~ by Michael Lee

What a difference a year makes!  Last year, at this time, we Democrats were celebrating a spectacular national victory in winning the Presidency and control of both houses of the Congress.  President Obama campaigned as the candidate of change.  He would avoid the pettiness of partisan politics and work with the community to address our long neglected national problems and end the era of Bush-Cheney.  While President Obama has effectively changed and ended major Bush policies at the cabinet level, his accomplishments in working to get Congress to act are excruciatingly slow.


This year, the likely issues for the off term elections will be the economy and terrorism.  At this point, neither of these issues favors the Democrats.  The recovery program is spending billions of dollars and yet there are no clear indications that it is working.  Real unemployment hovers about one in five workers when you factor in those who are discouraged and no longer looking for work and those who work part time when they would rather have full time jobs.  There is time for this to change before the November elections but until we see widespread construction and hear the sound of hammer and nails on main street, the impression is that we are over spending and the average middle class family is receiving no benefit.  The last two weeks have a clear illustration of the confusion in the administration about terrorism and how to combat it.

The coalition that elected President Obama - African-Americans, young voters, sporadic voters, college-educated whites - is unlikely to turn out in the 2008 numbers.  This means that this year's election will be decided by the older base voters in both parties.  Every poll I have seen indicates that independent voter support has collapsed though they are very unlikely to support the party of "No" in great numbers.  That is the one positive element in all of this.  The Republicans are not gaining any significant support because their platform is "No to Obama" and the Democrats and that does not endear them to any voters but their own base.

Typically, we Democrats usually run well behind party registration.  In 1994, when the GOP captured the Congress, Democratic voters stayed home on Election Day. That is really the concern for this year.

As I made the rounds of our local elected officials' and club holiday celebrations, I was struck by the frustration expressed by activists.  It is hard to predict the actual bill but I am sure the final health care bill will fall far short of our hopes and last year's expectations.  It will, however, expand health care to millions of Americans.  It will be incremental and we must go back to the White House and Congress and continually fight for advancements each year.  Our nation is now part of the world community and acts accordingly.  It is respected as an active partner in the community of nations.  We do have much to support in November.