is why you've seen Boehner offering a deal already and I'd imagine they'd give more ground in the coming weeks as well.
And therein lies the first big opportunity of President Obama's second term: will he take firm control of his agenda or will he lead from behind on a lot of as he has in the last four years? One my strong objections to the President was that on the big things, like health care, he essentially let Congress co-opt his biggest domestic achievement and turn it into a bloated, special interest goody packed Christmas tree of a bill- something you never would have seen Bill Clinton do. (That man had his faults, but he's been the best politician of the past twenty years hands down. He would have been all over that- his ego would have demanded nothing less.) President Obama promised leadership. He's got a tailor-made opportunity to go out there and be magnanimous in victory and provide some. Whether he will or not or if it's just business as usual is still an open question. I'm cautiously optimistic that freed from the shackles of running for re-election, the President might be different. Stay tuned.
The long term picture gets a little murkier. I'll take it one party/side at a time... Republicans/conservatives/righties: Enough already. Put the canned SPAM down, take off your tin foil hats, fix your mascara and get up off the mat. One day of mournful posts about the death of America, the triumph of the weed smoking Sodomites or complaining about having to go down to the Marxist Re-Education Gulag to get measured for your Mao suit is all you get. Time to get back to work, because guess what? The news wasn't all bad Tuesday.
While they were popping champagne in Chicago, you grabbed a couple of Governorships in North Carolina and Indiana, bring your total to 30- the highest level for either party in over a decade. Four states (Alabama, Florida and a couple of others who escape me at the moment) voted to opt out of Obamacare and in deep blue Michigan, birthplace of the United Auto Workers Union, voters struck down a measure that would have enshrined union rights in the State Constitution and struck it down big. You may have lost a battle on Tuesday but that doesn't mean you've lost the war- the battle lines have just shifted a bit and with state budgets feeling the pinch and fiscal strain, the next two to four years means that there are hugely important battles to be fought on the state level. The fight over the size and scope of government in American life continues and there's an important place for Republicans in that argument.
That's not say that there aren't problems either. The GOP is facing two major problems in the wake of Tuesday's electoral drubbing. First is generational, second is demographical. The first one is probably going to be the hardest one for the GOP to deal with: America is changing. While people dismissed the 'youth' turnout in 2008 as a fluke, expecting it to crater or drop significantly this year, it didn't. Ignoring the 'youth' vote as much as ignoring/pissing off the Hispanic vote was a disastrously bad idea for the GOP this year. If 2008 was the Millennials stretching their electoral legs, 2012 was them starting to flex their political muscles and as they're (we're, I guess) the largest generation in American history, we can't be ignored anymore. The GOP needs to start targeting this demographic and do so now.
And I'm sorry, but if Tuesday killed anything it was the Reagan Coalition. A blend of social and fiscal conservatives that were eventually run off the cliff by Gingrich's insistence on hyper-partisan insanity, it just isn't selling anymore. While I'm not a fan of Democratic nostalgia for the New Deal* and preaching about how awesome government can be, what President Obama has done hasn't been to resurrect the New Deal Coalition but rather stitch together a coalition of his own. Whether it lasts remains to be seen- but the GOP needs to get out the surgical tools and start stichin' because if they want any hope of electoral success, things have gotta change.
I remain convinced that the winning formula is 'socially liberal, fiscally conservative.' To me, the most tolerable Republicans are the fiscal Conservatives. When they start talking social issues, it's a complete and utter turn off. One of the founding principles of this country was the idea that there's room enough for everyone to believe how and what they will and when a political party starts preaching otherwise, it may win them votes on a narrow, albeit significant level but there's something that strikes me as fundamentally un-American about it. We can respect all beliefs, all lifestyle choices and all opinions. We don't do that enough anymore.
Now, I'm not saying you throw out the baby with bathwater and drop all social issues altogether. But leave contraception alone. Abortion is still distasteful enough to many people and enough people believe in sensible limits on it that it'll still bring in votes. And I'm calling it right now: the next GOP Presidential Candidate will be in favor of marriage equality. (Because marriage is good. We should have more of it.)
There's a reason that Ron Paul was so popular with the younger ground. Social conservatism just doesn't fly with most people under 30. I've been waiting for the promised social apocalypse for a couple of years now since the Varnum Decision here in Iowa. Gays keep getting married and I still love and am still married to my wife. Once people rationally accept that other people getting married has no effect on them, the whole argument against gay marriage collapses. Go libertarian on social issues, stick to your guns on fiscal conservatism and you'll be back.
The demographical problem is tougher. If I'm a betting man, I'm betting not only will the GOP have a 'come to Jesus' moment on marriage equality but I'd also bet the next GOP Presidential Candidate won't be a middle-aged white guy. I'm sorry, no more white guys, GOP. And if you're going to run for President, then you gotta put your starters in. You can't run Snow White and the Seven Dwarves in 2016 and expect to win. No offense to Mittens but amongst his many handicaps was having to fight through the bloodletting of the GOP primaries and still emerge as the best of the GOP B Team.
You need, NEED answers on immigration. That's another thing that killed the GOP... comprehensive immigration reform can't wait and while blanket amnesty might not be popular with elements of your base you need a better answer than 'self deportation' or 'sending them all back.' Right now the truth of that matter is legal immigration needs to incentivized more. It needs to be easy and free and that's not just an issue with Hispanic voters: as China and India rise, we're losing out on the race for talent and human capitol. That's not an issue we can ignore anymore and we need leadership on it. Might as well be from the GOP.
It's going to be a bumpy ride, GOPers. But one I think you'll come roaring back from, no problems.
As for Democrats/lefties: Stop gloating. It's unbecoming of you and you should be magnanimous in victory and not, well, dicks about it. Plus, you're the Democratic Party. Your capacity for snatching defeat from the jaws of victory is not to be underestimated. So, celebrate, but don't get cocky.
*One of the interesting aspects of this election is the Democratic lovefest about the cleansing power of government and the Green New Deal that Jill Stein pushed is the type of government that people get misty-eyed about. I think people like government that works directly for them. The New Deal brought jobs to the people, electrified the Tennessee Valley, championed rural electrification, it literally let people turn the lights on. People like that. Big bureaucracies full of unaccountable technocrats? Not so much. If Democrats are smart, they're going to design a government that benefits not unions, not special interests, not corporations but individual people. And if Republicans are smart about it, they'll make sure that government is lean, efficient and fiscally responsible with the people's money. Nothing seems to induce rage faster than stories of the Federal Government taking obscenely expensive vacations or trying to fund ridiculous pork.
Overall, I'm cautiously optimistic about all of this. Whether that optimism holds up remains to be seen. In meantime, (drops mic) I'm out kids. Peace, love and all that jazz.
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