Election Spoils - December 2006

To the victors, go the spoils.

By now, the Democrats in Washington are picking their new offices in the various legislative office buildings near the Capitol. Whenever one party takes over majority rule in either the Senate or the House of Representatives, its members get to choose the best offices. That usually means evicting the losing party’s members from their former suites which usually are larger and closer to the voting chambers.

Was this election really a total victory for the Democrats? Or just voter resentment of the status quo in Washington?

Certainly the Democrats reversed the 15 seat Republican majority in the House and ended up with a similar majority for themselves. And won the Senate. They also won a number of important Governor’s races throughout the country including my home state of Maryland.

Locally, Republicans in Broward County lost their County Commissioner, a long-time Congressman, and a State Representative. In each case, the Democrats did a better job of getting out their base and in convincing a majority of Independents and a notable number of Republicans that their candidates would bring new ideas to their elected bodies.

Martin Kiar, the Democrat who replaced our western Broward Republican State Representative, should be congratulated for his campaign which included endorsements from, and involvement of, several Broward County Democratic power brokers. Let’s hope he can gain similar access to Republican leadership in Tallahassee for the benefit of western Broward.

The 2006 election certainly was a wake-up call for the Republicans. As I had opined in several past columns in this publication, the Republican majority was too concerned with keeping power than in passing or retracting laws to better our country. A number were challenged by easy access to favors provided by lobbyists. Others made sure their districts received millions of dollars in pork barrel appropriations rather than helping to reduce the size of government.

But before the left starts acting as if they have a liberal mandate to socialize more of our economy and government with another Great Society effort, they need to realize that a vast majority of those new Democrats who won stood for many conservative principles.

It will be fun to watch San Francisco Pelosi and her team of old line liberals trying to push through progressive legislation. If you do not remember Congressmen Dingell, or Waxman, or Rangel from the ‘80s and early ‘90s, I’m sure you will know who they are in 2007! I also expect our own Congresswoman Wasserman-Schultz to gain more national notoriety as she joins that left-leaning leadership in some capacity.

And it will be fun to watch the action in the Senate. Former Connecticut Democrat Joe Lieberman won as an Independent with support from mostly the Republicans and other non-Democratic voters. In other words, the Connecticut Democrats could not elect their candidate who was the favored candidate of the anti-war, anti-Bush crowd. Even top national Democrats raised money and campaigned for their Democratic candidate to no avail. Sorry Hillary and Barack, you are not as influential as you think!

Lieberman, the former Democratic Vice-Presidential candidate in 2000 will now be the most powerful man in the Senate since if he chooses at any time to caucus with the Republicans, the Democrats will lose their majority. This same scenario happened in 2001 when “jumping Jim” Jeffords of New Hampshire switched to the Democratic caucus and upset the then balance of Republican power.

My biggest concern about the effect of the 2006 election will be its impact on our country’s economy. The Bush tax cuts which have led our country to tremendous growth in jobs and other economic activity - and in record federal tax receipts – will likely be altered by the Democrats. Some are already calling for more “fairness” as if having 10% of our tax payers funding nearly 70% of our federal taxes is not progressive enough!

And Hillary has already said that national healthcare will be a bad dream for those who thought her socialized medicine was laid to rest along with the Democratic control of Congress in 1994. Sometimes history repeats itself. Perhaps it will again in 2008.