In 2008, 26 incumbent Republicans won House seats in districts Obama carried. For the most part, these were narrowly Republican districts which flipped to Obama along with the rest of the country, but 7 of the 26 leaned Democratic according to the Cook Partisan Index. On the whole, Obama won these districts by an average of 7 points (identical to his national popular vote margin- true swing districts). Paul Ryan’s WI-1 is one of these districts (CPI=R+2). In 08′ he carried the district by 29 points while Obama eeked out a 4 point victory. So a 33 point swing. Curious, I took a look at the other 25 winning Republicans to see just how unusual Ryan’s margin was. It turns out, that exactly 2 Congressman outperformed Ryan; Mike Castle, in Delaware’s at large district (he ran 48 points ahead of John McCain) and John McHugh, in NY-23 (35 points ahead of McCain). The average in this group was 23.27 points ahead of John McCain. So Ryan ran nearly 10 points ahead of the average popular swing district Republican- popular because they survived, when dozens of others in similar districts lost. If we knew nothing else, this would be sufficient to demonstrate Ryan’s appeal, but as it happens we know a good deal more. We know, for instance, that ideology matters. Median Voter Theory tells us that candidates who are closer to the center, ideologically, will fair better all else being equal.
So I divided our list of 26 candidates into 3 groups, based on ACU scores. Movement Conservatives, with ACU’s above 90, Mainstream Conservatives, with ACU’s between 75 and 90, and Moderate Republicans, with ACU’s below 75. Ryan, with a lifetime ACU of 92.67, belongs to the first group. Unsurprisingly, given that these are the Republicans who survived, this is the smallest of the 3 groups, boasting just 7 members. On the whole, this group outperformed McCain by, 19.9 points. The Mainstream Conservatives outperformed McCain by 20.1 points and the Moderate Republicans outperfomed McCain by 28.5 points. But the variance between the first and the second group is larger than it at first appears for two reasons. First, Ryan’s included and he performs distinctly better than others in the Movement Conservative category. Second, two of the Congressman in this group are in districts where Obama performed unusually well. Peter Roskam in IL-6 won by 16 points, while Obama carried the district by 13 points. But IL-6 is not a very Democratic district. In fact, it’s ordinarily more Republican than Ryan’s district- Bush carried it by 7 points in 04′ and 9 in 00′. Even with Obama’s massive victory there in 08′, it still rates a CPI of 0 (no more Democratic than Republican). What could account for Obama’s overperformance here? Well, it turns out that Obama is actually from Illinois. Go figure. The other district is VA-4 (held by congressman Randy Forbes) which Obama carried by 1%. This district is ordinarily more Republican than either Ryan or Roskam’s district- Bush carried it by 14 points in 04′ and 10 in 00′. But like IL-6, VA-4 is uniquely suited to Obama- to wit, 1/3 of the population is black.
Comparing everyone to the CPI instead of Obama yields more uniform distinctions. Again Ryan’s ranks 3rd, behind Castle and McHugh (although he’s now much closer to Castle) but this time he laps the rest of the field. Ryan outperforms the CPI by 27 points, Roskam and Forbes outperform by 16 points, and the other movement conservatives are at 10 or below (Dan Lungren in CA-3 actually does worse than the CPI). When all is said and done, Ryan essentially matches the performance of two moderate Republicans (Castle ACU 51.69, and McHugh ACU 71.55) without giving up anything ideologically. He stands out even among a particularly persuasive group of swing district Republicans. And if we can drag him into the 12′ contest, we can expect at least some of that persuasiveness to carry over (more on that later).
May 2nd, 2011 at 6:37 pm
Matthew,
You put ‘ after 08, 00, and 09. What comes after those numbers. I thought the ‘ was to take the place of the “20″ which would come before all of those numbers.
May 2nd, 2011 at 6:42 pm
I think Ryan’s great – but who was his opponent in 2008? Did that contribute to his lopsided victory?
May 2nd, 2011 at 6:42 pm
Matthew,
How would Ryan get through the primaries, though? His budget doesn’t balance for over two decades; he voted for NCLB; the Medicare drug bill; the AIG bonus tax; the tax deal last December; and TARP. When the rubber hits the road, and his vote really counts, he’s not all that conservative.
May 2nd, 2011 at 7:08 pm
Sometimes I wish I was as clever as Matthew.
That’s not sarcastic.
