From Midterms to What?

The midterms just completed (except for recounts) were historically important, and in this critical time for our democracy, we must try to make some sense of where we are.  The bad news is split government; the good news is split government. Taking the latter first, leaving unchecked the current Administration’s control of both the Executive and Legislative branches could only have encouraged its bull-in-the-china-shop rampage against its arch-enemy—the “administrative state.” Its many successes in dismantling public interest government in less than two years, poisonous as this has been, would only have been prologue to an even more ambitious onslaught over the next two years.  The outcome of the recent elections can, with a lot of skill and a little luck, slow the demolition. Split government is far from ideal government, to be sure, but its function for the upcoming two years is, first, to put the brakes on the Trump devastation and, secondly but equally important, tee up some real issues for citizens to deliberate as we move toward 2020. 

The bottom line is that all the great reforms in our nation’s history have come, not as a gift from Washington, DC, but from a citizenry informed and organized and insistent upon making things right. We have a little better chance to do this now than we did a week ago.