Well, get used to the combination of a Republican House with a Democratic Senate and White House. It’s likely to remain that way for the next four years, not just two. And oddly enough, that might just help Washington lower the partisan temperature and strike a few compromises for a change. The campaign for midterm elections in 2014 has begun. Late Wednesday, President Obama travels to California to raise cash for the Democratic National Committee and his party’s House campaign arm. But chances that Democrats can gain the 17 seats needed to recapture control of the House appear remote. Republicans have better prospects of picking up the six seats they need to regain the Senate – but not drastically better. After midterm “wave elections” in 2006 and 2010, the calmer outlook this time reduces the stakes of electoral competition next year. That, in turn, may expand opportunities for bipartisan action on such issues as immigration, modest gun control measures and deficit reduction. “We’re going to maintain our majority,” Representative Eric Cantor of Virginia, the House majority leader, said in an interview. But with Mr. Obama not going anywhere either, he added, “I’m committed to seeing ways we can work with this White House, knowing full well we have big differences.” “I think what you’re seeing emerge now is an appetite for achievement,” said Senator Richard J. Durbin of Illinois, the Democratic whip, who is a solid favorite to win re-election next year. “We want to do some things – or at least try – on a bipartisan basis.” The ideological and political gap between the parties remains wide in any event. But the lure of seizing control of the House or Senate, and winning the presidency, has widened that gap in recent years by injecting all-or-nothing electoral drama into virtually every high-profile dispute. In 2006, Democrats used unhappiness over the Iraq war, the Bush administration’s handling of Hurricane Katrina and other Republican setbacks to recapture House and Senate majorities. When the financial crisis hit two years later, they captured the presidency. In 2010, House Republicans used continued economic weakness and a backlash against Obama administration policies to create their own comeback wave. Last year Senator Mitch McConnell, the minority leader, set his sights on winning control of the Senate and ensuring Mr. Obama’s defeat. As it turned out, voters last November preserved the existing balance of power. Odds favor their doing the same next time. As this week’s fund-raising jaunt suggests, Mr. Obama is lending his energies to Congressional Democrats now that he no longer has to campaign for himself. But history and circumstance argue strongly against Democrats retaking the House. Since voters tend to blame the White House incumbent for their discontents, the president’s party has lost House seats in all but three midterm elections in the past century. The number of times the president’s party has gained 17 seats in a midterm election: zero. Democratic campaign operatives say they will defy history and gain at least a few seats. Among other factors, they point to strong fund-raising and the Republican Party’s national image problems. But district lines drawn after the 2010 census circumscribe their opportunities. Charlie Cook, a political handicapper, estimates that fewer than 30 Republican-held seats are even at risk, and Democrats themselves have slightly more in jeopardy. The midterm electorate tends to be heavier than in presidential years with older voters and whites – both important Republican constituencies. In Senate races, Republicans once again boast an auspicious map of possibilities.
