"The Reports Of My Death Have Been Greatly Exaggerated"

Pam Belluck, writing in the very liberal Boston Globe, is almost joyously pronouncing the demise of even moderate Republicans in New England.  While this area will never be a hotbed of fervent rock-ribbed conservatism (and, frankly, I don't want it to be) it seems to me that this declaration is premature.  First the Globe runs down the list of losers this past mid-term election, and, indeed, it is impressive.

Dignified in demeanor, independent in ideology and frequently blue in blood, they were politicians in the mold of Roosevelt and Rockefeller: socially tolerant, environmentally enthusiastic, people who liked government to keep its wallet close to its vest and its hands out of social issues like abortion and, in recent years, same-sex marriage.

She conveniently ignores the fact that it was government, in the form of the Massachusetts Supreme judicial court, that first stuck it's hand into the same-sex marriage debate, and that it is government, in the form of the Massachusetts Democratically-controlled legislature, that is further sticking it's hand in by preventing the people from democratically deciding that issue.  But I digress.

But this election dealt the already-fading New England Republican an especially strong blow, one that some fear will increase the divide between the two parties nationally by removing a longstanding bridge between them.

The losing Republican "moderates" included Lincoln Chafee of Rhode Island, Charlie Bass and Jeb Bradley of New Hampshire, and Rob Murphy and Nancy Johnson in Connecticut.  She actually has the gall to point to Massachusetts as an example of this phenomenon.

In Massachusetts, where the Statehouse in Boston had been steeped in Republican governors for 16 years, voters threw the party overboard like so much tea.

Oh, come on.  That state has a 90% Democratic state legislature and a 100% Democratic congressional delegation.  It's an example more of how lame the previous Democratic opponents were than a sign of exorcising the Republican demons.  Ms. Belluck quotes former NH "moderate" Senator Warren Rudman on the reasons behind the New Hampshire losses.

“That to me is one of the most astounding things that happened on Election Day,” said Warren Rudman, the former New Hampshire senator who embodies the essence of the New England Republican. “What that tells me is that huge numbers of people in New Hampshire who are either moderate Republicans or independents voted a straight Democratic ticket. They turned out people who had served long and well in the New Hampshire legislature.

Except, Mr. Rudman, that's not true, by the numbers.  What happened in New Hampshire was not that Republican voters pulled the levers for Democrats, but that Republican voters simply chose not to vote at all.

I kept hearing about the vaunted Republican turnout machine in the run-up to the election.  And yet, those voters simple evaporated, never showed up.  How can we tell?  Let's look at the loss of Congressman Charlie Bass to Paul Hodes in NH-2, which happens to be my district.  Using rough numbers, in 2004, (admittedly a high profile Presidential year) Mr. Bass received 193,000 votes to Mr. Hodes 125,000, in a state that John Kerry won (barely).  In the last midterm year, 2002, Bass received 125,000 votes out of 220,000 votes total.  This year there were roughly 205,000 votes, or despite the intensity of the runup to this election, a 7% drop in total votes.  Bass received only 93,000, 100,000 fewer than he got in 2004.  Where did all these voters go? They didn't go to Hodes, who received 108,000 votes, less than he got in 2004, and only 13,000 more than the Democrat got in 2002.

So where did they go?  They went shopping.

What will it take to get Republican voters motivated to come out in 2008?  I should think about 2 years of Democratic control would be enough, if the actions and comments of Rep. Charlie Rangel recently are any indication.