Even if the Republicans win the Senate this year, it's still bad news, according to New York Times congressional reporter Carl Hulse. Hulse, whose reporting reliably supports Democratic wishful thinking, found a potential dark cloud for Republicans if they take over the Senate in 2014 in Tuesday's "Congressional Memo, "Mavericks Could Fracture a G.O.P. Senate Majority."
Hulse's favorite type of story invariably involves Democrats pressuring Republicans to give in on something related to policy or principle. In April 2010 he served as Bill Clinton's willing conduit to suggest Tea Party protesters could be lighting the fuse for another Oklahoma City bombing and has been convincingly accused of regurgitating Democratic talking points.
On Tuesday he unleashed his novel theory on how the Republicans could lose by winning the U.S. Senate.
Fear of losing a seat to a Democrat because of a Tea Party upset is one reason congressional Republicans are warily watching Tuesday’s Mississippi Senate runoff and other primary challenges to incumbents. But it is not the sole reason, and perhaps not the most important one, for Republicans this election cycle.
With control of the Senate within reach, Republican lawmakers and party operatives worry that the election of mavericks like Chris McDaniel, who is trying to unseat Senator Thad Cochran in Mississippi, could make a difficult governing environment almost impossible by expanding the ranks of Republican senators who are willing to defy the party leadership.
What good would a Republican majority be, they ask, if it is not a dependable governing majority? In fact, they suggest that a fractured majority could harm the party and its prospects by putting congressional Republicans nominally in charge but denying them real power to deliver on big issues. Trying to keep that from happening is one of the central motivations for Republican leaders who have been so determined to turn back Tea Party challengers this year.
