weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/004/691zjgqk.asp
Respond to this article YESTERDAY, September 27, marked the ten-year anniversary of the historic signing of the Contract with America on the steps of the US Capitol. A nd this fall marks the tenth anniversary of the subsequent (some would s ay consequent) election of a Republican majority in Congress. So far the celebrations have been pretty low-key, an unjust and probably unintende d comment on the magnitude of the event. The Republican takeo ver with the midterm elections of November 1994 has become for conservat ives a station of the cross in the progress of rightward ideas--on par w ith the 1980 election of Ronald Reagan in impact, a spiritual kin to the 1964 Barry Goldwater moment. Furthermore, the Contract with America remains one of the most popular th ings Republicans ever did. Still one forgets the breadth of strategist Newt Gingrich's campaign to w in a majority. On a panel at the American Enterprise Institute yesterday morning with political consultant Joseph Gaylord, Rep. Jennifer Dunne o f Washington, journalist Michael Barone, and former majority leader Dick Armey, the former House speaker emphasized that all but a couple of Rep ublican candidates signed the Contract with America. The election yielde d an additional nine millions votes for Republicans over 1992 and a pick up of 54 seats in the House of Representatives. But the theme of the panel was the Contract with America per se. The cont ract, more than one panelist noted, functioned as a script for inexperie nced candidates. It also got the campaign message directly to voters wit hout any filtering by an unsympathetic media.
returned more than once to the difference between a platform and a contra ct. The former, he said, is a group of policies supported by a candidate , while a contract is an agreement to carry out certain actions in excha nge for voters' support. Why the Contract with America worked so well was much discussed. Despite the image of the class of '94 as rabble-rousing radicals, all ten agenda items on the Contract enjoyed over 70 percent support of the American p ublic, which was in fact required for their inclusion. The other criteri on was that an item had to have been blocked from a floor vote by the De mocrats. The contract's populist character was underlined by its marketi ng, including a national ad-buy in TV Guide, which set a record for "the most expensive political ad," Gingrich noted. Also, the language of the contract had to be positive and non-political. We were "consciously edi ting against the New York Times," said Gingrich. There was more than one personal note to the proceedings. Dunne of W ashington recalled the first 100 days of the 101st Congress with a mixtu re of fondness and regret. "It was a wonderful time, an exhilarating tim e," she said, even as she observed that Republican rhetoric during this historic moment tended to be "harsh" and even "frightening" to some peop le. Dunne also recalled a long absence from her family and many late nig hts, including one on which "a young member of one staff was raped on he r way home" from the Capitol. A pugnacious Dick Armey took issue with Republicans ("we did not manage o ur enthusiasms very well . ") and Democrats alike ("but we were never as bad as the Democrats in the two years before"). He recalled the slig hts of naysayers, some in his own party. "A couple of times," he said, " the older guys just humored us." During the Q-and-A after the panel disc ussion, Armey addressed the question of whether the new Republican major ity in the House had ushered in an era of incivility in Washington. "I w ill not accept that it is the fault of Republicans," he said, calling th is a "bum rap." The problem was that "Democrats haven't yet learned to b e a docile, compliant minority."
WARNING: The page you have accessed is dependent on JAVASCRIPT which is n ot supported by your browser. Due to this limitation, you may experience unexpected results within this site.
|
http://csua.com/feed/