The 2014 elections are now 11 months away, but the political scene has already undergone dramatic changes just in the past three months. Republicans went into a political free fall after the government shutdown, and shortly thereafter Democrats plunged into boiling water thanks to the botched launch of and early public reaction to the Affordable Care Act. This column has cautioned against prematurely casting either of these developments as the defining events of the campaign. There is a natural human tendency to believe that any major development, no matter how long before an election, will be the last important influence on said election. This theory is fine in the last days before an election, but with almost a year to go, it is pretty unlikely that the national political situation will suddenly become static for well over 300 days. CONT.
Charlie Cook