Where Is the U.S. Headed after the Midterm Elections?

If the midterm elections are the American voters’ first report card for Obama, then Obama definitely does not pass the test.

2008 saw a government of unified Democrats, which was unexpectedly kept for only two years. It only took one big electoral loss for the House of Representatives to be handed to the Republicans. The Senate is also just holding on. The biggest losses were from the pile of governors who were shooed away by voters. As for the leaders of the Democratic Party, from within the “troika” — Obama (president), Pelosi (former speaker of the House) and Reid (senate majority leader) — Obama’s popularity has fallen below 40 percent, Pelosi lost the position of speaker, and even though Reid still holds the position of majority leader, he was all but overturned in Nevada. The Democrats’ loss is difficult to bear.

The current structure of two divided houses has determined that the future Obama administration cannot act as it did in the past two years, where it could do what it wanted on various reforms and legislation. Many commentators believe that the logic of the operations of party politics has decided that proposals, especially those that Republicans call “liberal,” will definitely face obstacles in the House, where they will be changed beyond recognition at best, and run aground or sunk at worst. In reality, the direction of post-election American politics is not yet clear, though there are three different scenarios.

First is the dead end that the majority of opinions believe will appear; that is, a rerun of 1994-1996, when Republican Rep. Gingrich and Democratic President Clinton met head-on on all legislative issues. This life-or-death struggle went so far as to have no scruples about bringing government to a halt. With the current depth of hatred between Republicans and Democrats, a rerun of that period of history is completely possible, especially since Republicans have an important agenda to push through: making Obama step down.

The Senate has few party leaders, and Republican Mitch McConnell said early on in the race that “the single most important thing we want to achieve is for President Obama to be a one-term president.” In the House, John Boehner, who will represent the Republicans and replace Pelosi as speaker, has repeatedly stated that Obama’s health care bill will be overturned, going further to pronounce that “this is not a time for compromise.” These all imply that the Republican Party, for the sake of driving out Obama, may not hesitate to let many legislative procedures come to a halt.

However, the Democrats have mentally prepared for a reenactment of Gingrich and Clinton’s previous big struggle early on and will not necessarily be as helpless as before. More importantly, this will give voters a very negative impression. In destroying the Democratic Party, the Republican Party will also be harmed — harming the other will not benefit the self. If it’s thought that the losses do not outweigh the gains, then the Republicans may choose another option.

When this sort of circumstance arises, another scenario may appear, namely cooperation. At present, with the Republicans and Democrats having swords drawn and crossbows loaded, believing that they will cooperate is unfathomable. However, this sort of development is definitely possible. Reasons include political considerations, such as that mentioned above and those concerning the personal motives and plans of a new batch of Republican representatives.

The “great plan to expel Obama” from the “old boys” in political circles is not necessarily in accordance with the interests of a younger school, who all still have brilliant political futures. Especially from the point of view of new representatives, as long as the old boys “raise trouble” on Capitol Hill, their own first terms in Congress will appear useless, as if yielding no results. Moreover, excess noise is not beneficial for incumbents. For those senators whose political resumes are clean and have ambition, their sights are fixed on the White House and therefore will be even less willing to stir up trouble.

This group of younger representatives will be more prone to cooperation. For example, possible Republicans include Blunt and Boozman. In reality, even McConnell once said that, “If Obama lets half of the Republicans’ proposals pass, then cooperating with Obama is not impossible.”*

What’s harder to predict are the congressmen that will be elected with the support of the tea party. The rise of the tea party originated from a bout of protest. Their platform rests on opposing the Obama administration’s overspending and operating on high levels of fiscal debt. However, at the same time, it doesn’t like the Republican Party’s many pranks. These representatives generally have little political experience, so it is difficult to examine their previous words and actions to judge how they will act in Congress. Therefore, even if the two main parties can cooperate, it is difficult to say that tea party members will not come out and spoil things.

Therefore, after the tea party members’ attack, the last scenario that could arise is trouble and chaos. No one knows what things will be like. What can be predicted is that under “tea trouble,” the Republicans and Democrats — the two main parties — will be even more willing to cooperate because from the point of view of these two major parties, once the two-party system is broken, there will be an era of either multiple parties or one in which one party will replace the other. Neither party is willing to take this risk.

The author is a Researcher at the Center for Public Administration Research of Sun Yat-Sen University

*Editor’s Note: This quote, accurately translated, could not be verified.