Midterms confirm political stalemate

Although Republicans won a more sweeping victory than expected in yesterday’s midterm elections, the results tell us surprisingly little about what Americans expect of their political leaders.

Instead, the outcome confirms a new pattern of alternating partisan victories every two years, as Republicans dominate midterm elections and Democrats marshal superior electoral strength in presidential elections. The pressing political question today is how to break that pattern, which otherwise augurs deepening polarization and paralysis in Washington.

{mosads}Exultant Republicans, of course, are hailing their sweep as a repudiation of President Obama. That’s true, up to a point. Midterm elections always are partly a barometer of public attitudes toward the sitting president, and there was no mistaking yesterday’s thumbs down verdict.

But if voters are dissatisfied with Obama’s performance, there’s little evidence they have fallen for Republicans or want the country to take a sharp right turn. On the contrary, exit polls found that voters disapprove of the Republican Party even more than Obama. Strikingly, 61 percent said they are dissatisfied or even angry with Republican leaders in Congress, even as they propelled GOP victories across the board.

However satisfying yesterday’s vote, there is no way Republicans can plausibly claim a national mandate for their policies (whatever they may be). What the midterm actually showed is that the GOP can win when a minority of the U.S. electorate — somewhere in the neighborhood of 40 percent — turns out to vote. That’s because its base of white men, married white women and mostly white seniors votes more reliably in off-year elections.

Democrats fare badly in midterms because they rely heavily on voters more likely to stay home. For example, Hispanic voters yesterday backed Democratic candidates by 30 points, up from a 22-point margin in 2010. Unfortunately for Democrats, however, Hispanic turnout fell two points from 2012 (10 to 8 percent).

Likewise, young voters (ages 18 to 29) heavily favored Democrats again, but they accounted for only 13 percent of the midterm voters, a big drop from their 19 percent share in 2012.

In higher-turnout presidential elections, Democrats have built what National Journal‘s Ron Brownstein calls a “blue wall” in the Electoral College — 18 states Democrats have carried in the past six presidential elections. These states spot the party’s nominee 242 of the 270 electoral votes needed to win.

So it’s tempting for Democrats to shrug off yesterday’s blowout and say, “just wait until 2016.”

Yet such complacency could be fatal. Besides running the table in red states, Republicans made significant inroads into blue territory yesterday. They won House seats in Iowa and New York, came close to ousting Sen. Mark Warner (D) in purple Virginia and, in the night’s biggest surprise, captured governorships in deep blue Illinois, Massachusetts and Maryland. The broad scope of GOP gains vindicated efforts by party leaders to recruit mainstream conservatives as candidates and help them fend off primary challenges by Tea Party-style insurgents.

Given their new dedication to winning rather than enforcing ideological purity, it’s conceivable that Republicans could breach the blue wall in 2016 by nominating a moderately conservative nominee who doesn’t scare off moderate and independent voters. Think former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, or an unthreatening Midwestern governor — say Ohio’s John Kasich, who handily won reelection in a crucial swing state — offering a record of executive competence rather than bristling hostility toward government.

A lot will depend, of course, on how Republicans use their control of Congress over the next two years. Will they assume responsibility for governing, or will they continue their cynical and relentless campaign to sabotage Obama’s presidency?

In either event, Democrats need a new strategy for breaking today’s political impasse. If the party continues to concede the white vote to Republicans by 20 points, as they did yesterday, they can forget about winning back the House anytime soon. Democrats should spend the next two years chipping away at the GOP’s massive advantage with white voters — especially working-class whites who once anchored the progressive coalition. That will also act as an insurance policy against the possibility of eroding support among young and Latino voters.

What would such a strategy entail? A new and more credible plan to accelerate economic innovation, investment and growth, and less emphasis on tired old ideas like raising the minimum wage (created in 1935) that poll well but don’t foster hope for a broader economic revival. Democrats must also address the public’s deep dissatisfaction with government by showing a sustained commitment to modernizing the public sector and decentralizing power to communities and citizens. And they should get behind a more balanced energy policy that serves the twin imperatives of creating jobs and slowing climate change.

Above all, Democrats need an infusion of fresh ideas that can expand the party’s appeal among moderates, independents and white voters. Only by enlarging the progressive coalition can they break the pattern of see-saw elections that is perpetuating the deadlock in U.S. politics.

Marshall is president of the Progressive Policy Institute.