Going Under 55 Isn't Enough

Two months have passed since I last did a real entry (Greetings don't count), so before I write my next musing, I would like to apologize for the delay -- even if I am sick and tired of apologizing on here. Sometimes, trying to make a thoughtful musing can be tedious and consuming, but I also can't just let this puppy sit still for too long a period of time. (I know, I keep forgetting all the time) So, here we go...

2010 is looking to be a year of revenge for Republicans, who look at history -- and tradition -- as a guide. In America, the party not in control of the White House tends to gain seats in midterm elections, largely as a result of controversy and misguided policies involving the White House, such as the tax controversies committed by some members of the Obamastration. For instance, after the election of Jimmy Carter in 1976, the GOP went on to win 15 seats in 1978 and then 34 seats in 1980 as Ronald Reagan knocked Carter out of office. The Democrats later gained back 27 of these seats in 1982.

But not all history goes as planned. In 1928, the GOP gained a net 32 seats as it elected Herbert Hoover to the White House on the basis of a strong economy. Then Hoover's popularity crashed as the nation began to experience the Great Depression, and the Democrats gained a staggering 52 seats in 1930 and 97 seats in 1932 when Franklin Delano Roosevelt was elected -- a total of 149 seats. The Democrats then broke with tradition in 1934, gaining 9 more seats, and then gaining an additional 12 in 1936, reducing the GOP to a paltry 88 seats in the ensuing Congress. But Republicans rebounded in the following election, gaining 81 seats in 1938.

Finally, there's two of the last three midterm elections to look at. In 1998, the Democrats gained five seats despite GOP expectations to gain seats as a result of the six year itch, where the party not in control of the Presidency expects to gain seats in the middle of a president's second term. The GOP was hurt by its attacks on the morality of a then-popular President Bill Clinton, which was largely exacerbated by an infamous sex scandal involving a White House intern named Monica Lewinsky. In 2002, tradition failed to materialize again as Democrats lost eight seats in the wake of redistricting and the War on Terror, the result of a combination of increased political power in the South and West and perceptions that Democrats were anti-military and anti-security. The odd election out in this bunch was 2006, when Democrats gained 31 seats and control of the House amidst a Bush Administration and congressional leadership mired in controversy from the War in Iraq to Hurricane Katrina to Terri Schiavo (yes, the person writing this is one Republican that wishes it could have been done without the "heckuva job" mentality).

Now, after losing 21 more seats in 2008, the GOP has regrouped and has begun to amplify its own message of change. One notable example of the winds of change that have transpired are those at the Republican National Committee, where former Maryland Lieutenant Governor Michael Steele became the first African-American to chair the RNC and whose impact has already been felt in GOP circles. Another example is the National Republican Congressional Committee, which is now chaired by Rep. Pete Sessions of Dallas and whose website has been radically transformed -- albeit in a rather minimalist form reminiscent of a very elaborate cell phone website (supposedly aimed at putting the GOP in tune with young voters -- a demographic lost to Obama by a 2-1 margin).

Generally, Hill committees (of which the NRCC is one such committee) tend to emphasize most efforts on incumbents of the opposing party who amassed 55 percent or less of the vote in the last election. The reason is because candidates who finish at such levels are vulnerable and subject to defeat in the next election. For instance, in 2006 a total of 36 Republicans won with 55 percent or less of the vote. Of those, 20 have not come back for the 111th Congress. 12 of them chose to run for reelection and were defeated, while eight others decided not to seek re-election or seek higher office, and of those eight only four of them remain Republican, leaving 16 Republican survivors of the D-Trip's 2008 dodgeball contest.

For 2010, the number of choice for Democrats now applies to a select class of 35 Republicans:

• Mike Rogers (Alabama 3, 54.0 percent)
  
• Don Young (Alaska, 50.2 percent)
  
• John Shadegg (Arizona 3, 54.1 percent)
  
• Dan Lungren (California 3, 49.5 percent)
  
• Tom McClintock (California 4, 50.3 percent) - freshman
  
• David Dreier (California 26, 52.7 percent)
• Ken Calvert (California 44, 51.2 percent) - was not targeted (by the D-Trip)
  
• Dana Rohrabacher (California 46, 52.6 percent) - was not targeted
  
• Brian Bilbray (California 50, 50.3 percent) - return appearance
  
• Bill Posey (Florida 15, 53.1 percent) - freshman, seat was not targeted
  
• Mario Diaz-Balart (Florida 25, 53.1 percent)
• Mark Kirk (Illinois 10, 52.6 percent) - return appearance
• Judy Biggert (Illinois 13, 53.6 percent)
• Mark Souder (Indiana 3, 55.0 percent)
• Lynn Jenkins (Kansas 2, 50.6 percent) - freshman and 2008 gain
• Brett Guthrie (Kentucky 2, 52.6 percent)
• Joseph Cao (Louisiana 2, 49.5 percent) - freshman and 2008 gain
• John Fleming (Louisiana 4, 48.1 percent) - freshman
  
