Regardless of what Democrats or Republicans say, the November mid-term election will be a referendum on Bill Clinton's presidency. Republicans have had high hopes that Clinton's humiliation would lead to broad gains in both Houses of Congress. Clinton, too, understands his future rides on this election. A new Washington Post poll suggests that the tide is turning toward the Democrats: 51% of likely voters polled said they would vote for a Democratic Congressional candidate in November while only 42% said they would vote for a Republican. Sixty-two percent said they disapprove of the way Congress is handling the impeachment inquiry. Fifty-two percent said they trust Bill Clinton to handle the nation's problems more than the Republican Congress. The president's big wins in the current budget negotiations have proven to many that "he's still able to lead."
- The Constitution tasks Congress with control of the nation's purse strings. Yet Congressional Republicans lost the upper hand by timidly haggling with the White House over the 1999 budget bill, presumably pressured by the need to get back home to campaign for reelection and the President's threat to "shut down the government" (and blame Republicans if they refused to yield to his demands -- as he succeeded in doing in 1996).
- Congressional leaders abandoned their already radically-pared tax cut plan, authorized an $18 billion appropriation for the IMF, dispensed with pro-life measures (Newt Gingrich broke his promise to defend Rep. Chris Smith's (R-NJ) hard-won measure which tied UN and IMF funding to a restriction on "family planning" agencies from using U.S. tax dollars to lobby foreign governments for abortion rights), and yielded to a host of the President's other demands ranging from $1.1 billion to hire teachers and $300 million for child literacy and after-school programs to funds to provide prescription contraceptives to federal employees, and other important but smaller items.
- Meanwhile, Clinton, insisting disingenuously that the budget surplus must be used to strengthen Social Security, "not tax cuts for the rich," has co-opted a huge portion of the surplus for his pet big-government initiatives. With his $1.1 billion funding measure to hire 100,000 new teachers in public schools, Clinton has energized the teachers' union (some of his most energetic pro-Democrat campaign workers) and is manipulating voter sentiment against the "don't care about children" Republicans. He is similarly using budget surplus monies to energize Democrat constituencies while shaming Republicans on other issues: the environment, "family planning," immigration and more. Clinton is counting on the drawn-out budget fight and other new initiatives to distract national attention from his scandals. Having left lesser aides to quibble with Congressional leaders, Clinton has devoted himself to the campaign trail helping pro-abort Democrats raise funds, while using campaign speeches to take pot shots at the Republicans and gird up support among Senate Democrats who may soon be his impeachment jury.
- The usual suspects, pro-abort NARAL, Planned Parenthood, Emily's List, the Gay & Lesbian Victory Fund, The Human Rights Campaign (gay-rights), the AFL-CIO, various environmental groups, etc. are spending millions and have mobilized their volunteers to defeat Christian and pro-life candidates and to minimize Republican gains at every level. Percentage-wise, Sodomites and Lesbians give more to their political cause than any other definable people group in America (e.g., blacks, Jews, Catholics, evangelicals, etc.).
Only two full weeks remain before the election. In addition to thousands of state and local offices, 36 state governor's seats, 34 U.S. Senate seats and 435 U.S. House seats are at stake. Meanwhile, despite the hype by liberal media about the influence of conservative Christian groups, evangelical Christians have a pitiful track record (with the exception of 1994) for turning out to vote (Catholics are even worse). In 1996 fewer than 25% of eligible "born-again" Christians voted in the critical presidential campaign (and 37% of evangelicals and 48% of Catholics who voted, voted for Bill Clinton). Participation in the 1998 (this year's) primaries was the worst in American history. In this election, many important races will be decided by only a few votes. The participation (or lack thereof) of Christians will decide literally thousands of races across America.