Why we lost the House, Senate etc... Uner Clinton

[absyntheNsugar]

In a previous thread, some posters drew the conclusion that the loss of the House and the Senate during Clinton's presidency was his fault. Having worked in the political machine (ok..well I was an intern for a Dem Congressman) I can say I saw first hand what caused it, and it was not Clinton.

In 1992 the districts were redrawn. At the time they were very much in Democrat's favor, however this changed after the districts were redrawn, favoring Republicans big time.

How could this happen during a Democratic administration? Well...

- The Republicans had worked their way up, taking control of many state congresses and local election boards.

- The Democrats in congress, many of whom supported redistricting laws and committees, soon switched parties (one, but not the only, example of this is Ben Nighthorse Campbell)

The assertion that Clinton "lost" congress is false. His presidency had little to do with it.

[Wellong]

1. you are way off

the elections that took place in 1994 were in districts that were drawn by a democratic majority of state legislatures in 1991. Clinton had one of the lowest approval ratings in presidential history at the time of the 1994 election. He had no coat tails.

The mid term election is almost always a loser for the party in power. But the GOP landslide in 1994 was unprecedented.

[absyntheNsugar]

2. If I could just find my redistricting maps from the day

I could show you. In 92, especially in the South and Texas, districts were gerrymandered to a point in which they looked more like worms than blocks. Atlanta, for example, was seriously cut into pieces, whereas rural blocks were kept intact. Austin was also cut into slivers. We compared them to maps of registered Democrats to Republicans and sure enough, the districts favored Republicans.

Please let me know were you got your data. I saw the maps.

[Wellong]

5. Atlanta

Atlanta, for example, was seriously cut into pieces, whereas rural blocks were kept intact.

Need I remind you which party did that?

And the Texas maps were also drawn by the same party.

Here is a hint. The party did not start with an R.

[absyntheNsugar]

7. Like I said

Many of those Democrats jumped ship to the Republican party shortly afterwards. This was a treason within the Democratic party, and I'm surprised more isn't said about this.

[really-looney]

34. Going after Newt

In 1990 there was only one Republican in the GA delegation. Newt. The Democrats in the state Legislature went after him and failed. In the process the cut a few lines too close and then add in the majority minority districts and you have all white Republicans and all African American Democrats in the GA delegation today.

[zbdent]

3. I'm sure the term limits had absolutely nothing to do with it

especially with the Repukes who decided that they weren't going to honor their pledges to step down peacefully when it applied to them.

[Wellong]

8. Not only republicans

abandoned their term limit pledge. Paul Wellstone also did, and would be alive today if he had kept his promise.

Both republicans and democrats alike failed to keep that promise all around the country.

[Bandit]

38. But it was the republicans that made a HUGE deal about keeping their

Promises. In fact to prove they were serious they invented what they called their "Contract" with America. It was to show that Republicans Keep their word It was a great sales gimmick and as gimmicks go it was not worth the paper it was written on. Most of those who went back on their promise to only serve two terms were Republicans and no one has held any of them accountable.

[jiacinto]

4. What people forget

1) The 1990 redistrcting: This was the redistricting that killed Democrats. In a well-intentioned attempt to elect more minorities to Congress they unwittingly helped the GOP. By creating these weird shaped district what the state legislators, in effect, did was throw all the Democrats into a few districts. That turned all the surrounding districts into Republican strongholds. Where you once had three Democratic districts, two Republican districts, and one competetive seat, you now had 4 heavily Republican seats, one heavily Democratic seat, and one competetive district. In 1992 many of these Democrats barely held on. In 1994 they were wiped out.

2) The South's March to the GOP: In the late 1980s and in the early 1990 many southern Democrats, once elected in the 1940s, 50s, and 60s, started to retire. Folks like William Natcher, Charles Bennett, Sonny Montgomery, Claude Pepper, and Jamie Whitten retired. Although their seats had been voting Republican for President and statewide offices for decades, the popularity of those Democrats held those seats. In effect the Republicans finally gained seats that should have been theirs since the late 1960s.

So that is why the Dems lost the House in the early 1990s.

[JeebusH]

6. A lot had to do with the old farts in the House ...

Foley and co. just weren't going to change their ways, blowing off reforms as they did and punishing freshman Dems who bucked them (thus hurting their re-election)

BTW, just before 1994 the Dems had a chance to knock Newt out of his seat, the people in his district were sick of him and the actor from the Dukes of Hazzard was running againsy him ("Cooter"), anyway the year before Congress gave themselves raises and Foley told the Repukes that they wouldn't fund any of their candidates that ran against them that made it an issue... well, old Cooter did make it an issue and Foley pulled all of DNC cash to Cooter and Newt barely won

[Wellong]

9. Cooter

After loosing to Newt did Cooter move and run again? Because he did get elected to the House.

