Yes, the news that 30 Republicans will be giving up their seats in the House, whether to retire or seek other office, is encouraging (though not, perhaps as Statistically significant as we might hope). Yes, the unprecedented and dismal approval numbers the new president boasts bode well for Democratic prospects. And, indeed, Republicans, with their embrace of policies that the majority of American voters vehemently oppose, seem to be asking for a spanking from the voters.
But there’s an element of real political seismic shifts we will not see this year, no matter how great our numbers in November may be. The real shift to watch for is found after wave elections, in the wake of the “bloodbath,” or “shellacking” or whatever hyperbole we hope to hear in November: partisan defection.
Beginning with Reagan’s first presidential win and cascading with his second, scores of Democratic pols in moderate-to-conservative states looked at the political landscape in the aftermath of those “tsunamis” and decided that their survival depended on partisan metamorphosis. Being the, well, political folks they were, they happily complied.
While few Dems today would mourn the loss of repugnant racists like Roy Moore and David Duke, the 1980s and 90s saw effective legislators like Phil Gramm, Richard Shelby and Ben Nighthorse Campbell slip across the aisle.
We will likely do quite well this year, snatching the House and possibly even the Senate. You’ll indeed hear hyperbole come that Tuesday.
But the lasting, even generational shifts are seen only after Election Night, when pols determine they’re looking for the butter on the wrong side of the bread. Real wave elections are those that make incumbents decide their names look better followed by a different initial.
I don’t know if we’ll start to see such a shift next year or how well it will serve us if we do. (Do we really want Peter King in our clubhouse?)
Nevertheless, it will be fun to watch, as politics most always is.