Blue State Versus Red State 2014 !

Another year, another round of elections, oh but 2014 could be a real game changer; it is the year of The Battle for the Senate. It has come to pass that control of the US Senate is up for grabs, and the Republican Party has a good chance of wresting control of the US Senate from the Democratic Party.  As you can see from this cover, sometimes civility takes a backseat in ! According to Nate Silver of  fivethirtyeight.com Republicans have a 63.3% chance of winning a majority and Democrats have a 36.7% chance of keeping a majority.

One particularly contentious race is in Kentucky where Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell is running against Democratic challenger Alison Lundergan Grimes in his bid for re-election. Mitch seems poised to win but it’s a hotly contested seat, who wins won’t be a certainty until election day. The polls seem to change daily. McConnell figures if the GOP takes the Senate, he gets to be in charge and maybe he’s right.   

This means nothing less than one party, the GOP, will control all of Congress, and they oppose President Barack Obama, so he will have to compromise with Congress or nothing will get done in Congress-just like Congress got nothing done in the last four years!

In the 1990’s President Bill Clinton had a Republican controlled Congress but the cooperation between the Executive and Legislative branches in those days, many felt, led to the prosperous economy of the 1990’s. Clinton certainly had to compromise with Congress on numerous occasions but together they accomplished plenty. However there were also other “achievements” of dubious value like Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, NAFTA, and the repeal of Glass-Steagall, which kept commercial and investment banking separate-some say this last move was responsible for The Great Recession of 2008.

Still, Clinton worked with his GOP Congress and the nation ran smoothly enough. If, as some are predicting, the Republicans take the US Senate, then maybe Obama should look at those times, study those times and see if there are lessons to be learned there; I believe there are.  We can all only hope that Congress might finally start earning their paychecks! Crazy idea, huh?