I predict a Republican victory of tsunami proportions on November 2nd.
For the last six months in various public forums, I have said that Republicans will take both the House and Senate. Most political observers, citing statistics from various states, continue to say that, while it appears certain that the House will go Republican, there are too few Senate seats in play for a Republican takeover. Further, many pundits state that Democrats will preserve their control of the Senate because the Republican Party has undermined itself by fielding whacko and semi-whacko candidates from the “tea party” wing or otherwise offering inferior candidates, e.g., Christine O’Donnell in Delaware, Rand Paul in Kentucky, Sharron Angle in Nevada, Linda McMahon in Connecticut and Carly Fiorina in California.
Without being able to cite statistics that support my view, I nevertheless predict the Republicans will also take the Senate. Imagine what the Republicans could have done if they had really good and visionary leadership. But they don’t. Indeed, in New York State, the Republican Party is seen as a bad joke, totally leaderless and without candidates who can win, despite new corruption allegations involving the Democratic Party in Albany. Take, for example, gubernatorial candidate Carl Paladino. He has disgraced the Republicans with his antics and ridiculous statements and is trailing by double digits in the polls. The Republican candidates running for the two Senate seats now held by Chuck Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand have had little impact and are given no chance of winning. Jay Townsend, who is running against Chuck Schumer, is totally unknown and unfunded, and running against a Senator who is known everywhere and is held in high regard. Joe DioGuardi, who is running against the recently-appointed Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, is unable to engender major support at a time when incumbents appear to be bearing bulls-eye targets on their backs.
New York State notwithstanding, I predict that mounting anger around the country will carry Republicans to victory in both Houses of Congress.
Why would intelligent voters leave the Democratic Party that they endorsed so heavily two years ago in the 2008 presidential election? The reason is obvious – deep, deep disappointment in the record of President Obama. The President has wasted many opportunities in his term to date, and has lost by his own admission almost every battle for the hearts and minds of the electorate in pushing through Congress monumental legislation that he signed into law.
Why did the President and Congress insist on reinventing the wheel when it came to health care coverage? Weren’t there prototypes in Europe and elsewhere developed and used for more than 50 years with proven track records that could have been used as models? Did the President and Congress have to terrify people who had insurance coverage in order to provide coverage for the additional 32 million Americans covered under the new law? Couldn’t those without insurance have been attached in some way to the Medicaid rolls? Why did the President and Congress sell out to the prescription drug companies and strip Medicare of the right to negotiate volume discount purchases that could have saved U.S. taxpayers more than a trillion dollars over ten years? What rankles most for many, including me, is why have there been so few criminal prosecutions of those who are responsible for having brought the U.S. economy to its knees, destroyed the nation’s prosperity and caused millions of Americans to lose their homes, their jobs and a substantial portion of their retirement savings? Why when looking at Obama’s cabinet and advisers, do we see the faces of those who many hold responsible for the economic debacle?
It is for these reasons, I believe, the coming November tsunami will roll across America and give the Republicans, who are undeserving of the honor, control of both Houses. The American public is enraged and wants to punish those who have been in charge of the country. They know those who will replace incumbents may be as bad or worse, but they also believe they can’t do any greater damage. They are willing to put up with them until the next election to teach our elected representatives a monumental lesson — that public service is an honorable profession and must be performed competently and honestly.
We are an optimistic, generous people, who believe in fairness and justice. And we will be heard.
Ed Koch is the former Mayor of New York City.
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(Source: RealClearPolitics.com)
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7 Responses
Remember to reprint this on Nov. 3 so we can evaluate.
“…Carl Paladino…has disgraced the Republicans…”
If he hadn’t made strong statements, nobody would have even heard of him, just like the other unknown Republican candidates.
I still think he has a shot, because of his universal name recognition, and because he is the only candidate who has stood up to the immoral Toeva activists.
Mr. Koch’s judgment is suspect on this issue, since he started the whole toeva revolution when he was mayor of NYC.
