David Harsanyi on Why Americans Won't Boot Incumbent Politicians
Even in the most catastrophic year for congressional incumbents, 90 percent of them will win re-election—and most of them will do so rather easily. Many of them, in fact, won't even have to run a campaign. In 2010, a year that saw one of the lowest re-election rates in decades after an eruption of anti-D.C. populism, 9 in 10 House incumbents won their races. After 2012, the Bloomberg Government Barometer found that 9 in 10 members of the House and Senate won their races as well.
These facts might be somewhat obscured lately, what with all the talk of a populist insurrection. But the impending revolution has been on a slow boil, writes David Harsanyi. This doesn't mean populist anger isn't real, that the distrust won't grow, or that there won't be change, he argues. It just means we rarely, if ever, blame our own.
