International Politics

	Vol. 227 No. 11
JOHN MCCAUGHEY, CONTRIBUTING EDITOR, WASHINGTON

It would be idle, therefore, to speculate but a few general principles can be drawn before the outcome of Nov. 7's US elections. Foremost is the obvious: that most hacks get egg on their face for predicting what the voters are likely to do. It is always election season in Washington. No sooner has one campaign ended than the candidates anticipate the beginning of the next one.

Likely (writing in advance) it can be said, however, that the Republicans will take a hit – possibly losing the House and conceivably the Senate. Much depends upon voter turnout. It may be even that the old rule that the person with the most money wins is dented, if not overturned.

What will not change, however, is the mood of the moment in Washington D.C. or, more exactly, on Capitol Hill. This is almost unprecedentedly vicious. Republicans, strangely, are pusillanimous at the moment. Democrats (assisted by the enviros) have a not-so-little list of revenges that they wish to take if they win, and staffers, who used to share a bi-partisan friendship, are now at daggers drawn. Panicky Republican staffers are bolting for other jobs, in fear that the Nov. 7 elections will go the wrong way.

Democrats call the current House the "Do-Nothing Congress," although they are far from explicit as to what they would do themselves were they to gain power. Public approval of Congressmen is at a near-record low – even journalists, realtors, lawyers and Roman Catholic priests are doing better in the polls. Who believes in politicians any more? Of course, who ever did? They seem to have been abusing pageboys for generations.

If the Republicans lose the House, they (and President George W. Bush) will endure a very lame duck session. For the rest of us, however, lame duck sessions are fun, because panicked politicians are likely to do all kinds of amusing things. Essentially, however, the Democrats (if they win control) will spend two years saying no to everything.

Dear old John Dingell (Dem.-Michigan), at age 80 slowed physically but not mentally, will be House Energy and Commerce Committee chairman, and his forte is oversight. Not for nothing are "Dinglegrams" feared.

Capitol Hill remains intellectually lazy on the subject of energy legislation.

Meanwhile, in energy terms, legislative life continued in lackluster style on the Hill. The Senate headed toward passage of a bill opening 8.3 million acres in the Gulf of Mexico to oil and gas exploration (about 85% of US offshore waters are now stupidly barred from drilling). Concurrently, a "former senior policy analyst to the Department of Energy" (now safely retired, one presumes) wrote a letter to a newspaper, saying that "an import tax on US petroleum imports is the only option." Someone (appositely) quoted Thoreau's remark about politicians that "If I knew for a certainty that a man was coming to my house with the conscious design of doing me good, I should run for my life."

Meanwhile, The Hill embraced an alternative to $3/gal. gasoline – that is $4/gal. ethanol or $5/gal., if you take into account its fuel inefficiency. The K Street lobbying corridor also continued to flourish despite the Jack Abramoff scandal and other distasteful events. In the end, though, Congress headed home for November without having adopted any significant energy legislation whatsoever. It is a Congress, as Winston Churchill said in another context, that is like "a pudding that has no theme."

Bottom Line? If the Republicans manage to hang on to power, then not much will change, and we can look forward to two more years of gridlock without much interest from a GOP Congress in challenging the administration. Tip-tap-shuffle.

Democrats need to pick up 15 House seats and six Senate seats to take control of those bodies. Can they do it? Who knows? The Democrats' problem is that they have not been able to capitalize on voters' dissatisfaction with the Republicans, because they (the Democrats) don't have anything to say to anybody about anything. Their problem is that the Party of Pelosi (as in Nancy, the minority leader from California) doesn't have a plan. Or, at least, none that anyone can decipher. It is tongue-tied.

On the other hand, Washington rumor has it that two members of the House have been reported to the Ethics Committee for suspected integrity. One trembles to think of their fate, if they are found to be guilty. God forbid that there should be accountability on the Hill. Or as some wag on the Hill said the other day, "Congressmen are like diapers. You need to change them often and for the same reason."