I think it is doubtful that senate will go to GOP barring Lieberman caucusing with the Republicans. It’ll be close, but it doesn’t matter since to do anything in the senate takes 60 votes, nobody will get that making the senate incapable of doing anything controversial.
President Obama knew when he walked in the door that he would probably lose Congress at the mid-terms. Most presidents lose seats in the mid-terms. Besides he promised more than he could possibly fulfill in 2 years so he was bound to disappoint. Therefore he did the most controversial stuff right away like healthcare, because of his veto even if he loses Congress next week it doesn’t matter they can’t revert his changes.
Lastly, there have been few criminal prosecutions in the financial crises because it it was caused more by greed and incompetence than malice and crime.
Thank you Edward Kochka for your opinion. Your article takes its usual knocks on Conservatives but thats ok because we could deal with it.
You knock the “tea party” (there is NO such thing as an actual organization!) for its candidates but you seem to forget there are primaries in each state where the candidates are vetted by us, the voters of that party. This year there are many people running in the general election who never would have taught they would enter politics but they found they had to run in order to change the socialist cliff this country was heading down under Obama/Pelosi/Reid and their minions.
On November 2, we have a chance to slow or even put a stop to the Obamatsunami of the last 22 months. We have a choice of voting for Obama and a continuation of failed socialism or we will place a vote for AMERICA. VOTE FOR AMERICA!!
#3,
Lieberman will not caucus with the Republicans because he knows he can never win a Republican primary. Connecticut Republicans had an excellent candidate for the US Senate in former Congressman Rob Simmons, who had been elected and re-elected in a very Democratic district. But he was too sane for today’s Republican party, as is Lieberman.
Koch does not know what he is talking about. Is he losing it?
Specifically:
“Why did the President and Congress insist on reinventing the wheel when it came to health care coverage?”
Actually the healthcare reform plan was designed to keep as much of the current system of employer-paid insurance as possible.
“Weren’t there prototypes in Europe and elsewhere developed and used for more than 50 years with proven track records that could have been used as models?”
Indeed there are. And opposition from the for-profit health insurance lobby made those prototypes politically impossible in the US.
“Did the President and Congress have to terrify people who had insurance coverage in order to provide coverage for the additional 32 million Americans covered under the new law?”
The President did nothing of the kind, and neither did the Democrats in Congress. The terror is the result of smears and lies by the insurance industry, the Chamber of Commerce, and the Republican-allied Fox News.
“Couldn’t those without insurance have been attached in some way to the Medicaid rolls?”
In fact a major part of the healthcare reform plan is a tremendous expansion of Medicaid. This could have been the model for the rest of the healthcare reform except that it would have been very expensive, and would have been bitterly opposed again by the for-profit health insurance lobby.
“Why did the President and Congress sell out to the prescription drug companies and strip Medicare of the right to negotiate volume discount purchases that could have saved U.S. taxpayers more than a trillion dollars over ten years?”
This is a very good question and should be addressed to President Bush and the Republicans who were responsible for this outrage that was basically a massive subsidy to the pharmaceutical and for-profit health insurance industries. They also failed to pay for it.
“What rankles most for many, including me, is why have there been so few criminal prosecutions of those who are responsible for having brought the U.S. economy to its knees, destroyed the nation’s prosperity and caused millions of Americans to lose their homes, their jobs and a substantial portion of their retirement savings?”
It should rankle you, and it should rankle everyone here. Republican-packed courts have gutted the laws that used to make these kinds of prosecutions possible, just as they have packed the courts with judges that have made it impossible for Jonathan Pollard to challenge his sentencing and will likely make it impossible for Shalom Rubushkin to have any chance on an appeal of either of his conviction or his sentence. (Note that Judge Reade was a Bush appointee.)
Yet most commenters here tell us how the Republicans are so much better. Go figure.
YOU are are such a navi!!! DUH!!! where were you 6 months ago