GOP Misread Public Mood

That crackling sound heard in voting booths across the nation Tuesday was the crisp snap of a backlash, the one provoked by House Republicans who aggressively pushed the case for impeachment proceedings against President Clinton.

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Back in the dog days of August, when Kenneth Starr's report on the Monica Lewinsky affair was released to the public, Clinton's presidency appeared to be in grave peril. So much so that Republicans quickly zeroed in on the impeachment issue and confidently predicted huge gains for their party in this fall's midterm election.

But the Republicans seriously misread the public mood. As summer turned to fall, there was growing evidence that a solid majority of Americans wanted to put the Lewinsky/impeachment question out to pasture. Which translated into a growing irritation with the way Republicans in Congress were pursuing the issue.

And Tuesday those resentments coalesced into a stunning show of strength by the Democrats that shattered all expectations and flew in the face of history.

With all of the 34 Senate races decided, the Republicans' anticipated gains turned out to be zero, zilch, nada. Both parties picked up three seats they didn't hold before, and so the night ended as it began: 55 seats for the Republicans and 45 for the Democrats.

But the high drama in Tuesday's election was on the House side. There, incredibly, the Democrats have gained seats. With all but a handful of the 435 races decided, the Democrats have picked up about five seats.

In the days leading up to this November day of reckoning, it was often noted that the party in control of the White House almost always loses seats in a midterm election - and, more often than not, the setbacks are in the heavy double-digits.

Nor is there any doubt that Republicans were hurt by their hard-line approach to the impeachment question. Exit polls revealed that 61 percent of the voters disapproved of the way Republicans have handled the Clinton/Lewinsky issue.

But there were other factors that played in the Democrats' favor Tuesday. One was the bread-and-butter issue that carried Clinton into the White House in 1992. Six years into his presidency, it's still the economy, stupid. In our exit polls, no less than 83 percent of the voters said they were pleased with the general economy, and most of them gave Clinton the lion's share of the credit for that.

The Democrats were also successful in putting their other pet issues - such as education and health care - on the front burner, and that also played to their advantage.

Finally, Clinton's avid courtship of one of his core bases of support - the African-American vote - in the closing days of the campaign was a strategy that paid off big time.

The black turnout, overwhelming weighted toward Clinton, was heavier than usual in a midterm election - especially in such Southern states as North Carolina and South Carolina, where Democrats won key Senatorial races that had been billed as toss-ups.

So what are the implications of this unexpected outcome for the 106th Congress?

Well, for one thing, it almost certainly takes the steam out of the impeachment momentum that had been building on Capitol Hill. Barring some dramatic new disclosures about the President, the Republicans are bound to be more amenable to a deal that will bring a quick conclusion to the affair - short of impeachment.

Among the many politicans interviewed in the aftermath of Tuesday's election was Clinton's former Chief of Staff, Leon Panetta. When asked about the impeachment issue, Panetta said the Republicans would be well advised to move swiftly away from it "for the good of the country and, frankly, for the good of their own party."

Beyond that, having strengthened their ranks in the House, the Democrats will be able to exert more leverage on the legislative front, and we should brace ourselves for some rousing battles over control of the agenda during the next two years.

What's more, the Republicans may be marching into those battles behind a new general. Four years ago, when the GOP captured control of the House for the first time in four decades, the hero of the hour was Newt Gingrich and his "Contract with America."

But in the weeks ahead, as the Republicans survey the damage and nurse their wounds, they may decide that Gingrich has become a liability, and come January, the Speaker of the House could face a spirited challenge to his leadeship.

In the meantime, the future no longer looks so bleak for Bill Clinton. He emerged from Tuesday's election as the biggest victor of all and he can now move into his last two years in the White House with a vigorous new lease on his presidential life.

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