• Bill Cassidy (Louisiana 6, 48.1 percent) - freshman and 2008 gain
• Thad McCotter (Michigan 11, 51.4 percent) - return appearance, was not targeted
  
• Erik Paulsen (Minnesota 3, 48.5 percent) - freshman
• Michele Bachmann (Minnesota 6, 46.4 percent) - return appearance
• Blaine Luetkemeyer (Missouri 9, 50.0 percent) - freshman
  
• Lee Terry (Nebraska 2, 51.9 percent) - return appearance
• Dean Heller (Nevada 2, 51.8 percent) - return appearance
• Leonard Lance (New Jersey 7, 50.2 percent) - freshman
• Christopher Lee (New York 26, 55.0 percent) - freshman
• Jean Schmidt (Ohio 2, 44.8 percent) - return appearance
• Pat Tiberi (Ohio 12, 54.8 percent) - was not targeted
  
• Jim Gerlach (Pennsylvania 6, 52.1 percent) - return appearance
  
• Henry Brown (South Carolina 1, 51.9 percent)
• Joe Wilson (South Carolina 2, 53.7 percent)
• Michael McCaul (Texas 10, 53.9 percent)
• Pete Olson (Texas 22, 52.4 percent) - freshman; constituents include yours truly
  
• Dave Reichert (Washington 8, 52.8 percent) - return appearance

Those who made return appearances to this dreadful list will need to find new ways to convince voters who took the other side the last two times that they're the right choice for the district, while freshmen who made the list should see the results of this election as a starting point to gain support for future battles. Meanwhile, those who were not even minor cannon fodder for the Democrats in 2008 will especially need to rethink their election strategies as they generally faced minor candidates who did not even attract the allure of the national party and therefore took the last election for granted. Some of these incumbents though are already likely top targets including Bachmann, whose McCarthyite demands for a patriotism test just weeks before the election almost cost her a relatively safe GOP seat in the northern suburbs of Minneapolis and St. Paul, and Cao, whose inspring election to Congress as the first-ever Vietnamese American on Capitol Hill is clouded by the fact that it happened in a very blue New Orleans seat that was ground zero for Hurricane Katrina and is majority African American, not to mention the fact that Cao wasn't indicted former Congressman William Jefferson. So much for the money in the freezer.

While the strategy of 55-and-under worked for Democrats in 2008 -- and the NRCC is now using the same tack for its 2010 ambitions, Republicans will need a more ambitious strategy if they really want to take a 2010 resurgence seriously that not only plays on the vulnerability of a candidate according to his election totals, but also aims to broaden the GOP base beyond one that is basically seen as older, white and rural -- a recipe for long-term electoral disaster. While the list of Democrats that fall into this trap is very large, it should be large enough to give the GOP an even bigger pool of potential districts to cut the electoral deficit down to 20 points or less -- but Republicans should be running in all 435 districts regardless of the odds stacked for or against them. The following Democrats won in 2008 with no more than 70 percent -- well over two-thirds -- of the vote:

• Bobby Bright (Alabama 2, 50.2 percent) - freshman and 2008 pickup
  
• Parker Griffith (Alabama 5, 51.5 percent) - freshman
• Ann Kirkpatrick (Arizona 1, 55.9 percent) - freshman and 2008 pickup
• Harry Mitchell (Arizona 5, 53.2 percent) - 2006 pickup
• Raul Grijalva (Arizona 7, 63.3 percent)
  
• Gabrielle Giffords (Arizona 8, 54.7 percent) - 2006 pickup
• Mike Thompson (California 1, 68.2 percent)
  
• Ellen Tauscher (California 10, 65.2 percent)
  
• Jerry McNerney (California 11, 55.3 percent) - 2006 pickup
• Anna Eshoo (California 14, 69.8 percent)
• Lois Capps (California 23, 68.1 percent)
• Brad Sherman (California 27, 68.6 percent)
• Adam Schiff (California 29, 69.0 percent)
• Jane Harman (California 36, 68.7 percent)
• Linda Sanchez (California 39, 69.7 percent)
• Joe Baca (California 43, 69.2 percent)
• Loretta Sanchez (California 47, 69.5 percent)
• Susan Davis (California 53, 68.5 percent)
  
• Jared Polis (Colorado 2, 62.6 percent) - freshman
• John Salazar (Colorado 3, 61.6 percent)
• Betsy Markey (Colorado 4, 56.2 percent) - freshman and 2008 pickup
• Ed Perlmutter (Colorado 7, 63.5 percent) - 2006 pickup
• Joe Courtney (Connecticut 2, 65.7 percent) - 2006 pickup
  
