GOP grim on hopes for 2008
Published 8:56 pm Saturday, September 29, 2007
WASHINGTON — It is gallows humor time for Republicans in Congress, where one lawmaker jokes that “there’s talk about us going the way of the Whigs,” the 19th century political party long extinct.
“That’s not going to happen,” Rep. Tom Davis, R-Va., hastens to add, although a little more than a year before the 2008 election, the major leading political indicators still point downward for a party abruptly turned out of power in 2006.
Fundraising for Republican campaign organizations lags. That is strikingly so in the House, where the party committee spent more than it raised in each of the past two months, reported only $1.6 million in the bank at the end of August and a debt of nearly $4 million.
Democrats reported $22.1 million in the bank and a debt of slightly more than $3 million.
Candidate recruitment has been uneven, particularly in the Senate, where Republicans must defend 22 of the 34 seats on the ballot next year. Democrats boast top-tier challengers for GOP-held seats in Colorado, Virginia, New Hampshire, Maine, Minnesota and Oregon.
Additionally, nine Republicans in the House and three in the Senate have announced plans to retire. Some of those leaving are in midcareer, when a departure often signals pessimism about the prospects for regaining the majority. Democratic retirements total two to date — both are House members who are running for the Senate.
“The Democrats will continue to be the majority party in the House and Senate and Hillary Clinton will make history by being the first woman president” in 2008, predicts Rep. Ray LaHood, R-Ill., one of three Illinois Republicans to announce his retirement so far.
What makes LaHood’s prediction stand out is his willingness to say it publicly.
Others predict Clinton will win her party’s nomination for the White House and say her polarizing effect on the voters will benefit GOP candidates.
Despite their difficulties, Republicans are not deep in the minority. A switch of 16 seats would give them control of the House next year; a change of one or two seats could deliver the Senate.
But a recent Gallup poll reported that 59 percent of those surveyed have an unfavorable impression of the Republican Party.