[charlie]

12. Before he ran against Newt n/t

[swinney]

10. 1994 loss

redisricting and D stayed at home in big numbers.

[Zynx]

36. And independents revolted against us.

The '94 midterms was one of the most crushing midterm defeats a party has seen in a long time and that can't simply be attributed to small factors.

[The Commie]

11. If their was no gerrymandering...

the House would be strongly democratic. The more densely populated states tend to be democratic, while the less populous states tend to be repug; so the house should have a higher proportion of Dems, but they dont. :( I think it is time to start curbing the BS going on in state legislatures, such as the Texas gerrymandering.

[Deja Q]

13. And did the repukes do anything with their "Contract For America"?

Why didn't the Dems call 'em on it? Or did they?

[Wellong]

16. Contract with America

If memory serves me right, the GOP got 90% of the "Contract" through the house and senate, and Clinton signed 70% of it.

My numbers might be off slightly, but I believe they are pretty damn close.

[Yupster]

18. Some of the Contract

didn't need presidential approval. Stuff like term limits for committee chairpeople. But you are correct. They passed everything but one item which I can't remember what it was? Was it term limits for House members? Who has a better memory?

[dolstein]

14. There were several factors

First, continuing trend towards the Republican Party in the South.

Second, the Bush administration's use of the Voting Rights Act to craft "majority minority" districts in the South.

Third, retirement of Democratic incumbents.

These factors produced significant gains for the Republican Party.

Fourth, the passage of the Brady Bill and the Ban on Semiautomatic weapons and the Clinton economic plan. These measures were not popular in rural states and districts, and ended up costing the Democratic Party several seats (including, most notably, the seat of then-speaker Tom Foley).

Fifth, the check bouncing scandal. This ended up costing several Democrats their seats.

All of these factors contributed to the massive Republican gains in 1994. And once the Democrats lost control of the House, they lost many of the fundraising advantages they had previously enjoyed. And the Republicans cemented their gains in the 2000 redistricting.

[BallaFaseke]

15. That about sums it plus

the Republicans keep cheating to stay in power.

[Wellong]

17. As it should have

Fifth, the check bouncing scandal. This ended up costing several Democrats their seats.


As it should have. Didn't Rostankowski go to jail over this? Or did he go to jail for something else?

[Skittles]

19. ARE YOU DONE WITH THE RNC TALKING POINTS?

PROBABLY NOT

[Bridget Burke]

20. Since Rush is still in "re-runs"

He's doing his part to spread the word!

[Name removed]

24. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Wellong]

27. Are you saying

that the House Bank scandal should not have cost anyone their seats?

[Kolesar]

29. the "bank scandal" was not a scandal

For a long period of time, House members had checking accounts with overdraft protection with no penalties. Some House members chronically kept their accounts "in the red". Gingerich and some other GOP operatives just decided to politicize the matter and used it to knock out congress members who had large overdrafts like Mary Rose Oakar.

[really-looney]

32. There was no such thing as the House bank

The Sergeant at Arms was charged with distributing Members of Congress salaries. The Bank did not pay interest, give loans or anything else that a bank did. It was a money pool. Some Members of congress both Democrat and Republican chose to abuse the system.

[JHB]

31. Something else.

Fifth, the check bouncing scandal. This ended up costing several Democrats their seats.

As it should have. Didn't Rostankowski go to jail over this? Or did he go to jail for something else?

No, it was for other financial abuses, plea-bargained down to wire fraud.

And incidentally, no it shouldn't have. No checks were bounced. What happened was the House Bank unofficially granted members the equivalent of no-penalty overdraft protection, and some members abused the perk (admittedly, some very badly). However, given scandals like Rosty's (and the still-new-to-the-public Whitewater investigation), Newt & co. were able to spin it as "check kiting" and paint a picture of widespread Democratic thievery.

[really-looney]

33. The Tax Increase (which led to economic expansion and balanced budget)

Congresswoman Marjorie Mesvinski from PA lost her job over it and many others did. I think it was Phil Grahm that asshole who said" they will be hunting Democrats with dogs after this vote" and he was right. The tax bill passed with out one Republican vote. The funny thing is that is what caused the Budget to balance and the economy to take off. There were provisions like the BTU tax which caused us most of the Democrats in Oklakoma

[ArkDem]

21. Yes, you are right. Clinton was only responsible

for the good things that happened while he was president. I keep forgetting.

