Via Atrios, the Washington Post has an interesting article about the Gingrich/GOP rise to power. It didn't just happen in 1994, they had a plan:
Back in 1992, seven upstart Republican freshmen forced real change in the House of Representatives.Gingrich and his gang played politics every day. They were relentless. The authors, Chuck Todd and Elizabeth Wilner, ask a key question: "Where is the Democrats' Gang of Seven?"
Egged on by a more senior revolutionary, Rep. Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.), these feisty newcomers exploited the House Bank and Post Office scandals unfolding on the watch of a longtime Democratic majority. The GOP lawmakers even posed for a poster, a macho black-and-white group shot. "The Gang of Seven," the caption read. "We closed the House Bank. We're changing Congress. Join the fight."
The answer, we all know, is that there isn't one. The Democrats don't have a back benchers strategy. Too many Democratic offices on the hill will smugly tell us that they don't do politics, they do policy. Ha. The bottom line is that unless the Democrats figure out how to do politics, they'll never enact any policy.
There are many smart, savvy, ambitious Democratic members of Congress. Hopefully, some of them will read today's Post article and look back at some of the strategies employed by Gingrich and the gang. The authors note that the Gingrich success was a process that required a longer term strategy:
The overlooked part of the 1994 revolution is that this landmark in our modern political landscape took time. There were GOP rumblings in the 1990 budget wars, followed by the 1990 election of some dynamic Republican freshmen. A message of change doesn't bring success overnight; it takes cultivation and cajoling, badgering and bludgeoning and a joyfully rebellious spirit that House Democrats appear to sorely lack.There are Democrats with a rebellious spirit, they just have to rebel. The blogosphere sure would welcome it. And, remember, in the end, they called Newt the Speaker.
