WASHINGTON — House Appropriations Committee Chairman David Obey’s belated decision not to seek re-election in November has sent shockwaves through Democratic leaders. If any Democrat were assured of re-election, the venerable Wisconsin liberal would be at the top of the ticket. But in a year of voter fury and a growing list of vulnerable officials, the once-untouchable Obey was in danger of being swept from office by a Republican wave.
Obey, at age 71, still as feisty and combative as ever, won 25 consecutive House elections in his 7th Congressional District. But in the last presidential election, the district was almost evenly split, with the powerful commission baron who shaped the $800 billion stimulus bill facing a younger, more aggressive Republican challenger who put the seat on the Democrats’ at-risk list.
Be obedient is not alone. Republicans targeted two other veteran Democrats for defeat: House Armed Services Committee Chairman Ike Skelton of Missouri and Budget Committee Chairman John Spratt of South Carolina. GOP insiders tell me they’re expanding their target list to include other Democrats who were once considered unthreatening but now polls show are in trouble.
Obey’s decision could cause other House Democrats to leave in the coming weeks. He is the 17th Democrat to leave at the end of this year. Until recently, election trackers estimated the GOP’s House gains at about 30 seats, 10 before taking over the chamber. However, some now believe that a gain of around 40 seats is no longer unthinkable.
Obey has insisted he can win re-election, but some say that’s just bravado. “He thinks Democrats will lose the House and doesn’t want to go back to the minority. I wonder how many of his colleagues are now having similar thoughts,” wrote John McCormack of The Weekly Standard. Time magazine’s Jay Newton-Small calls it “a troubling sign for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, for whom remaining in the House becomes increasingly arduous with each retirement.”
Democrats have been on a downward trend since the beginning of this election cycle, with the ruling party historically losing congressional seats. One by one, top office holders have turned down requests from the White House to enter key races, concluding that voter sentiment under Obama has turned decisively against their party. Two Republican gubernatorial victories in Virginia and largely Democratic New Jersey, followed by a GOP takeover of Edward Kennedy’s seat in Massachusetts, were warm-ups for this year’s midterm campaign, when Democrats are expected to lose at least six governorships and easily half a dozen seats in the Senate.
Senate election polls show Republican challengers leading in Senate contests in Illinois, Delaware, New Hampshire, Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Missouri, Arkansas and Colorado. And Democratic officials have struggled in California and Washington state.
The depth of Democrats’ troubles is particularly evident in the fight over the retirement of Indiana Sen. Evan Bayh. According to Rasmussen’s latest poll, Democrat Brad Ellsworth’s approval rating “remains around 30.” Former Sen. Dan Coats, who won the Republican primary on Tuesday, enjoys 54 percent approval, up five points from last month.
In addition to economic woes, a major factor hampering Democrats in Indiana and elsewhere is Barack Obama’s unpopular health care bill. A Rasmussen poll of likely Indiana voters found that 65 percent supported repealing the up-to-date law, which Ellsworth supported. Just 29 percent oppose repeal.
At the same time, dangerously low Democratic turnout in three statewide primaries in Ohio, Indiana and North Carolina points to a monumental problem for Democrats in the fall. Democratic turnout in Tuesday’s election dropped sharply, an alarming sign that has rattled local party strategists who are struggling to find ways to re-strengthen their party’s base. The dismal turnout is further evidence that “voters lack enthusiasm ahead of the midterm elections,” NationalJournal.com’s Hotline OnCall political blog reported last week.
Polls show that voters planning to vote for Republicans hold much more intense views than Democrats. Midterm elections traditionally have lower turnout than presidential elections, and that will be the case this time as well. That’s why Democrats and the White House are suddenly heating up the immigration reform bill in hopes of re-energizing minority voters, especially immense numbers of Latino voters, and boosting party turnout. But this defensive political stunt is too clever by half. Anger over a lackluster economic recovery related to unemployment, an unpopular government takeover of the nation’s health care system, a monstrous debt that will enhance by $1.6 trillion this year alone, and rising taxes is generating an anti-government wave that now threatens to effectively overturn Democratic control of Congress .