• Jim Himes (Connecticut 4, 51.3 percent) - freshman and 2008 pickup
• Chris Murphy (Connecticut 5, 59.2 percent) - 2006 pickup
• Allen Boyd (Florida 2, 61.9 percent)
  
• Alan Grayson (Florida 8, 52.0 percent) - freshman and 2008 pickup
• Robert Wexler (Florida 19, 66.2 percent)
  
• Ron Klein (Florida 22, 54.7 percent) - 2006 pickup
• Suzanne Kosmas (Florida 24, 57.2 percent) - freshman and 2008 pickup
• Sanford Bishop (Georgia 2, 68.9 percent)
• Jim Marshall (Georgia 8, 57.2 percent)
• John Barrow (Georgia 12, 66.0 percent)
• David Scott (Georgia 13, 69.0 percent)
  
• Walt Minnick (Idaho 1, 50.6 percent) - freshman and 2008 pickup
  
• Melissa Bean (Illinois 8, 60.7 percent)
• Debbie Halvorson (Illinois 11, 58.4 percent) - freshman and 2008 pickup
  
• Bill Foster (Illinois 14, 57.7 percent) - midterm pickup in 2008
  
• Joe Donnelly (Indiana 2, 67.1 percent) - 2006 pickup
  
• Andre Carson (Indiana 7, 65.1 percent)
• Brad Ellsworth (Indiana 8, 64.7 percent) - 2006 pickup
  
• Baron Hill (Indiana 9, 57.8 percent) - 2006 pickup
  
• Bruce Braley (Iowa 1, 64.6 percent) - 2006 pickup
  
• Dave Loebsack (Iowa 2, 57.2 percent) - 2006 pickup
  
• Leonard Boswell (Iowa 3, 56.4 percent)
• Dennis Moore (Kansas 3, 56.4 percent)
• John Yarmuth (Kentucky 3, 59.4 percent) - 2006 pickup
  
• Ben Chandler (Kentucky 6, 64.7 percent)
• Chellie Pingree (Maine 1, 54.9 percent) - freshman
  
• Mike Michaud (Maine 2, 67.4 percent)
• Frank Kratovil (Maryland 1, 49.1 percent) - freshman and 2008 pickup
  
• John Sarbanes (Maryland 3, 69.7 percent)
• Barney Frank (Massachusetts 4, 68.0 percent)
• Bart Stupak (Michigan 1, 65.0 percent)
• Mark Schauer (Michigan 7, 48.8 percent) - freshman and 2008 pickup
  
• Gary Peters (Michigan 9, 52.1 percent) - freshman and 2008 pickup
  
• Tim Walz (Minnesota 1, 62.5 percent) - 2006 pickup
  
• Betty McCollum (Minnesota 4, 68.4 percent)
  
• Jim Oberstar (Minnesota 8, 67.7 percent)
• Travis Childers (Mississippi 1, 54.5 percent) - midterm pickup in 2008
  
• Bennie Thompson (Mississippi 2, 69.1 percent)
• Russ Carnahan (Missouri 3, 66.4 percent)
• Ike Skelton (Missouri 4, 65.9 percent)
• Emanuel Cleaver (Missouri 5, 64.4 percent)
• Shelley Berkley (Nevada 1, 67.6 percent)
• Dina Titus (Nevada 3, 47.4 percent) - freshman and 2008 pickup
  
• Carol Shea-Porter (New Hampshire 1, 51.7 percent)
• OPEN SEAT (New Hampshire 2, 56.4 percent) -- Paul Hodes is running for the open U.S. Senate seat of Republican Judd Gregg
  
