Part Two: The Quagmire of Freedom

Further indication that Republican gains are transitory and rather small are evident. 1936, the year of Roosevelt landslide re-election, saw a Senate elected with 75 Democrats. By contrast, when Bush eked out a second term by the smallest margin in history, the balance of power after 2004 was shifted from 52 Republicans to a mere 55. To give some context to the events of 2004, consider the history of the past decade. Republicans saw their power continually decimated until 2000, a year which showed almost perfect division within the electorate. The advent of global war allowed the Republican party to gain a small line of support. Now, looking at 2006, it seems as if Republicans small gains may be eroded once again. Party identification has been shifting towards the GOP over the decades, but the Democrats still have a six point lead over Republicans. While the Democrats are unlikely to take Congress, a highly plausible net change of 4 governorships would put a majority of those into Democratic hands. I think it is fair to ask a quite simple question:

What is going on here?

Two adjacent Presidential elections being this close, control of Congress being so narrow for such a sustained period. These are phenomena most pundits have dismissed as mere anomalies.
But what if they're not? Here is a hypothetical: what if Democrats do well in 2006 and congress is back where it was two years ago? What if in 2008 the electoral map is virtually identical to that of 2000 and 2004?
The years after the end of the New Deal Democrat era have seen no major changes in the nature of government. Any bold new initiative has been shot down. Think Clinton's (or Nixon's or the US Congress's in the 70's) health care plan, think Bush's social security scheme. Even Ronald Reagan, probably the most effective President since Johnson, was able to do little more domestically than cut taxes and temporarily reduce domestic spending by a small amount. The last three decades have seen only one Amendment to the US Constitution. (A fairly technical and ineffectual one at that)*
Here is a crazy thought: Americans have become too good at politics. We have done the unprecedented in this nation, turned the exercise of Democracy into a multi-billion dollar industry. Perhaps no single politician or political party can gain enough traction for any long enough period of time to make a sustained impact on society.
What this means is that we are, in fact, fighting a costly yet bloodless trench war in this nation, a quagmire of freedom. In the coming years, should no one party gain control over the goverment, something will have to give.
Yet both parties are preoccupied with fighting the next battle instead of winning the war. We have become stuck in the biennial mindset. I have heard much musing over the coming elections in 2006 and 2008. But what about 2010? What about 2014 or 2018 for that matter? It will take long term thinking to escape from the quagmire of freedom. So, what exactly does this entail? I shall give some examples in my next posting.
*Granted, the purposes of the 27th (preventing Congress from raising its pay between elections)are noble, but in practice the Amendment is often circumvented through "cost of living adjustments."