Obama’s first midterm test failed, as well as George W. Bush’s
Republicans were ready to party like it was 1994, which is the year they managed to capture the majority in the U.S. House for the very first time in 40 years, and in the Senate for the first time in 8 years.
It was also the year they finally ended Democratic dominance in the South for the very first time in more than a century, winning the wide majority of the region’s governorships, but also the seats in both chambers of the Congress.
Republicans were at least expecting to have another “Tea Party” celebration like the one they had after winning 63 seats in the House in the first term of President Barack Obama. He used to call it “shellacking.”
Of course, democrats have had their “big wave” years too, as in 2006 they seized the House and surprised many voters by getting a bare majority in the Senate. At the time, it was a setback for the Republican president, George W. Bush, who called it a “thumpin'”.
In fact, Democrats had a granddaddy of waves back in 1974, when they elected 76 of their nominees to be House Freshmen in only one day. They were known as “Watergate babies”, because of the scandal that spawned them: earlier the same year, evidence of major criminal involvement led to the resignation of Republican President Richard Nixon.
As the offending incumbent was removed, his Republican successor, Gerald R. Ford pardoned him in September and all that cloud around the GOP had yet to lift.
