The "Public Option" and the Congressional Vote

Today's "Daily Beast" (see http://www.thedailybeast.com/cheat-sheet/?cid=hp:cheatsheet1#cheatrow_9672) outlines the dilemma for President Obama and the fate of the so-called "public option" in the debate over health care reform. It also provides a great classroom example of the politics of the legislative process.

Here is the Obama dilemma: The public option is not likely to make it through the Senate without a filibuster. So the Senate version will have no public option. The House version of the bill can be passed with the public option.

So assume the House passes the bill with the public option and Senate does not. Debate in the Senate is over because the bill is passed, and thus there will be no more opportunity for a filibuster. Rather, the legislative process at this point simply requires a conference committee to reconcile the House and Senate versions, and then another vote in both the House and Senate. The reconciliation bill can either include or exclude the public option. A simple majority vote in the Senate could then pass the bill.

So it seems that the real debate in the health care debate is likely to boil down to a highly partisan law with the public option vs. a modestly bi-partisan law without the public option. The political implications of a highly partisan law can be used by Republicans to make significant gains in the 2010 midterm elections.

The long, complex debate over health care appears to be narrowing to this dilemma for Obama and the Democrats; and it seems that they can steer the legislative process in either direction -- a good case study in dancing legislation!

A Different Type of Health Care Map

The staff from Politico.com have created a list of the 10 "hot spots" for the health care debate across the country:

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0909/27650.html

The list includes the following: (1) Alabama, (2) South Jersey, (3) Arkansas, (4) New Hampshire; (5) Pennsylvania; (6) Oregon, (7) Western North Carolina, (8) Florida, (9) Southside Virginia and (10) Eastern Ohio. If you are teaching in or near any of these so-called "hotbeds", you might want to try asking your students what makes the area such a hotbed. Consider the following factors:

• Ideological fissures in the local electorate;
• Areas where the "generation gap" is most pronounced (younger people tend to support President Obama)
• Key local races in next year's local midterm elections in the area may well be decided by the fate of the health care program;

etc.

2010 US Senate Elections

Last Friday's posting (see below) discussed the GOP's prospects for winning a majority of seats in the 2010 House midterm elections. Today we take a look at the Senate.

Currently there are 60 seantors who align with the Democratic caucus and 40 with the Republican caucus. The GOP would need to keep all of its current seats and win back 11 from the Dems to achieve a majority (a mere 10-seat flip would produce a tie, with the tie-breaker being Democrat VP Joe Biden).

38 of the Senate's 100 seats will be contested in 2010. 19 of the 38 are currently GOP seats and 19 are Democratic seats. According to congressional election analyst Charlie Cook (www.cookpolitical.com) 12 of the 19 Democrat-held seats are solidly Democrat, and 11 of the GOP seats are not competitive. Barring a number of unexpected vacancies or a serious shift in the political winds, it is very unlikely that the Senate will find itself under Republican control as a result of the 2010 midterm elections.

Cook contends that the best prospects for the GOP are in Nevada (where Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is vulnerable), Connecticut (where 30 year incumbant Senator Chris Dodd is in trouble), and Illinois (where President Obama's former senate seat, occupied by interim Senator Burris, has been the point of controversy). Somewhat safer, but still vulnerable, are the Democrat seats held by Senators Boxer (CA), Specter (PA), Bennet (CO), and Lincoln (AR).

If the Republicans are to achieve divided government in the short term, they will need to focus their efforts on the House races rather than on the Senate.

2010 Midterm House Elections

If history is a guide, Republicans will gain seats in next year's midterm congressional elections.

Let's first take a look at the prospects for the House races (Next Monday we'll look at the Senate). 1978 and 1994 were the last two House midterm elections similar to 2010. In 1978, Jimmy Carter was a first term Democratic incumbent, and his party held strong majorities in both houses. The Republicans won back 15 House seats that year (but the Democrats still held a whopping 277-158 majority).

In 1994, Bill Clinton was a first term Democrat, and his party held a 256-176 majority in the House. Following a bruising loss in the battle to pass health insurance reform and the GOP's nationalized "Contract with America" campaign, the Democrats lost 54 seats in 1994, giving the GOP a majority for the first time in 40 years.

