Democrats and Republicans will be tested in 2022
2022 is likely to pose difficult tests for both parties. Here are three of the biggest challenges each will face in the new year.
For Democrats, the onus will be on President Joe Biden to navigating these three issues:
• Tamping down inflation. Steadily rising prices hurts both the economy and the national psyche. It interferes with price signals, which distort investment decisions and hurts families’ pocketbooks if their wages don’t keep pace. It damages the national soul, too, by giving rise to negativity and hopelessness. Presidents who preside over periods of high inflation, such as Harry S. Truman and Jimmy Carter, are inevitably hammered for it either in midterms (1946) or for reelection (1980). It is in the interest of Biden and the nation for inflation come under control and trend downward by midyear.
• Reestablishing a national global defense strategy in the face of Russian, Chinese and Iranian provocation. This Eurasian axis has been gaining strength all year and increasingly looks poised to strike. None of their apparent immediate objectives, such as gaining control over Ukraine or Taiwan, immediately threatens the survival of the United States. But the same could be said of British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain’s decision to permit Nazi Germany’s annexation of Czechoslovakia’s Sudetenland in 1938, which inevitably led to World War II just a year later. Only a new global strategy akin to the Cold War’s containment plans will suffice to both stave off conflict and prevent the steady desertion of the United States’ allies.
• Managing the shift from pandemic to endemic. People will only submit to government restrictions for so long. Americans typically give their leaders two years to manage hardships; after that, they will become frustrated if they don’t see progress or feel hope. We are fast approaching the pandemic’s second anniversary. If we are still stuck in a seemingly endless cycle of misery and despair by the middle of year three, Democrats will pay a heavy price in the midterms.
Republicans surely look at these challenges and think their future is bright. But it doesn’t mean they are home free. They should recall the lessons of the 2010-2012 period and make sure not to repeat the same mistakes. For example:
• Stay sane. In 2010, extreme and often wacky tea party Republicans such as Delaware’s Christine O’donnell won party primaries in winnable Senate seats, only to go down to inglorious defeat in the general election. There’s a risk this could happen again, as voluble MAGA enthusiasts such as Arizona’s Kari Lake could win primaries in some key swing states. Party leaders need to get involved early in these races and try to ensure that the party is represented by conservatives who look more like Florida’s Ron Desantis than the failed 2010 Senate Republican candidate in Nevada, Sharron Angle.
• Make sure Republicanled states are well-governed. That means striking the right balance between economic growth and public spending, and between protecting public health and safety and individual rights. The more Republican governors such as Desantis, Texas’s Greg Abbott and Iowa’s Kim Reynolds can do this, the better the contrast the GOP can draw with national Democrats if Biden does not right his ship.
• Remember that the GOP failed to take the White House just two years after enjoying an tsunami of success in the 2010 midterms. This came about largely because of complacency. Party leaders thought victory was assured and concluded they did not need to present a candidate with a strong alternative vision. Instead, they nominated Mitt Romney, the least offensive candidate in the field, much as the GOP selected Thomas Dewey in 1948 and Bob Dole in 1996. In all of these races, the party’s leader offered no new ideas and primarily banked on dissatisfaction with the incumbent. GOP leaders should learn from these failures and foster intraparty dialogue to craft a new agenda that responds to the new problems of our times. Republicans have tried beating something with nothing before; they should resolve to instead beat the fire of one vision with the fire of another.
How the two parties manage these issues in the new year will determine not only their standing at the end of 2022, but for years to come. Let’s hope they’re both up to the challenges.