• John Adler (New Jersey 3, 52.1 percent)
• Frank Pallone (New Jersey 6, 66.9 percent)
• Steve Rothman (New Jersey 9, 69.5 percent)
• Rush Holt (New Jersey 12, 63.1 percent)
• Martin Heinrich (New Mexico 1, 55.7 percent)
• Harry Teague (New Mexico 2, 56.0 percent)
• Ben Lujan (New Mexico 3, 56.7 percent)
• Tim Bishop (New York 1, 58.4 percent)
• Steve Israel (New York 2, 66.9 percent)
• Carolyn McCarthy (New York 4, 64.0 percent)
• Michael McMahon (New York 13, 60.9 percent)
• Nita Lowey (New York 18, 68.5 percent)
• John Hall (New York 19, 58.7 percent)
• VACANT SEAT (New York 20, 62.1 percent by now-U.S. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand)
• Paul Tonko (New York 21, 62.1 percent)
• Maurice Hinchey (New York 22, 66.3 percent)
• Mike Arcuri (New York 24, 52.0 percent)
• Dan Maffei (New York 25, 54.8 percent)
• Eric Massa (New York 29, 51.0 percent)
• Bob Etheridge (North Carolina 2, 66.9 percent)
• David Price (North Carolina 4, 63.3 percent)
• Mike McIntyre (North Carolina 7, 68.8 percent)
• Larry Kissell (North Carolina 8, 55.4 percent)
• Heath Shuler (North Carolina 11, 62.0 percent)
• Brad Miller (North Carolina 13, 65.9 percent)
• Earl Pomeroy (North Dakota, 62.0 percent)
• Steve Chabot (Ohio 1, 52.4 percent)
• Charlie Wilson (Ohio 6, 62.3 percent)
• Dennis Kucinich (Ohio 10, 57.0 percent)
• Betty Sutton (Ohio 13, 64.5 percent)
• Mary Jo Kilroy (Ohio 15, 45.9 percent)
• John Boccieri (Ohio 16, 55.4 percent)
• Zack Space (Ohio 18, 59.9 percent)
• Kurt Schrader (Oregon 5, 54.3 percent)
• Kathy Dahlkemper (Pennsylvania 3, 51.2 percent)
• Jason Altmire (Pennsylvania 4, 55.9 percent)
• Joe Sestak (Pennsylvania 7, 59.6 percent)
• Patrick Murphy (Pennsylvania 8, 56.8 percent)
• Chris Carney (Pennsylvania 10, 56.3 percent)
• Paul Kanjorski (Pennsylvania 11, 51.6 percent)
• John Murtha (Pennsylvania 12, 57.9 percent)
• Allyson Schwartz (Pennsylvania 13, 62.8 percent)
• Tim Holden (Pennsylvania 17, 63.7 percent)
• Patrick Kennedy (Rhode Island 1, 68.6 percent)
• John Spratt (South Carolina 5, 61.6 percent)
• Jim Clyburn (South Carolina 6, 67.5 percent)
• Stephanie Herseth Sandlin (South Dakota, 67.6 percent)
• Lincoln Davis (Tennessee 4, 58.8 percent)
• Jim Cooper (Tennessee 5, 65.9 percent)
• Ruben Hinojosa (Texas 15, 65.7 percent)
• Chet Edwards (Texas 17, 53.0 percent)
• Ciro Rodriguez (Texas 23, 55.8 percent)
• Lloyd Doggett (Texas 25, 65.8 percent)
• Solomon Ortiz (Texas 27, 57.9 percent)
• Henry Cuellar (Texas 28, 68.7 percent)
• Jim Matheson (Utah 2, 63.4 percent)
• Glenn Nye (Virginia 2, 52.4 percent)
• Tom Perriello (Virginia 5, 50.1 percent)
• Jim Moran (Virginia 8, 67.9 percent)
• Gerry Connolly (Virginia 11, 54.7 percent)
• Jay Inslee (Washington 1, 67.8 percent)
• Rick Larsen (Washington 2, 62.4 percent)
• Brian Baird (Washington 3, 64.0 percent)
• Norm Dicks (Washington 6, 66.9 percent)
• Adam Smith (Washington 9, 65.5 percent)
• Nick Rahall (West Virginia 3, 66.9 percent)
• Tammy Baldwin (Wisconsin 2, 69.3 percent)
• Ron Kind (Wisconsin 3, 63.2 percent)
• Dave Obey (Wisconsin 7, 60.8 percent)
• Steve Kagen (Wisconsin 8, 54.0 percent)

So out of 257 seats held by Democrats (including the three vacant Dem seats in California, Illinois and New York), 138 -- over half -- can be seen as even remotely vulnerable to a challenge from Republicans. In some of these districts, it is impossible in the present for a Republican to compete adequately. And in a select few, the Democratic incumbent's fall under 70 may have been the result of a third-party challenge -- whether from a liberal who considers the incumbent "Republican Lite" or from a conservative who finds the incumbent too extreme. But other seats hold ripe opportunities for Republicans, such as the vacant seat in New York's 20th District that was vacated by Kirsten Gillibrand after her appointment to Hillary Rodham Clinton's former Senate seat when the latter became Secretary of State.

But relying on numbers alone will not expand the GOP base. Republicans need to also reach out to underserved segments of the voter rolls that dot the American political lexicon: the young, the educated, the minorities, the party switchers, the suburbanites, and other groups filled with people who find themselves to be Republicans at heart but are turned off by some of the toxic elements of the GOP stew.

Simply put, if you want a regional party that bleeds members by the minute and imposes litmus tests to please a handful of activists who put themselves ahead of their country, then you are fine with business as usual in the GOP. But if you want a party that appeals to a patchwork quilt of Americans, that offers compelling solutions to both today's problems and what may hold for the future, and that unites us as one America, then Republicans need to get the message if they haven't already, leave the divisive culture wars and wedging of the past behind, and look towards a new day of optimism, strength, freedom and fairness. 2010 will be a very big test to see if that new day will dawn, and if it hasn't by then, we simply have no one to blame but ourselves.