10/23/00 11:50 a.m.
House Envy
Tom Davis on the battle for Congress.

By NR's John J. Miller & Ramesh Ponnuru

e're going to hold the House, and I don't think by one or two seats," predicted Rep. Tom Davis (R., Va.), head of the National Republican Congressional Committee, in a meeting with reporters on Friday. "We have always felt decent about holding the House, but in the last ten days we're seeing a little bit of a bounce."

Davis feels particularly hopeful about Missouri's 6th Congressional District, an open seat currently held by Democrat Pat Danner. Davis cited a Kansas City Star poll putting Republican Sam Graves ahead of Democrat Steve Danner by 9 points. He also highlighted Michigan's 8th Congressional District, where Democrat Debbie Stabenow is running for Congress, and Republican Mike Rogers leads Democrat Dianne Byrum in a pair of recent polls.

Davis downplayed the possibility of a bruising budget fight between President Clinton and Congress damaging GOP prospects. "If this were an off-year, all the focus would be on Congress," he said.

He added that one of the Democrats' major failings this year was their inability to find a strong challenger to Rep. George Nethercutt (R., Wash.), who is breaking a term-limits pledge.

The Joke’s on Them
The editors of The New Republic emerged from an underground bunker last week following a month of intense deliberations, cut off from the rest of the world, about whom to endorse for president. And now they have chosen Al Gore. He clearly deserves the presidency, they write in an editorial for the October 30 edition of their magazine. But do the American people deserve him?

"If [Gore] loses on November 7, it will not simply set America on an ideological course that we consider perilous and unworthy of our best traditions. It will be a sign that we are not living in a serious age."