Will the Democrats Keep the House?
The current split in the House is 220 Democrats and 211 Republicans with four vacancies. The Republicans need a net gain of only seven to reach a majority. Will they get at least that?
The conventional wisdom is that they will, and the conventional wisdom is right.
First, look at the numbers. Since WWII, the out party has gained an average of 26 seats in the midterms. Over the last four midterms, the number was higher — 36 seats. So history is very much on the Republicans’ side.
Now there would be cause for concern if the country were in rip-roarin’ good shape under Joe Biden and the Democrats. What with inflation near a 40-year high, labor force participation abysmal, a major war in Europe, Iran working on The Big One, racial division roiling, murder spiking, interest rates climbing, the stock market tanking, and a recession on the horizon, this is not something we need to spend a lot of time with. Talk of the Red Wave is not entirely idle.
Or is it?
Regrettably I think it is, because Republicans have two big and unique problems. The first is Dobbs and abortion. Although as I have argued, abortion will remain available to anyone who seriously wants one, the MSM will do its utmost, which is a lot, to hype stories suggesting, not only that this is not the case, but that abortion has become brutally difficult to obtain, especially for — ready now? — “the poor and minorites,” not to mention the thousands of seventh graders who will be raped by their stepfathers. And in truth, there is reason to think that the abortion issue rings an ideological bell even among suburban women informed enough to see through the MSM deceit. Some recent primary results lend credence to the notion that abortion will carry no little weight in November.
The second big problem for Republicans is Donald Trump. The evidence is accumulating that Trump committed troubling misconduct, and possibly a crime or crimes, in taking papers — classified and unclassified — with him when he left the White House. Even a very partisan Justice Department, which regrettably is what we have, will be careful to have an airtight case if and when it indicts Trump — a prospect I view at this point as, at the minimum, a realistic possibility.
And then there are the usual Trump problems, at least three of them. First, his having egged on the January 6 rioters and failed, until too late, to do anything effective to curb the destructive behavior he encouraged. Second, his relentless and at this point relentlessly tiresome talk about how the the election was stolen. Constantly complaining about what a victim you are is childish, unworthy, and, at some point, just boring. Third, his intentional and antic divisiveness in the Republican Party, backing relatively weak specialty candidates (as Paul has noted), while lambasting anyone who won’t agree with him that he wuz robbed. The Democrats must be pinching themselves about their serendipity, and of course are more than happy to amplify Trump’s non-stop speeches about himself.
I know smart people who think these two problems may well keep the House in Democratic hands. But I don’t think so, and not just because of recent mid-term history and the sorry shape of the country in general and the economy in particular. In my view, there are two sleeper issues that will help keep on track the usual midterm trends, trends that auger strongly for a Republican victory.
The first is how clear the Democrats have made it that they embrace, not just trendy Wokeism, but a thoroughly sick and poisonous view of America. That is joined at the hip with their now-obvious determination to use public schools to plant this shameful vision in your kids’ heads. All this while actual education — you know, math and English and that stuff — gets put on the back burner.
White suburban moms may well be angry about Dobbs, yes, but how do you think they feel about their children being taught day in and day out that they carry the stain of slavery in their souls, that they are to be ashamed of the color of their skin, and that they must make amends for something they had nothing to do with? How do those moms feel about having their kids taught that their country’s sometimes dark but so often heroic history is nothing but a footnote to the slave trade? How do they feel about having their sons taught they they are nascent rapists, and their daughters that they are defined by being tomorrow’s or next week’s or next month’s rape victims? How do they feel about being being labelled dangerous hayseeds for telling the school board that maybe having a drag queen show for third graders isn’t such a good idea?
Glenn Youngkin won in Virginia last year campaigning against the Democrats’ use of public schooling to poison our children’s minds. That issue has, if anything, grown stronger and more pressing this year. And although Republicans may be divided on many things, Trump in particular, they are united in opposing the bizarre and corrosive doctrines being palmed off as education in our classrooms
The second sleeper issue is the one we saw last week when Joe Biden could not have made it clearer that the Democratic Party has turned its back on the majority of Americans who never went to a four year college, and will now force them — the hoi polloi — to pick up the tab for upper-middle class kids and the fat loans they ran up to pay for their Yale-sponsored major in gender studies. My take on the moral, fiscal and — for the Democrats, the political — disaster is here. When the Democrats are using a silver platter to hand Republicans the allegiance of the working class, there are going to be repercussions at the ballot box.
If Donald Trump is God’s yakety yak gift to the Democrats, Joe Biden is doing his best to return the favor to the Republicans. For once, his best is really good.
My prediction: The House will revert to Republican control in November with the usual off-year swing toward the out-party, or perhaps slightly more.