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It’s Beginning To Feel A Lot Like 1994

Especially worrisome for members of Congress is that the proportion of Americans who approve of their own representative’s performance has fallen sharply. Traditionally, voters may express disapproval of Congress as a whole but still vote for their own member, even from the majority party. But 55 percent now approve of their lawmaker, a seven-percentage-point drop […]

Especially worrisome for members of Congress is that the proportion of Americans who approve of their own representative’s performance has fallen sharply. Traditionally, voters may express disapproval of Congress as a whole but still vote for their own member, even from the majority party. But 55 percent now approve of their lawmaker, a seven-percentage-point drop over three months and the lowest such finding since 1994, the last time control of the House switched parties. ~The Washington Post

Given all the predictions of GOP meltdown this year, this was what you would have expected to have happen if the House were really going to change hands.  It used to be that GOP consultants would hide behind the hope that this cycle would focus on district-by-district issues and that voters might despise the GOP Congress in the abstract but were not nearly as hostile to their own members.  They used to feel good that there was no strong anti-incumbency feeling in the country.  That is beginning to change:

Fifty-three percent now call themselves anti-incumbent, while 29 percent describe themselves as inclined to reelect lawmakers — almost precisely the same percentages as in June 1994. 

So, Republicans, if you’re feeling down about the likely reverse 1994, put in some Soundgarden and sing along to Fell on Black Days to remind of the good old days when you were conservative and still had principlesSing along now:

Whomsoever I’ve cured I’ve sickened now
Whomsoever I’ve cradled I’ve put you down
I’m a search light soul they say
But I can’t see it in the night
I’m only faking when I get it right
Cause I fell on black days
How would I know
That this could be my fate?

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