“My politics fit Delaware’s politics. They appreciate the fact that I’m independent.”
That was Michael Castle, long-time Republican congressman from Delaware, quoted in CQ’s Politics in America.
Did Castle’s moderate politics fit Delaware’s politics? His strong re-election record would suggest so. The man had never had a close race since first being elected to the seat in 1992, consistently winning by 20 or 30 points, even as Delaware went from a state that voted 60-40 for Reagan in 1984 to a state that voted 62-37 for Obama in 2008.
And sure, he was a Republican, but he was the kind of Republican who could vote for all six of the Democratic majority’s signature bills in the 110th Congress (one of only three Republicans to do so) and who would regularly break with the Republican orthodoxy to support, for example, embryonic stem cell research.
But popular as Castle might have been statewide, the Republican primary was decided by just 57,582 voters, or 6.5 percent of Delaware’s 885,000 residents. Of those, 30,561 preferred Christine O’Donnell. That’s just 3.5 percent of Delaware’s residents – not enough to fill a single major league baseball stadium.
It is now widely assumed that Democrat Chris Coons will win trounce Christine O’Donnell in the general election, mostly owing to the fact that O’Donnell is a certified nut job.
But what I wonder is this: what happens to somebody like Michael Castle? And what happens to the many Republican moderates in Delaware who liked voting for Castle, year after year?
What happens to the Lisa Murkowksis and the Bob Bennetts as well, also forced out of their seats by a handful of insurgents for even more minor tilts towards moderation? (Bennett, to his credit, has been quite public in his criticism of the Tea Party, criticizing them for lacking a governing philosophy.)
As more and more moderates are swept away in the Tea Party tide, what becomes of them and their supporters? Presumably, many are adrift, feeling like the Republican Party no longer represents them.
For Democrats this should be a tremendous opportunity, a moment to reach out to disillusioned Republican voters who no longer see a home for themselves in the increasingly extreme party.
Republicans are rapidly forfeiting the center, gambling that an angry and energized base is a surer path to victory than a wide appeal. That may indeed be the case in 2010, but there is good reason to believe that this moment is fleeting.
What this means is that Democrats have an opportunity to seize and secure the vital center, to lay a firm claim on the politics of reason and moderation, and to provide a welcoming environment for the Michael Castles of the world.
But it’s a chance that won’t last forever. Eventually, Republicans will get wise to the fact that becoming more extreme is not a sustainable majoritarian strategy. Democrats ought to more aggressively seize this opportunity, while it lasts.
Photo credit: Lou Angeli
