Good News for the GOP? Not So Much.

Ever watch "SportsCenter" on
ESPN? Pound for pound, it's pretty much the most consistently
entertaining program on television, but if you watch enough of it, you
really get a sense of the similarities shared between sports reporters
and political reporters. ESPN, like CNN, MSNBC and even Fox News, has
to fill 24 hours with programming each day. More often than not, there
are enough games, events and high-profile arrests in the sports realm
to fill the time for ESPN, just as there are usually enough murders,
car chases, wars, balloon boys and stories about puppies who found
their way home to fill the time for the news channels.

Sometimes, however, both "SportsCenter" and the news networks find
themselves seemingly without sufficient content to make the nut. If
there's an off-day for most teams during baseball season, for example,
ESPN is forced to show the same handful of highlights over and over
again, and then has to fill the rest of the time with hardcore analysis
of stuff nobody really cares about. Conversely, if one big event
happens – Terrell Owens demands a trade to Neptune, for example, or
Roger Clemens admits to freebasing pine tar – the entire network
focuses like a laser beam on it and leaves everything else on the
cutting room floor. The way these events get reported is of a type, as
well: One guy says something about it, and she reports on what he said,
he reports on what she said, someone else writes an article about what
they said, and presto, a consensus is reached because everyone was too
lazy to do anything other than report on other people's "reporting."

That is sports journalism in a nutshell, and that is political
reporting to a "T." We're all seeing an example of this now that the
news networks, as well as quite a number of newspapers, have come
together to declare Tuesday's off-season elections in New York, New
Jersey and Virginia to be some kind of earth-rattling triumph for the
GOP and a devastating defeat for the Obama administration. CNN and Fox
have been crowing about a "GOP sweep" thanks to Republican victories in
the gubernatorial races in New Jersey and Virginia, and because Maine
passed another virulent piece of anti-gay legislation.

It wasn't just the TV talking heads spouting this line. "The
Republican victories in the races for New Jersey and Virginia governors
put the party in a stronger position to turn back the political wave
President Obama unleashed last year," reported
The New York Times on Wednesday morning, "setting the stage for
Republicans to raise money, recruit candidates and ride the excitement
of an energized base as the party heads into next year's midterm
elections…. The results in the New Jersey and Virginia races
underscored the difficulties Mr. Obama is having transforming his
historic victory a year ago into either a sustained electoral advantage
for Democrats or a commanding ideological position over conservatives
in legislative battles."

Not to break away from the pack here, but the situation deserves a
little more in-depth analysis than what we've gotten so far, which has
basically amounted to these news people playing umpire during a close
play at the plate. Obama is out because they say so, even though it
wasn't the last out, there is plenty of game left to play and the blue
team is still way ahead on runs. You can't argue with the ump, though,
so that out is officially A Big Deal.

Not so much.

First of all, the Democratic candidate in New Jersey, Jon Corzine,
was an unbelievably unpopular incumbent who ran a tragically poor
campaign. Corzine's unpopularity vastly predates Obama's impact on the
electorate, and was the entire reason he lost. As for Virginia, well,
that state has been a tough get for any Democrat for a couple of
generations now; Obama's success there in the 2008 presidential
election was the exception and not the rule for Democrats historically,
and speaking of history, the party that wins the White House has gone
on to lose the Virginia governor's office one year later every time
since the Carter administration, so we're not into any kind of
mold-breaking situation there.

Second of all, these were two statewide elections where Obama was not on the ballot,
and there is no national significance whatsoever behind two states out
of fifty voting for Republicans. Furthermore, Democrats cleaned up in
local elections all across the country, especially in mayoral races,
but there doesn't seem to be a lot of breathless reporting on this
facet of yesterday's vote coming from the news folks. The umpire made
the call, and that's how it goes. Or something.

Speaking of the national picture for the GOP, it is difficult to
make a cogent argument that two statewide gubernatorial wins are enough
to alter the country's opinion of the party, especially since the
country's opinion of Republicans remains monumentally bleak. Just two
weeks ago, a Washington Post/ABC News poll reported:

Less than one in five voters (19 percent) expressed
confidence in Republicans' ability to make the right decisions for
America's future while a whopping 79 percent lacked that confidence.

Among independent voters, who went heavily for Obama in 2008 and
congressional Democrats in 2006, the numbers for Republicans on the
confidence questions were even more worse. Just 17 percent of
independents expressed confidence in Republicans' ability to make the
right decision while 83 percent said they did not have that confidence.

On the generic ballot question, 51 percent of the sample said they
would cast a vote for a Democratic candidate in their congressional
district next fall while just 39 percent said they would opt for a GOP
candidate.

And, perhaps most troubling for GOP hopes is the fact that just 20
percent of the Post sample identified themselves as Republicans, the
lowest that number has been in Post polling since 1983. (No, that is
not a typo.)

Finally, the idea that yesterday's elections bode well for the
Republican Party might make for good television, but that doesn't make
it right. The race in New York's 23rd District has far more national
import than the other two, and the writing on the wall doesn't make for
good reading for the GOP going forward. The election went sideways
several weeks ago when moderate Republican candidate Dede Scozzafava
came under fire from the high priests of the far right because they
deemed her not conservative enough. Ersatz luminaries like Limbaugh,
Beck and Palin jumped on board the third-party candidacy of
Conservative Party candidate Doug Hoffman, and the resulting bedlam
eventually drove Scozzafava out of the race. Scozzafava stepped aside
after endorsing the Democratic candidate, Bill Owens, who went on to
win Tuesday's election by a margin of 49-45.

This was a nifty win for the Democrats, because the seat was
formerly held by Republican John McHugh, who vacated the seat after he
was tapped by President Obama to serve as secretary of the Army. Beyond
the pick-up, however, is the fact that the whole national Republican
infrastructure has been shaken up thanks to this race. The hard-right
GOP base revved itself up and successfully tore down an electable
moderate member of their own party. If they get it into their heads to
do this in other races come 2010, we could very easily watch the GOP
eat itself next year, as it's ground troops attack and soften up fellow
Republicans, making them ripe pickings for Democratic opponents. The
Democrats have been expecting to lose seats in 2010, something that
nearly always happens during the first midterms of a new presidency,
but open warfare within the GOP could very much mitigate the damage.

Speaking of the NY-23 race, memo to news reporters: the Democrat
won. It isn't a "sweep" when the other team wins a game. The news
people should ask the sports reporters for a refresher course on
athletic terminology. It's probably a good idea to have your facts
straight before your broadcasters open their mouths or your printing
press puts ink to paper.

A wild idea, I know, but it might be for the best.