I have to admit I miss Arthur Schlesinger's cycles of history, which used to take around three decades to swing back. These days, as the woman with the Koch-employed husband said, "I'm so upset with the way things are going in Washington-changing every two years, trying to undo what the other party did. I don't believe the economy would be any better if the Republicans were in control." But we now know that analysis hardly moved anyone whose vote was up for grabs. I predict that there will not even be a gesture toward centrism and bipartisanship on the part of Republican leadership. They're too scared, and too eager. Pace David Brooks, the level of extremism and partisanship I described will go up-way up. This midterm is the party's first salvo in its first order of business, to end Obama's Presidency. There will be little mercy and a great deal of rancor. Tomorrow we'll find out how Obama sees the next two years. I see one of the ugliest political periods in my lifetime, which has seen a few.
RPCV George Packer writes: This midterm is the party's first salvo in its first order of business, to end Obama's Presidency. There will be little mercy and a great deal of rancor.
The Era of the Disappearing Era
from Interesting Times by George Packer
Tom Perriello went down to defeat tonight in Virginia's Fifth District. The first returns had him behind by double digits; then he clawed back and ended up losing by just four percentage points, 51-47. The race was over within two hours of the polls closing. Last time around, in 2008, it took a couple of weeks for a recount to give Perriello an upset victory over the incumbent Republican, Virgil Goode. Tonight, in the same offices over the same Charlottesville wine bar, he and his mother and brothers and sisters and nephews and nieces and staff watched the rural areas of the district go heavily for State Senator Robert Hurt. The divide in the Fifth is city/county. Not enough people in Charlottesville and Danville voted to overcome Fluvanna and Pittsylvania.
I spent the morning down in Henry County, on the North Carolina state line, and in the Republican precincts turnout was heavy and determined. In interviews, Perriello was a second-tier topic and Hurt never came up. These voters' ire and disappointment were directed at Barack Obama (who campaigned for Perriello in Charlottesville last Friday, clearly answering the directive recently issued by Interesting Times-political advice that the White House might now regard as somewhat misguided). A Republican poll watcher who only gave her name as Lorna said, "I'm a constitutional conservative and I do not ever approve of distribution of wealth, and I am not a socialist, this country is not socialist, we are founded on Judeo-Christian principles. I will riot in the street if I have to. I have never been so ashamed of the way Obama has diminished the Presidency. He calls certain people enemies. He doesn't dress properly. He talks about certain networks. He is just what he is-a Chicago agitator." Others were more measured: one man said he would vote Republican "strictly on the basis of the health care bill. I sell health insurance-I don't want to compete with the federal government."
One good reason for a reporter to go to polling places and talk to actual voters, as opposed to sitting in a television studio and talking to other talkers, is that you always come away surprised. A surprise today came in the form of a woman who couldn't even remember whom she voted for in 2008. She told me, as if startled by herself, that she had come to vote for Perriello because of Jane Mayer's article on the Koch brothers (who have poured some of their money into the Fifth). This woman's husband works for a Koch-owned company, and when they started getting inundated with company literature telling them how to vote, she became suspicious. Then Jane's article explained it all. "I believe in free enterprise, I believe in people being rewarded for hard work, but I'm sick about all the greed in big business, and the corruption. In business and government. I just don't think people's votes should be bought." She wouldn't give me her name for fear of reprisals, but she said, "I'm going to be a lot more politically astute and intelligent."
My uncle and grandfather were congressmen, and my mother always described the defeats that ended their careers as devastating. Politicians can't help taking a loss as a direct personal rejection, and it goes to the core of their being. Tonight, Perriello was the one keeping everyone else's spirits up. In the coming days he'll feel the pain of his defeat. But he's only thirty-six, and he can feel good about having run an aggressive race in which he took the risk of standing on his principles-which he repeated in a gracious concession speech at the wine bar-rather than fudging or disowning them. One way or another, we'll see him again.
The big news in Virginia was that Rick Boucher, a twenty-eight-year veteran Democratic congressman from the coal district to the west of the Fifth, lost his seat, too. That's an indicator of a gale-force wind that Perriello was never likely to survive. Tonight is a stinging repudiation of Obama and the Democrats, even if they hold some of the Senate seats that the Tea Party appeared ready to claim. We're living in a time of instant eras. Bush's permanent Republican majority lasted six years. Obama's new liberalism lasted two. I have to admit I miss Arthur Schlesinger's cycles of history, which used to take around three decades to swing back. These days, as the woman with the Koch-employed husband said, "I'm so upset with the way things are going in Washington-changing every two years, trying to undo what the other party did. I don't believe the economy would be any better if the Republicans were in control." But we now know that analysis hardly moved anyone whose vote was up for grabs.
Yesterday, I ran into Senator Mark Warner, of Virginia, who was campaigning with Perriello in Martinsville and Danville. When I interviewed him over the summer for my piece on the Senate, he had said that he expected the election of some moderate Republicans, like Mark Kirk of Illinois and Mike Castle of Delaware, who might be able to create more middle ground for bipartisanship. When I reminded him of this yesterday, Warner wouldn't abandon the hope. How is it faring tonight? Not well-Castle lost to Christine O'Donnell in the primary, Kirk is losing, and Rand Paul and Marco Rubio, and perhaps other Tea Party senators, are headed to Washington. I predict that there will not even be a gesture toward centrism and bipartisanship on the part of Republican leadership. They're too scared, and too eager. Pace David Brooks, the level of extremism and partisanship I described will go up-way up. This midterm is the party's first salvo in its first order of business, to end Obama's Presidency. There will be little mercy and a great deal of rancor. Tomorrow we'll find out how Obama sees the next two years. I see one of the ugliest political periods in my lifetime, which has seen a few.
