A beleaguered president all but gives up on his signature domestic program. His approval ratings are in a death spin. His own party grows wary of his leadership and judgment. Core supporters feel betrayed. In Congress, his party’s leaders are dealing with scandals and criticism from within that they have become self-satisfied and lost their way.
In the Democrats’ dream sequence, it is 1994 all over again.
No doubt the problems facing George W. Bush and the Republicans are many and real. There’s not much talk about Social Security reform from the White House these days. The intellectual wing of the conservative movement is savaging his choice of Harriet Miers for the U.S. Supreme Court. And there are rumblings that his political right arm, Karl Rove, could be getting some very distressing paperwork from special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald, the same kind that a Texas prosecutor has served on Rep. Tom DeLay (R-Texas), the twice-indicted and now former House majority leader.
But before Democrats get too smug about the opposition’s troubles, it’s important to note a few facts. First, there is no indication that the American people hold them in any warm embrace. They can’t win by simply watching Republicans self-immolate. They need to provide a coherent alternative, which they have not been able to do in a big way since a guy named Clinton was running for office.
Second, there is no movement propelling Democrats like there was Republicans in 1994, with a lot of pent up energy moving the country to the right. And members in both parties have done one thing with ever-greater skill: drawn congressional districts that are more protective of incumbents than ever before.
Joe Gaylord was a maestro of the Republican Revolution of 1994, serving as a top political counsel to Rep. Newt Gingrich, who led Republicans to a historic victory, retaking the House for the first time since the Eisenhower administration.
“I think that they need to be prepared for a difficult election,” said Gaylord, who now teaches at Harvard University’s Institute of Politics, of fellow Republicans. “Not that it’s one that they can’t win or they won’t win, but it’s going to be a challenge.”
It will be a challenge because there are several national issues that won’t go away by next fall, including the war in Iraq, the recovery from Hurricane Katrina and high energy prices. Top that with a strong overlay of scandal fallout.
Gaylord believes the scandal part of the equation will drop off, but the other issues should force Republicans to adopt a more national strategy.
“At the time we did the `Contract With America’ in 1994, there were lots and lots of people in our party who said you cannot do this because you will saddle candidates with these ideas, and Clinton has messed up enough that we will win anyway.
“Gingrich and I had exactly the opposite opinion. We needed it because candidates had to be able to say what they were for because every time before, when Americans were going to make a radical change in government, you had to provide an alternative.”
Republicans have done almost as poorly as Democrats in doing that so far. And they, as the party in power, have the burden of dealing with problems of the moment.
“The most obvious thing they need to do is to make this Katrina recovery work because clearly it is going to be a continuing story,” Gaylord said. “Whatever levers they have to push in whatever direction to solve the challenges that the victims of this storm face, they need to work on, big time.
“The second thing is I think they have to rewin the argument on Iraq. People are not as enthralled as they were.
“And then, I think they need to pick something new, whether it happens to be borders, coastline and immigration for security sake, or health care; but it’s got to be something that people care about. Those are things people care about. They’ve got to get on that and be pretty relentless about it so they can make the point that they have, one, righted the ship; two, sailed forward; and three, have a plan that people care about.”
So far for the Republicans, not so good on all those fronts.
For the first time in the Bush II presidency, Republicans seem to have lost the discipline that has kept them in control of the agenda and won them both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue. The president seems to return to the haven of the war on terror when other things go wrong.
Gaylord believes the GOP needs to think beyond the moment. “When you get into a bad patch … you have to be making long-range plans about how you are going to jump out. You better think it through like a chess match, through your second or third move, because it’s got to be a steady and measured kind of progress.”
But the greatest hope for keeping control may be in the quality of the opposition that Republicans face.
———-
Michael Tackett is the Tribune’s Washington Bureau chief.
