On Tuesday, Obama Will Get a Slap in the Face

It looks as if Republicans will take over the Senate. This will put the U.S. president in a hard situation. Not only does he have difficulties, but also his opponents aren’t as good.

This Tuesday bodes for bad news for both parties. As for the Democrats, they will supposedly lose control of the Senate in the midterm elections, and as for the Republicans, in such an event, they must find their way back from the roll of incessant naysayers in the realm of policy making. Their winning the majority in the House of Representatives in 2010 authorized them to block the president’s policies, but should they continue to vote with a majority in both chambers of Congress, they will need to take responsibility for the real policies of Washington.

Six Senate seats out of a total of 36 ballots for the U.S. Senate may go from the Democrats to the Republicans, and the current Democratic majority of 55 to 45 seats would be broken. This actually speaks to contemporary historical experience for Barack Obama’s party: There hasn’t been a Senate election in which the Republicans were able to beat so many incumbent Democrats since 1980.

At that time, the GOP seized a dozen seats, and in all subsequent elections, at most two Democratic senators were replaced by Republican challengers. But statistics are not reliable allies. With a probability of 96 percent, the interactive “Election Lab” at The Washington Post predicts a Senate takeover with 58 seats for the Republicans, as well as a strengthening of the existing majority in the House of Representatives. Americans are disappointed in the president, so much so that they would vote twice; they seem ready to punish his party companions. Only 41.6 percent are satisfied with the performance of Barack Obama, with 53.5 percent giving him poor grades.

No Room for Complacency

Acknowledging the predictions, the Republicans have little room for complacency, nevertheless. They also have less than half of the population’s approval — 45.4 percent — and their good grades are only slightly ahead of the Democrats’ — 43.2 percent. There is no trend of moving toward the Republicans; rather, we observe a renunciation of the Democrats. The economic recovery is too slow. Although the unemployment rate, which was 10 percent in October 2009, fell to 5.9 percent, many jobs pay poorly. Obama’s promise to strengthen the middle class failed to materialize.

The fact that he inherited the banking crisis and a record debt from George W. Bush suited him for his six years after his first election just as little as the total Republican opposition. The massive error in judgment on the president’s part in foreign policy, and doubts about the government’s handling of Ebola only compounded these issues.

In this situation, the strongest battalions of the Democrats are dissolved. Obama owed ​his re-election in 2012 in large part to female voters, but even then, married women voted mostly for his challenger Mitt Romney. Now Obama’s support is also shrinking among unmarried women. The reason is that the allegations by the Democrats that Republicans are waging a “war against women” with their rejection of abortion has caught the attention of only a part of the female electorate. On the other hand, women don’t make monothematic voting decisions. Many questions about the future, such as the reform of the education system and job security, are important, and thereby, confidence in Obama, who began as a messianic restorer and now seems only to be treading water until 2016, has fallen.

Leading the Tea Party Around by the Nose

The trend among Hispanic voters is even more clear. In surveys, about 50 percent of them tended toward the Democratic Party. This slim majority is far from the 71 percent that voted for Obama in 2012. This is an acknowledgment of the failure of immigration law reform. Obama promised treating the approximately 11 million illegal immigrants from a legal perspective as a “top priority.” When blocked by the Republicans, Obama announced the use of presidential executive rights, i.e. preliminary injunctions, which should always be first announced in the spring rather than in the late summer. But because the debate also lead some representatives to fear for their re-election, Obama again postponed his decision for until the cows come home.

Few Hispanics will switch to the Republicans. A large portion is likely to remain at home on Tuesday. Republicans have proposed no serious compromises in immigration matters, and have instead focused on obstruction. Even that is no more than a delay tactic. They were known until 2008 as a party that under their President Ronald Reagan undertook important domestic and international political decisions in consultation with a Democrat-dominated Congress, and that also took over responsibility in the era of the Democratic Bill Clinton in the House of Representatives.

New Republicans must urgently develop the willingness to take responsibility after this Tuesday. Going at it alone is not an option. They continue to depend too much on leading the tea party around by the nose; from their point of view, any compromise with the Democrats is a kowtow to the hated “big government.”

Hunter or Hunted

Noninterventionists are pressing forward in foreign policy; they want Washington to take a back seat and be unassuming in the world. Such a policy doesn’t make sense with this attitude, particularly since the GOP will be far and away from a two-thirds majority in Congress, given the understanding over party lines may be disposable. And a continuation of the current zigzag course in dealing with Syria, Iraq and the Islamic State would no longer only bring reproach for Obama, but for the majority leaders in Congress as well.

Republicans will celebrate abundantly in the coming days, but without thoroughly readjusting their coordinates, their representatives and senators are already likely to find themselves in 2016 in the role of those Democrats who are facing losses this Tuesday. So, the hunter becomes the hunted. Voters are disillusioned by the actors. On that account, the midterm elections illuminate the problems of a deeply divided United States, but don’t cure them.