Incumbent losses may echo in November

WASHINGTON -- Republican, Democrat. House, Senate. White, black.

The moderates fared worst.

But primary voters did not discriminate Tuesday night, dispensing defeat to Sen. Joe Lieberman and two House members in an unusually strong, single-night repudiation of incumbents.

"The winds of change are blowing," said Rep. Rahm Emanuel, an Illinois Democrat.

"I don't see it as an anti-incumbent move," said Vice President Dick Cheney, adding that the night's two other lawmaker-losers, Reps. Joe Schwarz, R-Mich., and Cynthia McKinney, D-Ga., don't involve "national ramifications."

Schwarz and Lieberman shared a connection, though, and it crossed party lines.

Both are moderates in their parties who sought to survive in an era of intense political division. Both were targeted for defeat by activist groups from outside their states, and both fell to rivals offering a harder edge.

For her part, McKinney suffered her second primary defeat in four years in a roller-coaster career marked by incendiary public comments and confrontations. In June, she apologized to the House after scuffling with a Capitol police officer. Both she and her rival, Hank Johnson, are black, as are a majority of the voters in their district.

Overall, the polls suggest incumbents have more reason to be concerned than they have in recent campaigns.

A Washington Post-ABC News survey this month showed an anti-incumbent mood akin to 1994, when a landslide swept Democrats from power and ushered in an era of Republican control in Congress. In the survey, 53 percent described their mood as anti-incumbent, only 29 percent said they were pro-incumbent. In June 1994, the result was 54-29 percent.

Paradoxically, 55 percent of those polled said they approved of the way their own representative was doing his job, with 37 percent disapproving.

That marks a decline from the levels regularly recorded in the late 1990s, although it still leaves individual lawmakers with better grades than the 51-38 percent rating of 1994.

Democrats and Republicans both focused on Ned Lamont's victory over Lieberman in claiming a clamor for change would benefit their own campaigns this fall.

"The perception was that (Lieberman) was too close to George Bush and this was, in many respects, a referendum on the president more than anything else," said Sens. Harry Reid of Nevada and Chuck Schumer of New York, the party's leader and the head of its Senate campaign committee.

Republicans said Democrats had it exactly backward.

"The Harry Truman, JFK Democratic icon was defeated yesterday by someone who ran essentially a single-issue race. I think it is not only a bad thing for the county, it is a bad thing for the Democratic Party," said Republican chairman Ken Mehlman, referring to Lieberman. He said Republicans "welcome independent-minded, Democrats like Joe Lieberman."

In defeat, though, Lieberman and Schwarz read the results the same.

"I look at this election as probably a victory for right-to-life, anti-abortion, anti-embryonic stem cell groups but it's a net loss for the Republican Party because it just pushes the party farther to the right," said Schwarz, serving his first term.

In some respects, his 2004 victory was less expected than his defeat two years later. Then he was the only moderate in a six-way primary, winning with less than 28 percent of the vote and coasting to victory in his Republican district in the fall.

This time, he had only one challenger, conservative Tim Walberg, who had support from the conservative Club for Growth, the Michigan Right to Life and groups opposed to President Bush's plan to give illegal immigrants a path to citizenship.

Schwarz was endorsed by Bush, Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., and the National Rifle Association.

Outside groups spent an estimated $3 million combined on the race.

If Schwarz was trounced by conservatives, Lieberman fell to liberal primary voters who saw the veteran Democrat as too accommodating to the president and too supportive of the war in Iraq.

He said he intends to run as an independent, adding he didn't want to see the likes of Lamont's supporters "take over my party or the country."

A CBS News-New York Times survey of Connecticut voters leaving their polling places found that 78 percent of them disapproved of the decision to go to war with Iraq, and only 22 percent approved. Sixty percent of the opponents voted for Lamont.

Nearly 60 percent said Lieberman was too close to Bush.

Outside groups played a role in the Connecticut race, as well, although in a less visible way. Lamont's candidacy drew energy from bloggers who lampooned Lieberman, and members of MoveOn.org raised more than $250,000 for him.

Just as Schwarz had the backing of his party establishment, Lieberman's supporters included the Democratic hierarchy. Bill Clinton campaigned for him, as did several incumbent senators.

McKinney's loss seemed to have little, if any, connection to a national trend.

"I'm getting tired of being embarrassed. She's an embarrassment to the whole state," said James Vining, 72, who said he voted for her rival, Hank Johnson.