Off Base

PUNDITS had barely recovered from their failed election predictions before they began delivering an equally unanimous evaluation of the Republicans’ defeat: too much impeachment, not enough moderation. Of course, the conventional wisdom misses much of the story.

GOP budget-meister John Kasich zeroes in on the real “curse of Lewinsky,” as he puts it: not so much voter backlash as the delusion of Republicans that they didn’t have to talk about the issues because antipathy to Clinton would drive their voters to the polls. It didn’t. Pollster John McLaughlin’s election night survey shows that two million fewer conservatives voted this year than in 1994, while the number of moderate voters increased by a like two million. Low turnout is supposed to benefit Republicans. But this year’s overall turnout was lower than in 1994, and its makeup shifted left. Two million fewer Republicans and five million more Democrats voted in 1996 than in 1994. “This voting behavior,” says McLaughlin, “turned the usual mid-term gains into a bust for the Republicans.”

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Kate O'Beirne

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PUNDITS had barely recovered from their failed election predictions before they began delivering an equally unanimous evaluation of the Republicans’ defeat: too much impeachment, not enough moderation. Of course, the conventional wisdom misses much of the story.

GOP budget-meister John Kasich zeroes in on the real “curse of Lewinsky,” as he puts it: not so much voter backlash as the delusion of Republicans that they didn’t have to talk about the issues because antipathy to Clinton would drive their voters to the polls. It didn’t. Pollster John McLaughlin’s election night survey shows that two million fewer conservatives voted this year than in 1994, while the number of moderate voters increased by a like two million. Low turnout is supposed to benefit Republicans. But this year’s overall turnout was lower than in 1994, and its makeup shifted left. Two million fewer Republicans and five million more Democrats voted in 1996 than in 1994. “This voting behavior,” says McLaughlin, “turned the usual mid-term gains into a bust for the Republicans.”