Maybe There is Change in the Air?

As the country approaches the dog days of summer, there are some voices in Democrat-land who are suggesting that perhaps the results next November may turn out to be better than they had feared. This is the result of a number of events which have occurred over the past weeks whose cumulative effect has been to make the country wake-up to the serious challenge to which American has fallen. While this may be premature, it also may we worth pondering.

After 18 months of engaging in congressional trash-talking, Members of Congress have decided that the voters in November may well want to see what the 117th Congress actually has accomplished. Almost miraculously, before the August recess, both Chambers are in a flurry of activity expediting numerous pieces of legislation that they have been posturing about for months.

To the surprise of many, Congress appears to be on the verge of passing a significant piece of legislation addressing seriously climate change. Congress seems prepared as well to improve the long-awaited increase in veterans’ benefits. It is permitting Medicare to begin negotiating drug prices with the pharmaceutical industry. Congress also appears ready to increase cooperate taxes as well as to enhance government control of energy production.

Many of these items had been on President Biden’s original “wish” list. Compromises appear to have been negotiated quietly to navigate the bills through various factions within the Democratic Party as well in a bi-partisan manner with Republicans. The old-fashioned type of legislating that Biden employed during his years in the Senate may finally be operating.

The spillover from the Supreme Court’s decision during its last term may be reaching down to the people. Yesterday’s primary results in Kansas saw the voters reject an effort to remove the right to an abortion from the Kansas state constitution. By a vote of 59-41 %, Kansans gave a very clear signal that even the citizens in the center of the country are opposed to the Court’s decision in the Dobbs case, overturning Roe vs. Wade. House Members and Senators seeking re-election in November—especially Republicans--are going to be hard-pressed to run on a platform outlawing abortion. The decisiveness of this vote—in Kansas—may also make those running on a platform trying to limit further gun control legislation—once again largely Republicans—think twice whether that position will be palatable to the voters.

The fact that Donald Trump’s supported candidates have obtained mixed results in the Republican primaries, undoubtedly is making many Republicans running in November re-consider how far behind the Trump banner they want to campaign. It is already clear that the former President is considering announcing his intention to run again for President in 2024. It is similarly clear that there are an increasing number of Republicans who are murmuring—at least among themselves if not publicly—whether they consider a Trump-peat a viable winning option for Republicans in 2024. Furthermore, the fact that he is considering announcing his candidacy before the mid-terms appears to have sent shudders through some in the Republican Party leadership.

Finally, skeptics of the impact that the January 6 Committee’s public hearings might have any impact, seem to have been assuaged. Many had felt the Committee’s long postponed public hearings would have no impact on an exhausted public which had moved on from the Capitol insurrection. In fact, the just concluded first set of hearings proved to be gripping to a nation which had grown cynical that anything would emerge from the hearings. It appears that the hearings have affected many independent voters. It also has motivated or coincided with the Justice Department’s decision to move ahead more emphatically with its own investigation. It is unclear what influence these hearings are having on voters in the primaries, but some analysts are suggesting that these hearings are encouraging some Republicans to vote against Trump endorsed candidates and/or consider potentially voting for Democrats in the fall. The Committee also has indicated that it will have a further round of public hearings beginning in September which would conclude shortly before the mid-term elections.

The sum of all these actions might be indicating that after so many bleak signs for Democrats for the fall elections, events may be turning around. While the economy is still challenging for the Biden Administration as it faces November, Americans went on vacation paying as much as one dollar less per gallon than they had only six weeks earlier.