Posted by Jed Lewison on Sun Nov 9, 2008 at 6:58 AM Pacific

Sorry, GOP: This Is Bigger Than 1992

Almost immediately after last Tuesday's election, pundits crawled out of the woodwork to make the case that 2008 was 1992 all over again, and that to be succesful, Barack Obama needed to avoid the mistakes made by Bill Clinton that led to the disastrous 1994 midterms.

Here's one such example from the WSJ's Gerald Seib:

Some Democrats, seeing the margins of victory they have rolled up, doubtless now will start pushing for new economic policies, new financial regulatory structures, new government plans for health care and a new strategy for dealing with the lingering war in Iraq, built solely on Democratic terms.

Yet history provides warning signs in front of such thinking. Simply consider the paths of the last two newly elected presidents, Bill Clinton of the Democrats and George W. Bush of the Republicans.

Mr. Clinton won in 1992 with friendly Democratic majorities in Congress strikingly similar to those Sen. Obama will enjoy: 258 House seats and 57 Senate seats. He did, in fact, reach across the aisle to Republicans initially to balance the budget and promote free trade -- policies that had durable and lasting support precisely because they had a bipartisan foundation.

But he then fell into the trap of leaning on the power of Democratic votes, and ignoring the animosity of minority Republicans, to try to push through the single biggest domestic effort of his first term, a wholesale remaking of the nation's health-care system. It was an overreach, which Republicans drove home by reminding voters that Mr. Clinton had won office with just 43% of the popular vote, thanks to the votes siphoned away by independent candidate Ross Perot.

The backlash was instant, and painful. Democrats lost 54 House seats and 10 Senate seats in 1994, just two years after Mr. Clinton took office.

There are many problems with Seib's argument, but perhaps the biggest is that the 1992 election has little in common with the 2008 election, starting with the fact that unlike 2008, 1992 wasn't a Democratic wave election.

In 1992, Democrats actually lost seats in Congress (though they gained one in the Senate), and although Bill Clinton won 370 electoral votes, as Seib noted, he didn't achieve a majority of the popular vote. (One can "blame" Perot for this, but remember that Reagan still managed a majority in 1980 despite a strong third-party bid.)

In 2008, on the other hand, Democrats have gained at least 19 seats in the House. In the Senate, they've gained at least six seats. And Barack Obama assembled the strongest Democratic presidential coalition in decades.

Roughly 28.3% of the voting age population voted for Obama, a number exceeded only by Reagan in 1984 and Nixon in 1972 in the ten elections since 18 year-olds were given the right to vote. (Bill Clinton won 23.7% of the voting age population in 1992.)

Obama's victory was marked by depth as well as breadth. If you add up the electoral votes in all the states in which he won by at least 10 points, you get 262 of the 270 EVs he would need to win re-election. (Keep in mind that the distribution of EVs will change slightly after the 2010 census.)

It would take only two additional states to get over the 270 threshold, Iowa (which he won by 9 points) and Colorado (which he won by just under 7 points).

Comparing Obama's victory to 1992, if you look at the states that Clinton won big -- by 10% or more -- he only takes in 188 EVs. Even if you just look at two-party vote (a dubious method of factoring out Ross Perot), Clinton only gets 230 EVs.

Obama's victory wasn't just impressive for its electoral geography. Obama did best among young voters, most of whom will still be able to vote in 2012. (Not to mention the influx of another four years worth of younger voters.)

At the same time, Obama did worst among the oldest voters. I hate to be this blunt, but not all of those voters will live long enough to cast ballots in 2012.

Looking at these factors, Obama has about as rock solid an electoral coalition as an incoming first-term president could have.

Combined with the returns on senatorial and congressional campaigns, the notion that Obama in 2008 is in the same political situation as Bill Clinton in 1992 is laughable on its face. Obama is in a much stronger position.

What's more, the GOP will have a tough time arguing that Obama wasn't elected to accomplish a progressive agenda. After all, Barack Obama won despite dire warnings from Republicans that he was a socialist interested in "spreading the wealth around." Notice that Obama's response wasn't to deny these attacks, but rather it was to mock them.

So now when Republicans make the argument that somehow Obama needs to govern from a "center right" perspective or else Democrats will face a repeat of the 1994 mid-term elections, they are living in a bit of a fantasy world. No doubt they believe in their fantasy, but it's nothing but a fantasy.

In fact, the only thing that could possibly lead to widespread electoral disaster is if Democrats fail to enact the progressive agenda upon which they campaigned.

