The number of words spilled in analysis of U.S. Rep. Eric Cantor’s primary defeat, by our rough count, has rolled into the trillions, with “earthquake” and “seismic” receiving special attention.
So much rumination can lead to oversimplification. In this case, it’s how “the tea party rose up to smite the Republican establishment,” quite possibly to everyone’s detriment. This necessarily requires us to reverse the “GOP establishment has beaten back the tea party (except in Texas)” oversimplification from just the other day.
Our goal in the news business is to explain and illuminate. At times, we must reduce complicated and complex systems to symbols to save time and space.
For instance, this newspaper has relatively few points of specific agreement with Michael Quinn Sullivan, driving force behind the uber-conservative Empower Texans and Texans for Fiscal Responsibility.
Yet we also recognize that he had a point a few months ago when he said, “The media narrative about ‘the’ tea party movement has been wrong since the beginning; there is no ‘the’ tea party. There is a great variety within the various tea party groups and conservative organizations.”
Still, Cantor was trounced by 11 points in Virginia’s 7th District primary and then announced he would step down as House majority leader. Two North Texans, Jeb Hensarling and Pete Sessions, briefly considered seeking Cantor’s leadership job before stepping aside for California’s Kevin McCarthy, House GOP whip, or his new challenger, Idaho’s Raul Labrador.
What Cantor’s defeat reveals is the folly of ascribing too much motive to how 65,000 voters in the Richmond suburbs decided one House primary race. Yes, Dave Brat, a college economics prof, hit Cantor hard on his nuanced immigration reform position, but polling also reveals much of their district actually favors reform (as does this newspaper). Yet Brat’s shot was rated so long that leading national tea party organizations declined to back him, leaving Cantor with a massive fundraising advantage.
What then? More likely, Cantor allowed his leadership responsibilities to separate him from the constituents whose votes he would need every two years. A House member who loses touch back home is begging for trouble. Cantor’s staff came off as aloof, their boss increasingly as just another “Washington guy.”
That latter criticism seems far more valid among the base activists fired up enough to vote in a party primary. Instead of oversimplifying Cantor’s loss to tea party vs. establishment, we should recognize that while incumbency has its advantages, it increasingly has pitfalls with so many Americans convinced the country — and their federal government — is on the wrong track.
This is a sentiment worth taking to heart as we gear up for the November midterm elections: Remember where you came from.
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