[livinontheedge]

23. BJ Clinton accomplished many great things, but . . .

his character shortcomings undermined our party's rise toward dominating the political lanscape for a generation. With the Clinton economy, Gore should have won in a landslide AND won reelection easily. THEN, we would have had Hillary for eight years. My how different the world would have been.

Clinton's blow jobs did great damage to our party, not to mention our nation. There is no wayt in hell anyone will ever convince me that Gore would not be the president but for those damned bj's.

[MadMan]

22. Simple!

(and I'm surprised nobody here at DU has touched on this yet)

Americans like having a "balance of power" in our gov't. You can go back to the beginning of our young republic (no I don't have cold hard facts - I said YOU can go back!) and see that this is the case. The party in the WH loses seats in Congress because Americans like to have one party in control of the WH and the other party in control of congress. That way, the fringe on both sides of the aisle get canceled out and legislation and policy making occurs more towards the middle.

This "theory" is further proven by the fact that what the repricks did in 2002 was deemed "unprecedented" (adding seats in congress while their party was in the WH). It saddened me terribly that those damn liars did so well. By all historical indications, they shouldn't have. It's no wonder why it happened that way though. The republican machinery is well-oiled and tuned while the democratic machinery... ha!... what machinery? Need I say more?

[Capn Sunshine]

26. re machinery

The republican party is a well oiled machine;
the democratic party is a box full of shiny parts that when assembled make a damn sight better looking and sounding thing but it will never be a machine; further it tends to fall back into it's shiny parts during non election years..........

[Cocoa]

25. Gephardt credits dem courage

in his stump speech, he talks about the 1993 budget, which was passed without any republican support, and which he says cost some dems their seats, though it turned out to be the correct thing for the economy.

[andym]

28. Bob Dole

Dole blocked Clinton's health care package in the senate.

He made Clinton look both ineffectual and scared people into thinking that that Clinton and would destroy the Democrats would destroy
the quality of American healthcare.

It was reported widely before that election.
Lowered Clinton's popularity (and Demos) significantly

[OKHRANA]

30. let's not forget the Hillary health care and gays in the military issues

In 93 and 94, Clinton made some rookie mistakes by trying to do too much too soon with these issues. He got nothing but hell for it until after 94 when the Repukes got their landslide. After 94 he got things going and this led to his own comfortable win in 96. If I remember right, right after that election in early 97 he got too comfortable and his top issue became his sex life until the whole country's top issue was that too. I agree if not for that Gore would be President today.

[kentuck]

35. Some might argue the DLC divided the party but...

those other Democrats might argue that it is the left that is dividing the Party. What really is dividing the Party is success. The success of Bill Clinton has divided DU and the entire Party to the point it is today. The bottom line: it was Bill Clinton's penis. No kidding.

[doppledang]

37. Sounds like denial

I've no dog in this debate, but your facts are wrong. The Republicans started taking over state legislatures in 1994. They had done better in the 1980 election (Reagen's) than they had done in 1990. 0 representatives switched parties at the federal level. (More had done during the 1980s, like then-Reps. Phil Gramm, Trent Lott, Newt Gingrich.)

IMO, Clinton calculated he could purify the party ideologically by forcing his own party to choose sides. He planned to take losses; he just didn't know how badly it would snowball.

[Penible]

39. I am relying on memory, but

I recall that Clinton was caught on tape musing that Democratic losses would be good for him because a Pub house could help him triangulate in accordance with the advice of Dick Morris. The ensuing silence from progressives was remarkable. Does anyone else remember this?

[Bandit]

40. Dick Morris was not an adviser at that time

Dick Morris came much later. So your memory is quite faulty.

[Penible]

41. The role of Dick Morris

can be found here, at a Nightline interview:

http://abcnews.go.com/onair/nightline/clintonyears/clinton/chapters/4.html

Morris claims to have advised Clinton about the '94 elections, advice Clinton ignored to the grave detriment of the party. Clinton took Morris to his bosom immediately after that, according to Geo Stephanopoulos in the same interview.

It can hardly be said that Morris came "much later."

Where my memory is unclear, is exactly when and in what words Clinton mused (opined?) that it would be beneficial to him if the Party lost the House.

Arguably, for whatever it is worth, the best thing to happen to BC in terms of re-election was the loss of the House.

[OKHRANA]

42. Morris and Clinton go back to the 80's

Morris said on O'Reilly a few months back that in 89 in an outdoor reception, he (Morris) said something that Clinton misinterpreted and Clinton actually physically tackled him to the ground (in front of Hillary).

Morris said because of that he broke off his relationship with Clinton and didn't even want to speak to him but he was contacted for help by Clinton in 94 when the election went so bad for him.

I believe this story because it was quite provocative and if it was not true it would have been denied by Clinton or Hillary.