The Democrats officially ceded the seat of their fallen hero — a seat they had held since the late Ted Kennedy’s brother occupied the White House — when Vice President Biden administered the oath of office to Republican Scott Brown last week. Brown’s arrival in Washington sounds the death knell for the dreamlike demands of President Barack Obama’s liberal base. Gone are the days of health care optimism and cap and trade consensus. Silence reigns where there were once cries for a second stimulus and righteous calls for a New York City civilian trial for Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed.
At least Obama had fair warning. Fragmentation of Democratic majorities began last November in New Jersey and Virginia. At the time, I described the gubernatorial victories of Republicans Chris Christie and Bob McDonnell as needed boosts for a desperate Republican Party, not direct repudiations of Obama’s policies. For the GOP to continue such success, it would have to court Independents and field “the right candidate … trumpeting a tailored message.” Three months later, despite doomsday predictions of the Tea Party's rise, Republicans have utilized this game plan to perfection. The American public has indeed rejected the Democratic mantra of more: more spending, more debt and more centralization of power in Washington. Judging by history, however, Obama should be quietly cheering his party’s fall from grace this coming November. Yes, you heard me correctly — root for the Republicans, Mr. President.
As a man who grounded his 2008 campaign in centrist rhetoric, Obama has been willing to punt the liberal agenda to Reid and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on Capitol Hill. On top of the criticism that boxes him in from his left and right, the president has watched the center slip from his fingers. Therefore, Obama cannot tie his legacy to Democrats in Congress if he has any hope of turning his fortunes. In fact, working with a resurgent opposition party after 2010 would insulate the president from warring factions in search of his head. Then-candidate Obama enraged many Democrats when he claimed that Ronald Reagan had altered the trajectory of the political landscape in a way Bill Clinton had not. He did not mention that, as Jonathan Rauch of the National Journal reminds us, both Reagan and Clinton, the most popular and successful recent chief executives, shared power for significant portions of their terms. Detractors to the divided government theory may argue that George W. Bush benefited from Republican majorities in Congress throughout most of his presidency. How did that go for him in the end?
Data derived from the American Presidency Project demonstrates the counterintuitive notion that a Congress run by the rival party need not cripple a sitting president. The combined concurrence percentage of combined House and Senate votes to the expressed wishes of President Eisenhower (an underrated president) was roughly 70 percent. This statistic is relatively high until you consider that less successful presidents like Jimmy Carter (77 percent) and G. W. Bush (81 percent) witnessed better levels of concurrence. Reagan left office with a 62 percent concurrence mark and a 63 percent approval rating. Clinton’s Congress voted for his policy proposals only 57 percent of the time, but he exited the White House with support from two-thirds of the nation.
Christie, McDonnell and Brown are just the first wave. Voters are frustrated with the priorities of Democrats in Washington. The economy is slowly recovering, but it will be a long march out of the woods. Republicans are priming viable, jobs-focused candidates in Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana and Illinois. Shift to the center and Obama could enjoy a Clintonesque revival after the midterm elections. Embrace arrogance and partisanship, and Obama’s legacy will follow the path blazed by Carter and Bush.
Michael Stubel is a junior in the School of Public Affairs and the School of Communication and a moderate libertarian columnist for The Eagle. You can reach him at edpage@theeagleonline.com.
