Speaking of movie references, I’m guessing that Democrats’ main argument for the foreseeable future will be Han Solo’s “never tell me the odds”. Over at National Journal Alex Roarty suggests that it’s unlikely that President Obama’s approval ratings will bounce back:
In fact, no president in the last 60 years has watched his approval ratings bounce back during their second term. Either they didn’t make it to another stint in office (Ford, Carter, and George H.W. Bush), never dipped in the first place (Eisenhower and Clinton) or were removed from office at the nadir of their popularity (Nixon). Lyndon Johnson recovered somewhat, but only after announcing he would not seek another term. Ronald Reagan dropped from the low 60s to the high 40s amid the Iran-Contra scandal, and his popularity never recovered entirely until his last months in office. But it also never fell to lows experienced by Truman or Bush.
Or Obama, for that matter.
I’m in the analysis business not the prediction business but if I were to venture a guess my WAG as of this writing is that in 2014 the Republicans’ hold on the House will narrow a bit while the Democrats’ hold on the Senate narrows a bit. Things look different in the states holding elections for the Senate this time around than they do in the country at large. But, as I say, that’s no more than a guess.
The air is still dusted with Obamacare confusion, making it’s future unclear as to how much better or worst it might get.
If somehow damage-control and constant WH spin is able to stabilize the dems rocking boat, restoring people’s love/confidence in this administration, then 2014 will have few political changes in congress.
However, if glitch-fixes only uncover more problems, if security breeches intensify distrust, and people become more infuriated with the failures of Obamacare overlapping onto their well being, then it could spell a wipe-out for the dem party in ’14.
What I would caution the R’s to stop doing is assuming the latter will happen, and instead work on ways to either fix Obamacare or replace it with a good plan of their own. Fruitless political sparring and gamesmanship has become old, tedious and not appreciated by the public, whose lives politicians are toying with.