51/49 nation: big swings from tiny shifts

Tom Davis isn't normally the type of person who gloats. But the GOP congressman from northern Virginia can be blunt as a hammer – and at a day-after meeting with reporters in Washington's Capitol Club on Wednesday he took aim at erstwhile election opponents and banged down a few nails.

Mr. Davis, chairman of the Republican Congressional Campaign Committee, said that this year too many Democrats sat around making fun of President Bush while he – meaning George W. – was out building national support. And Davis thanked Georgia's Democratic Gov. Roy Barnes for pushing through a redistricting plan that split the state's African-American vote, demoralized minority voters, and unintentionally resulted in big GOP gains.

"Governor Barnes was appropriately swept out of office" on the Republican tide, said Davis.

Ouch. But in private many Democrats were saying similarly harsh things about themselves. In a nation where voters are still split 50-50 between the two big parties, Republicans managed to bull their way to victory by a few percentage points. That gain means power – and perhaps power for some time. Early analyses show that Dems may be defending more vulnerable seats in 2004. Nor did this midterm exactly enhance the Democrats' chances of winning back the Oval Office two years hence.

"A huge amount of resources was poured into this election, which created a shift of a few people, which will have huge consequences," says Dennis Goldford, a political scientist at Drake University in Iowa.

One thing the elections of 2002 were not about, apparently, was realignment. In that they were unlike 1994, when deep-seated frustration with the nation's direction swept the Republicans into power in the House and Rep. Newt Gingrich into the speaker's office. Nor were they even 1980, when the Reagan revolution brought the GOP to power in the Senate.

Both 1994 and 1980 were surprising, and involved changes in power in substantial numbers of seats. In 2002, by contrast, only a handful of House and Senate seats changed hands. Overall, 45 percent of voters reported pulling the lever for a GOP candidate, according to a poll by the Republican-leaning firm Public Opinion Strategies, while 39 percent voted for a Democrat. "This was a sliver of a change, not a massive sea change," says Democratic pollster Anna Greenberg.

The public remains cautious about a possible war with Iraq and has concerns about the direction of the economy and instances of corporate malfeasance, says Ms. Greenberg.

Indeed, Monitor interviews in relatively competitive electoral districts throughout the nation showed that many voters remain unsettled about the direction of the country. There was little "throw the bums out" passion among those interviewed; in fact, there was little partisan enthusiasm for either party.

Take Catawba, N.C., a town of 800 cradled in the northern backwaters of Lake Norman. On paper, the town is as evenly split between Republicans and Democrats as anywhere in the state. In practice, Catawba tends to be conservative with a small "c," with the town and surrounding county routinely supporting six-term House veteran Cass Ballenger (R).

Voters who braved a cold rain to cast ballots at the Old Catawba school cited issues from Social Security to the recent sniper attacks in Washington as factors in their choices. Many said they were turned off by what they judged negative campaigning in the North Carolina Senate race between Democrat Erskine Bowles and Republican Elizabeth Dole. Jobs, in a county with one of the highest jobless rates in the state, were a big concern. "My main concern this year is unemployment, and what our leaders are going to do about it," says Andrea Irwin, a home health nurse.

The rise of independent voting is a local trend, say long-time residents. Once a bastion of straight-ticket Republican voting, Catawba is increasingly producing split results at the polls. Indeed, much of the opposition to Mr. Ballenger comes from local business people, who oppose his support for the Republican party's free-trade principles. North Carolina leads the nation in manufacturing jobs lost to foreign trade. "We're worried about the economy and all these jobs going overseas," says Julie Mercer, a homemaker whose husband is a NASCAR mechanic.

But even if the election of 2002 was not about realignment, it shifted the gears of the US political system as surely as if the GOP had gained 10 Senators and 30 House seats.

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