A week has passed, and Republicans are still hoping to pretend that losing the seat of former Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert is no big deal, hoping it will all go away. Far away. The National Republican Congressional Committee even went so far as to release a statement that "one election in one state does not prove a trend."
And the thing is, they're right - just like a hole in a dam doesn't mean all dams will have holes in them. But that hole is really bad news for people counting on that one dam, because there's going to be a whole mess of water flooding through in a minute.
Democrat Bill Foster defeated Republican Jim Oberweiss, 53%-47%.
Yes, it's just one race. But there are several critically important issues to take from this and ignore at your peril.
As noted, the most obvious, of course, is that this occurred in the Republican seat of the former Speaker of the House. But it's important to keep even that in historical perspective. While the occurrence isn't the same as when sitting-Speaker Tom Foley was defeated, or when sitting-Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle was defeated, it's a cousin.
The Illinois 14th is a very Republican district in the western suburbs outside Chicago. Dennis Hastert may not have been running, but the district re-elected him for 21 years, and the district understood and was used to his clout. When Foley and Daschle were defeated, those also were each just "one election in one state," but their defeats were part of a clear, significant change in public preferences of the national agenda, because the two men were national party leaders. We know today that those losses were not isolated events. Understand, too: even more than a Senate leader, House leaders live in districts that guarantee them profound support. When that support switches parties, it's an earthquake. And though an earthquake may not be a "trend," it leads to aftershocks.
Secondly, it's important to put the Democratic victory in another perspective: in 2006, when Democrats were taking over the House in a landslide, Dennis Hastert's district was so Republican that it re-elected him with 60% of the vote. In the 2004 presidential election, it voted for George Bush with 55%.
And by the way, in the last four elections in the Illinois 14th, Republicans got 74%, 69%, 60% and 47% - and lost the seat. (Hint: that's a trend.)
Yet something even that important might be less-noteworthy than this additional perspective, not mentioned in most articles on the election - Bill Foster didn't just get a majority of the votes in the Democratic counties of his district...he even beat his Republican opponent in the Republican Kendall, Kane and DuPage Counties.
Still another perspective: the so-called referendum issue. Both Barack Obama and John McCain made TV ads in support of their favored candidates. And the Republican district voted for the Democrat who Obama promoted. To be fair, this election was in Illinois where Obama is, of course, the sitting-Senator and especially popular. But this election was also in a long-time Republican stronghold where Republicans are especially popular.
And finally, and most importantly, this victory by a Democrat in the district of the former Republican Speaker of the House relates directly to what I wrote here a few weeks ago:
"Even the cheeriest GOP pundit expects a Democratic landslide in Congress. This might be the first election ever with reverse coattails, where the bottom of the ticket carries the top along on a tsunami wave. Ultimately, with fewer candidates for Republicans to happily support in local races, with a presidential candidate at the top the far-right despises, you might need the world's biggest lever to wrench morose conservatives from their darkened home bunkers on Election Day."
On Super Tuesday, 14 million Democrats voted, compared to 10 million Republicans.
That may not be a "trend" either, just a one-time occurrence. Sort of like the 2006 Congressional elections.
Trends are tricky things, of course. Sometimes you don't seem the until you connect all the dots and see the picture that was there all along. Or what looks like a wave, actually is only a wave -- just a really massive one that, when it hits the shore, you realize is a tsunami.
As the Chicago Tribune reported the day after the Republican loss of Dennis Hastert's suburban district:
"To the north, Democrat Melissa Bean of Barrington unseated Republican veteran Phil Crane in 2004 and fended off a well-funded challenger two years ago. Along the lake, four-term Republican Rep. Mark Kirk of Highland Park has been stockpiling campaign cash for a rematch against Dan Seals, who came surprisingly close in 2006."
The National Republican Congressional Committee may not want to see this loss of Dennis Hastert's district as a trend, but to see a trend you at least have to open your eyes.