Time Mag points out Dems toppled after 40 years, GOP falls apart in 12

[Bucky]

They're trying to establish a historical trend using only two data points. Not good social science, not even good math. Is there any other reason why the Democrats took 40 years to build up such a calcified leadership and the Republicans got to the "so corrupt the people get disgusted and vote them out" stage in only 12 years? Well, you know there is or I wouldn't be posting this.

But before I get to the punchline, let's look at a couple of more data points. The Democrats took control of the House in a big way in the 1932 elections. They actually won control of the House of Representatives in 1931 through vacancy elections, but 1932 is generally regarded as the "realigning" election because of the scope of that year's victory (an over 90 seat gain for the Democrats). House Speaker Cactus Jack Garner rode FDR's coattails to a supermajority called the New Deal Coalition (farmers, poor, labor, urban voters, liberals, and government reformers).

Time Magazine's "40 years" thesis is really talking about a coalition that ran Washington for 62 years. Republicans briefly and barely regained the House twice in those six decades (elections of 1946 and 1952) but always lost control to the resurgent New Deal coalition after only one term in power. The political logic of the have-nots using the power of government to better the country's overall economic situation (combined with relatively little economic competition from other parts of the world) made too much sense to be denied.

Late in the 20th century that coalition crumbled in parts--in large part due to the growth of the middle class (the largest voting block excluded from the coalition) and the deft political exploitation of social wedge issues by the conservatives. The biggest stumble came in the 1980 "realignment" election. But it wasn't a real voting realignment in Congress. Democrats held onto the House and, while Republicans did win control of the Senate, Democratic candidates for the Senate collectively won a majority of the votes. It only happened that the Republican votes tended to be cast in smaller states, while Democratic votes were wasted in big state races in California and Ohio (Republicans won New York that year, but with less than 50% in a 3-way race). Six years later the Democrats regained the Senate.

The Democratic coalition didn't fully come off the rails until the 1994 election. That, unlike 1980, was a true realignment--they won 55% of the House vote. Why? The world was at peace, the economic logic of the former have-nots all sticking together was decimated by the New Deal's success in equalizing the benefits of America's economic success, and the Republicans' Contract with America campaign brilliantly and consistently highlighted the abuses of power (even if they were tame by 2006 standards) of the Democratic House leadership. The socially more homogenous Republican Party's media presence was able to develop a strong core message and stick to that message in a more disciplined, lock-step presentation on tv and on the stump. Their domination of talk radio was virtually unchallenged. They honed their core message on social wedge issues to a fine art.

Compared to the six decades of control by the Democrats, the Republican revolution is falling apart at the seams after just 12 years. Considering the relative passivity of the Democratic opposition (four weeks out from the election, we're still debating how to pitch our core message and that core message is only apparent because their leaders were protecting a child predator) the Republican coalition is bleeding by its own hands. The answer why our side's coalition lasted five times longer than their side's coalition lies not with Democratic strengths, but with Republican weakness.

The New Deal coalition and its Fair Deal-Great Society-Economy Stupid successors had an inherent logic to them. The core message was always (1) build quality jobs, (2) create equal opportunities, (3) sustain our way of life, and (4) strengthen the economic infrastructure of the country. Most GOP wedge issues tend to fall into those four categories (welfare programs are really about economic infrastructure, gays in the military is really about equal opportunity, OSHA and EPA exist to sustain the health and safety of Americans as part of our way of life, affirmative action fits in all four messages). When the coalition lost steam in the 70s, 80s, and 90s, one major cause was that the major points of the Democratic agenda had created success and stability for most voters. The Democratic Party in Congress successfully implemented its agenda.

The Contract for American coalition crumbled after 12 years in large part because they failed to live by their agenda. The Republicans, simply put, didn't mean what they said to get elected. They promised to clean up government; instead they wallowed in lobbyist donations and governed by special favors. They promised to balance the budget; with a Democratic president leading the charge they did, but under a Republican president clearly didn't care to. They promised to limit the power of Congress; instead they used their power to bully opponents, shake down interest groups, increase pork barrel legislation, seek special favors, and line their own pockets. In the end they were undone by the same rub-my-back politics they ran against.

In subsequent years the coalition took on other issues that their leaders did not believe in. They campaigned on morality but took bribes, covered up for sexual predators, and embraced torture. They ran on limiting government but launched assaults on the Bill of Rights worse than the Alien and Sedition Act, ceased all serious oversight of the executive branch, and supported a string of activist/interventionist judges. They ran on honesty but supported a war based on fabrications and selective facts. They ran on security issues, but have more than doubled the strength of our terrorist enemies while weakening our alliances and alienating the rest of the world. They ran on responsibility but have run up a mountain of debt with spending they simply will not control.

The Republican agenda was a sham almost from the start. They fixed a few institutional abuses in Congress that needed fixing in the mid 90s. Since then it's just been an orgy of kleptocrats and power mongers who know how to scare voters and coif their hair. Time Magazine says that the cycle of reform and abuse is increasing in speed--Democrats for "40" years, then Republicans for 12, maybe this time Democrats will only be back in power for four or six or eight years, if that trend holds.

Or maybe that's not the trend at all. I suggest the trend is that the party that has a genuine platform that it works toward and sustains will take longer before it starts abusing its power. I suggest that a ruling coalition that bases its agenda on the needs of the people it serves, the people that it works for, will have a longer run in power so long as it's actually meeting those needs. Republican rule by wedge issue has always been a hollow foundation. Encouraging people to fear and loathe their neighbors can get you reelected, but it doesn't really give you much to do once you hold office. Without a genuine core mission, the temptation to use high office for personal gratification is too central to ignore.

Sincere, if misdirected, reformers like Newt Gingrich always give way to cynical plunderers like Tom DeLay. Every revolution comes down to a choice between its Trotskys and its Stalins, between its Jeffersons and its Burrs. Do you seek power to address issues or do you address issues to seek power? The Republican class of 1994, like the Bolshevik class of 1917, decided its paramount need was to gain and enjoy power.

But the real problem for the Sons of Newt was that the so-called Revolution of 1994 was never a revolution to begin with. They didn't effect an agenda because they didn't have an agenda. Unlike what Jefferson called the "Revolution of 1800" and what nobody dared to call the Revolution of 1932, the current crop of Republicans entered office with very few important issues needing to be addressed. My grandma, a compulsive needlepointer, used to love that adage about idle hands being the devil's workshop. Besides their ruinous tax cuts and their wilful neglect of executive oversight, the Sons of Newt have had little they want to do for the country's problems. They have far too much idle time upon their hands--and now they have the devil's handicrafts to show for it.