The current partisan distribution of the House is 256-D, 177-R. The GOP needs a net 40-seat shift in the 2010 midterm elections to gain a majority.

Congressional election analyst Charlie Cook (see www.cookpolitical.com) identifies 106 (of the 435) congressional districts that might possibly experience a shift in partisan control. 71 of these CDs are currently held by Democrats and 35 by Republicans. 48 of the 71 Democrat seats are in districts that Bush won in 2004 and McCain won in 2008, indicating that the GOP potentially can turn enough seats to win back the House -- assuming that they can hold onto most of their 35 competitive seats.

What are the primary factors that will influence the magnitude of GOP gains in 2010? First is the state of the economy particularly as reflected in the unemployment rate; second is how well-organized the GOP is in running a coherent national campaign; and third is the success or failure of the Democrats in passing health insurance reform this year.

An Historical Perspective: Obama versus Reagan versus Clinton

Many political scientists accept it as a token of faith that a president's hopes for reelection rest mainly with the state of the economy. Certainly most of the models that predict presidential elections incorporate economic indicators into the formula, including Emory University Professor Alan Abramowitz's highly successful model. (see http://www.emory.edu/EMORY_REPORT/erarchive/2008/September/Sept8/Election.htm).
Still, when communicating this fact to undergraduates, it is helpful to have specific historical comparisons. John B. Judis's fascinating article from The New Republic a few days ago offers exactly the right mix of graphic data and historical analysis to assess the challenges facing Obama on this score. The link is:
http://www.tnr.com/article/job-one

Judis's most interesting data compares Obama to Reagan and Clinton. The arc of Reagan's popularity in his first term tracked precisely with the unemployment rate; more than a decade later, Clinton's second-term approval ratings similarly tracked the unemployment rate almost exactly. (The charts Judis offers in his piece are especially telling). Finally, Judis consider's Obama's rising disapproval rating in his first year, which appears to track -- you guessed it -- the unemployment rate.

Judis's article makes interesting reading for professors, and offers lots of fascinating historical comparisons to discuss in class....

New Data on Public Perceptions of the First Amendment

Since 1997, The Freedom Forum's First Amendment Center has been studying the "State of the First Amendment" (SOFA) from the perspective of public opinion. SOFA examines public opinion about free expression rights and American uses of the news media for news and information. The most recent annual national survey was released a few days ago.

Highlights of the latest survey include:

* Despite the popularity of Twitter and other social media, Americans continue to rely primarily on TV for getting news.

* Less than 1-in-20 Americans trust social networking sites more than Internet sites maintained by local news media, and only 3% say that Twitter is a very reliable news source.

* When asked to name the freedoms guaranteed by the First Amendment, 55% were able to name freedom of speech. Far fewer were able to name freedom of religion (18%), freedom of the press (16%), freedom of assembly (14%), and right to petition (4%). Four-in-ten could not name any of the freedoms in the First Amendment.


For the full survey results as well as past surveys, go to: www.firstamendmentcenter.org

Where Your Students Should Go For Info About the Health Care Debate

I have been struggling of late when students interested in the health care debate ask me where they should go for information on the Internet. When the debate gets as complicated as this one has, I long for that one website where casual (and not so casual) observers of the heath care debate can go for all the information they might need, including legislation, transcripts of all hearings, links to blogs, columnists, think tanks, lobbyists etc. There are a few portals like that on the Internet, but the best I’ve seen so far is Timothy Noah’s “Health Care Reform: An On-Line Guide… “ on Slate.com. The link is at:

http://www.slate.com/id/2220222/

Noah is a senior writer for Slate and a former assistant managing editor at the U.S. News & World Report. He’s been updating this website frequently, so if you’re looking for a veritable “department store” of information about the health care reform debate with less obvious ideological overtones, I would send your students there first ….

The American Politics blog is coming!

On Monday morning, September 21, Professor Ken Dautrich and myself plan to launch this blog with tips, hints and suggestions on how to most effectively teach American politics using the three perspectives highlighted in our textbook: the historical, the popular and the global. Sometimes our suggestions will utilize technology from the Internet and elsewhere. But mostly we will offer advice and tips that can be used by any teacher or professor, no matter what resources one has at his or her disposal.

We look forward to getting your comments as well. Count on three or four new suggestions each week to help launch your own American politics lectures and seminars this fall!