May 2nd, 2011 at 7:14 pm
The spin in #3 of course would fall apart like the house of cards that it is were Ryan to enter the primaries. Ryan would make the rest of the field look like dwarves. He would easily win the nomination. I would be elated if he were to run, and if he became the leader of the GOP and the next GOP president.
But unless an unusual turn of events takes place, I don’t think he is going to run. Steve Hayes of the Weekly Standard says that Ryan and Daniels are very close, and that Ryan will not challenge Mitch if Daniels jumps in. Check out his Tweets on the subject here: http://twitter.com/#!/stephenfhayes Scroll down to the May 1st Tweets.
Further, even if Daniels gets in and flops, it will likely be too late at that point to hand the baton to Ryan. I continue to believe that Daniels made the decision months ago to run. I could be wrong. Daniels could stay out. Ryan could get in. But I’d bet on Daniels in and Ryan out, not the other way about.
May 2nd, 2011 at 7:19 pm
Dave,
I agree Daniels is going to run, and his record as governor is a lot better than Ryan’s when tough votes arise.
What do you mean about spin? I was simply stating the facts about his controversial (yet largely ignored by conservatives) voting record.
May 2nd, 2011 at 7:23 pm
6 RD,
I just feel that it’s really easy to hang any legislator with their voting record. In Ryan’s case, I think he was trying to be a loyal young Republican officeholder. If you look at what he actually believes, given the proposals that he designed, it becomes apparent he and Bush are nothing alike.
The reason he doesn’t bring the budget into balance for so long is that no one, not even Ryan, is willing to make the case that current seniors have to see their benefits cut. And that’s the only way to bring the budget into balance quickly, well, that or major tax increases.
May 2nd, 2011 at 8:17 pm
Dave7,
Excellent points. I am withholding judgment on Ryan’s conservatism until we see the final 2012 budget, and how he votes. I don’t doubt he is conservative overall (as Matthew noted, his ACU rating is quite high), and I’m not trying to hang him. I was simply pointing out that with Daniels, Bachmann, Ron Paul, and others with more conservative, though in many cases less substantive, records, running Ryan may be in trouble. Those are big votes, after all, and the way he voted was not conservative.
I want a balanced budget soon, and I believe we have to hit seniors. It’s unfortunate that Ryan’s plan is center-right, not conservative.
But, perhaps I am too extreme…? :O)
May 2nd, 2011 at 9:24 pm
Random Dude,
Some of those were strategic- he has two auto-plants in his district and probably couldn’t comfortably vote against the auto-bailout- some are simply the price of being in leadership- TARP for instance. Paul Ryan was able to write a seriously conservative budget and then convince 230 Republicans to possibly walk the plank to support it in no small part because he’d cultivated leadership for over a decade (the Young Guns of Cantor, McCarthy, and Ryan have practically taken over the chamber). And a few were probably honest deviations from conservative orthodoxy. For instance, I assume Ryan actually more or less approves of Medicare Part D, since he’s cited it as the model for his Medicare plan in all his townhalls. Either purists will listen to what he has to say on these deviations, or they won’t. Michelle Bachmann has a 100 ACU to Ryan’s 92.67, but Michelle Bachmann has no influence beyond her megaphone. She couldn’t convince 100 Republicans to walk the plank for a budget she’d drafted, much less the whole conference. Legislating is a particular skill and it’s a shame that most people don’t realize this, preferring to give undue credit to people who cast the right votes, make the right noises, but never drive policy.
May 2nd, 2011 at 9:38 pm
Adam X,
Ryan has won over 60% of the vote for 6 elections straight. Which could mean that he’s had nothing opponents every time but even if it did mean that we’d have to ask WHY it meant that. Ryan’s district is R+2- Bush carried it by 6 points in ’04, Obama by 4 in ’08. It’s very, very modestly Republican. In comparison, Michelle Bachmann’s MN-6 is heavily Republican. Bush carried it by nearly 15 points- Pawlenty carried it by 19 in ’06. Even Obama got nowhere near McCain, losing by 8 points. And yet Bachmann won in ’08 by just 3 points and even in ’10 by only 12. Ryan expanded his lead to 38 points in ’10. Political parties target districts based on vulnerability. Ryan’s district is vulnerable- much more vulnerable than Bachmann’s. If he’s not drawing strong challengers (and I don’t know that he isn’t) it’s because while his district is vulnerable he’s not.
May 3rd, 2011 at 8:36 am
This voting record thing is why we don’t elect Presidents from the House of Representatives.
No way he runs and he will have a battle to hold his seat, as he is being targeted by the hateful left. They are good at character assassination. It’s what they do.