The proceeding article talks about how the Republican Party turmoil will not have a significant impact on this upcoming election. I however, disagree with this article. Brendan Nyhan who is the writer of this piece draws our attention to the clash of Republicans in 1998 and how the effects did not inhibit the election of George Bush. He also says that most citizens do not keep track of the house anyway which has some substance to it. The bottom line though, is that the people aren't actually directly choosing the next president. The electoral college is. So by all means, Nyhan is wrong because this house turmoil will have disastrous consequences for the Republicans and have high yield for Democrats. The political elite in the college will vote accordingly and democrats should expect this chaos to be highly beneficial.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/10/upshot/democrats-shouldnt-expect-house-disarray-to-help-in-2016.html
I agree with the article that the crisis occurring in the house at the moment will not affect the outcomes of the election by much. The GOP currently can't elect a leader because if the member is not agreed upon by the Tea Party, they threaten to shut down the government and crash the markets. Along with the presidential elections, electing the speaker of the house is also a big issue at the moment. While the Democrats do have an advantage, history has shown that in times of crisis, they have not stood up to take action for their beliefs and the change they want in government. Rather, they have been silenced by the GOP for a long time. Unless they have changed their mentality, the house isn't going to change much and it probably won't affect the outcome of the presidential elections.
ReplyDeleteI definitely agree that democrats should expect the House chaos to be beneficial - but perhaps not in regards to the 2016 presidential election. However, I think that the disarray will have a monumental effect when 1/3 of the Senate's seats and all 435 of the House's seats will be up reelection in 2016. People are sure to be having this congressional republican-caused chaos in mind. There will certainly be more voters putting democrats in the house - and that could turn the tables for the years to come.
ReplyDeleteI disagree with the article as well. I think his strongest argument was that the American public is not informed about the turmoil in Congress right now, thus it won't impact their decision to vote Republican or Democrat in the presidential election. However, the political elites have much more influence on the way elections swing, and unlike the public, they do recognize this increasing tension within the Republican Party. I think that the Democrats have a reason to expect an election in their favor in both the upcoming presidential and Senate elections.
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