Washington Week: Student Voices (O)

COLUMN: Democrats should not get their hopes up
By Dan Hemp
The Collegiate Times (Virginia Tech)
10/11/2006

(U-WIRE) BLACKSBURG, Va. — Let's face it — things seem grim for the Republicans in the upcoming election. Growing dissatisfaction with the war in Iraq has voters clamoring for a change in policy. Not surprisingly, the media has put a damper on great economic news and low gas prices with a massive blitz that reinforces that clamor. And to top it all off, Congressman Mark Foley recently resigned over the disgusting page scandal.

Taking all of that into account, it appears as if the Democrats are poised to at least gain seats and perhaps take control of the House of Representatives or the Senate. However, there are a couple of reasons for Republicans to be more optimistic than the national sentiment might suggest.

So let me put on my rose-colored glasses, and I'll explain them.

First of all, the media has always presented things much more negatively for Republicans than for Democrats. When Ronald Reagan saw unprecedented economic growth, the media preached of the increasing gap between the rich and the poor and the high numbers of homeless people on the streets. Just a few short years later, Bill Clinton saw similar economic growth, but the tremendous economic gap and all of the homeless people just disappeared from each of the nightly news programs. Today, we are back to the same gap and the same problem.

Despite the media's efforts to sway individual judgments, the American people are astute, and they usually sift through the bias to find reality.

Second, as much as Democrats would love Bush-bashing to be the foremost issue in the election, that simply overshadows the truth - they simply do not have a platform on which to run. Whenever the Republicans offer real solutions to serious problems, all the Democrats do is stand in the way. When Republicans suggested a fix to the looming Social Security problem, they hooted and hollered in opposition without putting forth their own answer.

Even though Iraq is not going the way we would like it to go, the only remedy the Democrats can suggest is a "change in policy." What that change actually consists of is a mystery.

Without question, we made mistakes and underestimated how this war was going to go. But without a doubt in my mind, if the Democrats took control of the operation, we would find out what a real military disaster is.

Third, Republicans are still running close in many states where they usually have limited success. In New Jersey, State Senator Tom Kean, Jr. is running neck-and-neck in recent polls with Democratic incumbent U.S. Senator Tom Menendez for Menendez's seat in Washington. In Maryland, Lieutenant Governor Michael Steele is within the margin of error with Democratic Congressman Ben Cardin. In that state, Democrats outnumber Republicans by a 2-1 margin.

These polls do not suggest that a sweeping takeover by the Democrats is in the cards.

Finally, the raw numbers of how many seats the Democrats need in each house of Congress to gain control make it difficult for them to triumph. According to most experts, approximately seven Republican-held Senate seats are in play for Democrats. The Democratic Party needs to gain six seats to take over that body. This means that they need to win six of those seven seats that are in contention while not losing a single seat to Republicans in closely-run races like those in New Jersey and Maryland.

In the House of Representatives, each side has used redistricting to their favor so much that incumbents are protected like never before. Therefore, the 15 seats that Democrats need for control of the House will be difficult to attain, especially considering any seats they might lose in this election.

When Election Day rolls around, many races will be close, and control of Congress might not be decided that night. However, the political culture does not suggest a huge sweeping victory by either side. Now that Democrats have set their standards enormously high, they may come out of this one disappointed.

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