The forecast is bad for Democrats this November: the Republicans could take back the House and will certainly take some seats in the Senate.
If he loses the House, Obama will find himself in the same frustrating situation President Clinton was in after 1994, when Newt Gingrich’s Republicans captured the House and Senate. Obama won’t be signing any more behemoths like the Health Care bill; he’ll be forced to settle for dull compromises like Clinton’s welfare reform act. In terms of domestic policy, his biggest accomplishments will be behind him. In a few years, he might be saying things like “the era of big government is over.”
If anything, Obama’s strait jacket will be tighter than Clinton’s, considering how much more extreme the parties have become in the past fifteen years. Despite many public efforts, very few compromises has been hatched so far in Obama’s presidency, with no Republican votes for the health care bill and only one for the stimulus. The Republicans seem content to reject Obama’s agenda, even after it’s been decaffeinated.
Instead of getting depressed over their future, the Democrats should work on passing as much as they can before November. They still haven’t attended to some of the boldest bullet points in Obama’s agenda: financial and immigration reform.
I’m especially worried about financial reform. The recent market crash revealed serious problems in the financial industry that threaten our country’s prosperity, and although some Republicans have been working with Democrats on the current bill, I doubt that a House with a Republican majority will pass the changes needed. Indeed, Republican Congressional leaders have been saying that the regulations in the current bill – meant to keep banks from failing and prevent another crash – would stifle the banking industry and need to be toned down or forgotten.
If we don’t make the necessary reforms now, it could be years before another opportunity comes along. By then, the impetus will be gone. American voters have short memories. We would just have to brace ourselves for the next meltdown.
Climate change is another urgent issue, and Democrats should make further reforms in the next few months, considering how watered-down the cap and trade bill they passed last year was.
Taking action on these issues will improve their odds for November anyway. Whether or not a majority of Americans support Obama’s ideas, the Democrats will at least be a party that can get things done – which will contrast with all the stubborn head-shaking Republicans have been doing lately. Financial reform will be especially beneficial because most Americans, like me, don’t think too highly of banks. The Consumer Protection Agency Democrats have been talking about founding would endear voters who’ve been saddled with the outrageous bank fees that are always pissing off me and my friends.
I’m hoping the economy gets back on its feet before this fall – I’ve already heard economists say that the recession is over. That would soften the blow for the Democrats more than anything else. Either way, it wouldn’t hurt for them to go over Obama’s campaign speeches from 2008 and see what they missed.
Let me begin by making an admission that fatally undercuts the credibility of everything else I am about the say: I have not been able to stay awake through an entire episode yet. I start with great intentions and commitment, get energized by some terrific New Orleans music, and then after watching a bunch of seemingly random characters move without apparent purpose through the extremely depressing, brutalized post-Katrina landscape, I doze off. It’s embarrassing to admit, but maybe it also says something about the show’s pace. I never nodded off during The Sopranos or The Pacific.
One thing I can say with assurance, based on the portions of the two episodes I’ve watched before drifting off into the Land of Nod. Davis McAlary, the appalling goateed DJ played by Steve Zahn, is the most annoying TV character I’ve every watched. He seems to have no redeeming qualities whatsoever. He is a slob. He is a rude and mean-spirited neighbor. He is an arrogant liar. He is a looter and a thief. He drinks the most expensive wine at his girlfriend’s restaurant without permission or compensation. He has temperamental outbursts when asked to play songs from a playlist. He bugs people like Elvis Costello who are trying to watch a nightclub show in peace. Are we supposed to like this jerk or find him interesting? I sure don’t. I can’t imagine why his chef/restauranteur girlfriend wouldn’t kick his sorry ass to the curb in a nanosecond, or why Elvis Costello wouldn’t bitch-slap him for telling obvious falsehoods about his musical abilities. In my view, when that character is on the screen he sucks the wind out of the show every time. Couldn’t a corrupt FEMA official take him out and do us all a favor?