Sorry, GOP: This Is Bigger Than 1992

Almost immediately after last Tuesday's election, pundits crawled out of the woodwork to make the case that 2008 was 1992 all over again, and that to be succesful, Barack Obama needed to avoid the mistakes made by Bill Clinton that led to the disastrous 1994 midterms.

Here's one such example from the WSJ's Gerald Seib:

Some Democrats, seeing the margins of victory they have rolled up, doubtless now will start pushing for new economic policies, new financial regulatory structures, new government plans for health care and a new strategy for dealing with the lingering war in Iraq, built solely on Democratic terms.

Yet history provides warning signs in front of such thinking. Simply consider the paths of the last two newly elected presidents, Bill Clinton of the Democrats and George W. Bush of the Republicans.

Mr. Clinton won in 1992 with friendly Democratic majorities in Congress strikingly similar to those Sen. Obama will enjoy: 258 House seats and 57 Senate seats. He did, in fact, reach across the aisle to Republicans initially to balance the budget and promote free trade -- policies that had durable and lasting support precisely because they had a bipartisan foundation.

But he then fell into the trap of leaning on the power of Democratic votes, and ignoring the animosity of minority Republicans, to try to push through the single biggest domestic effort of his first term, a wholesale remaking of the nation's health-care system. It was an overreach, which Republicans drove home by reminding voters that Mr. Clinton had won office with just 43% of the popular vote, thanks to the votes siphoned away by independent candidate Ross Perot.

The backlash was instant, and painful. Democrats lost 54 House seats and 10 Senate seats in 1994, just two years after Mr. Clinton took office.

There are many problems with Seib's argument, but perhaps the biggest is that the 1992 election has little in common with the 2008 election, starting with the fact that unlike 2008, 1992 wasn't a Democratic wave election.

In 1992, Democrats actually lost seats in Congress (though they gained one in the Senate), and although Bill Clinton won 370 electoral votes, as Seib noted, he didn't achieve a majority of the popular vote. (One can "blame" Perot for this, but remember that Reagan still managed a majority in 1980 despite a strong third-party bid.)

In 2008, on the other hand, Democrats have gained at least 19 seats in the House. In the Senate, they've gained at least six seats. And Barack Obama assembled the strongest Democratic presidential coalition in decades.

Roughly 28.3% of the voting age population voted for Obama, a number exceeded only by Reagan in 1984 and Nixon in 1972 in the ten elections since 18 year-olds were given the right to vote. (Bill Clinton won 23.7% of the voting age population in 1992.)

Obama's victory was marked by depth as well as breadth. If you add up the electoral votes in all the states in which he won by at least 10 points, you get 262 of the 270 EVs he would need to win re-election. (Keep in mind that the distribution of EVs will change slightly after the 2010 census.)

It would take only two additional states to get over the 270 threshold, Iowa (which he won by 9 points) and Colorado (which he won by just under 7 points).

Comparing Obama's victory to 1992, if you look at the states that Clinton won big -- by 10% or more -- he only takes in 188 EVs. Even if you just look at two-party vote (a dubious method of factoring out Ross Perot), Clinton only gets 230 EVs.

Obama's victory wasn't just impressive for its electoral geography. Obama did best among young voters, most of whom will still be able to vote in 2012. (Not to mention the influx of another four years worth of younger voters.)

At the same time, Obama did worst among the oldest voters. I hate to be this blunt, but not all of those voters will live long enough to cast ballots in 2012.

Looking at these factors, Obama has about as rock solid an electoral coalition as an incoming first-term president could have.

Combined with the returns on senatorial and congressional campaigns, the notion that Obama in 2008 is in the same political situation as Bill Clinton in 1992 is laughable on its face. Obama is in a much stronger position.

What's more, the GOP will have a tough time arguing that Obama wasn't elected to accomplish a progressive agenda. After all, Barack Obama won despite dire warnings from Republicans that he was a socialist interested in "spreading the wealth around." Notice that Obama's response wasn't to deny these attacks, but rather it was to mock them.

So now when Republicans make the argument that somehow Obama needs to govern from a "center right" perspective or else Democrats will face a repeat of the 1994 mid-term elections, they are living in a bit of a fantasy world. No doubt they believe in their fantasy, but it's nothing but a fantasy.

In fact, the only thing that could possibly lead to widespread electoral disaster is if Democrats fail to enact the progressive agenda upon which they campaigned.

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