A Fake Democracy?
Why no one has much chance of toppling Congress's incumbents
MONROEVILLE, PA.--With the war in Iraq, $3-a-gallon gas, and Jack Abramoff dogging Washington Republicans, it might seem a good bet for an ambitious Democrat like Chad Kluko to give up a six-figure salary and campaign for a seat in the House of Representatives. After all, he was a top executive at Verizon Wireless, started his own technology company, and makes a convincing case for bringing the lessons he's learned from business to bear on government. But Kluko was hardly the Democratic Party's first choice to run in Pennsylvania's 18th District, which fans out east and west from southern Pittsburgh. He has close to zero name recognition, entered the race late--in January--and has no political experience. "Don't you usually start in city council?" a reporter with Monroeville's Times Express recently asked. Despite his business credentials, political analysts say, Kluko has little chance of winning.
Next week, Kluko will face off with primary opponent Tom Kovach, a risk-control engineer and Navy veteran whose campaign faces an even steeper climb. His only big donor is his father, who gave $2,000. "I refuse to ask people for money," he says, "because they'll expect something in return." Instead, Kovach is spending Saturday afternoons knocking on doors. "He seems like a friendly guy," says Renee Beasley, a 38-year-old mother of three, after meeting him in her Westmoreland County driveway. A Republican who backed Bush in 2004, Beasley sounds ready to support a Democrat for Congress this fall. "Spending is out of control and on the wrong things," she says. "I'm open to change."
It's the kind of sentiment that Kluko, Kovach, and hundreds of Democratic candidates nationwide are seizing on in their quest to wrest control of the House from Republicans this November. Like most of the challengers, though, whoever wins next week's primary here must face what has become a nearly insurmountable obstacle: an incumbent, a fact of modern political life that is making it all but impossible to change the balance of Congress. Republican Rep. Tim Murphy has represented Pennsylvania's 18th District since 2002. His ties to Bush may be a drag on his poll numbers, but Murphy will have some major advantages in the midterms. Southwestern Pennsylvania has long been Democratic territory, but his GOP-friendly district was drawn up for him by the Republican-controlled state legislature. As of April 1, Murphy's re-election campaign had raised more than $1 million, 50 times as much as Kluko and Kovach combined.
Plus, Murphy's House perch has allowed him to deliver for constituents. At a banquet for local officials in Coraopolis, Pa., Murphy distributes fact sheets detailing $7.8 million in construction projects he won through last year's highway bill, including $1.6 million to widen and repair the local interstate. Over a plate of ravioli, Coraopolis Police Chief Alan DeRusso, a Democrat, says he has been a supporter since Murphy helped him claim a grant that let him hire two new officers. "If you don't have a safe town," DeRusso says, "you don't have anything."
Murphy's strengths, and his challengers' weaknesses, help explain why, six months before Election Day, the Democrats' plan for seizing the House still looks like a long shot. Polls would seem to indicate otherwise. A report last month by the Pew Research Center says current polls "reflect anti-incumbent sentiment not seen since late in the historic 1994 campaign." That was the year Republicans picked up 52 seats, taking control of the House for the first time in 40 years. Asked which party could best tackle the nation's problems, more than half the respondents in a Washington Post/ABC News poll said Democrats; just 37 percent said Republicans.
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