Democrats beware.
A congressional election on the Gulf Coast of Florida has just spelled impending disaster for your party this coming November.
Republican David Jolly has just defeated Democrat Alex Sink for the seat vacated by the death of longtime Republican U.S. Rep. C.W. Bill Young. Democrats thought the special election could provide a breakthrough in a traditionally strong GOP district. They were mistaken.
http://www.tampabay.com/news/politics/local/adam-c-smith-column-david-jolly-victory-spells-trouble-for-democrats/2169745
Jolly won, although by a narrow margin.
He managed to make the Affordable Care Act the issue. He nationalized a local contest. Sink was sunk by her support of the ACA, which Republicans have demonized successfully — and wrongly, in my view — as some kind of evil government intrusion.
How will this play out in all 435 congressional districts? Not well if you’re a Democratic candidate, or so it appears at this moment.
Democratic candidates are spooked, or at least they should be spooked, by the prospect of running for Congress with public disapproval of the ACA so high. Tampa Bay Times political columnist Adam Smith put it this way: “Don’t be surprised to see vulnerable Democrats across the country start distancing themselves from health care reform in a way that Sink did not.”
None of this discussion, of course, matters for the 13th Congressional District of Texas, one of the most reliably Republican districts in the House of Representatives. Incumbent Mac Thornberry of Clarendon faces a Democrat this fall, someone named Mike Minter; Thornberry will cruise to re-election.
The contested races involving potentially vulnerable Democrats do pose a problem. Democrats have all but given up the idea of regaining control of the House and they are in serious danger of losing control of the Senate.
What happens if the GOP gains control of both congressional chambers? Well, gridlock will tighten. Dysfunction will intensify. Tempers will flare. Relations between the White House and Capitol Hill will go from bad to worse to abysmal.
Government will not work.
When the new Congress takes over in January 2015 we just might be longing for the “good old days” that are about to pass into history.