October 31, 2006
October Surprise III Posted by Joshua Zeitz at 06:55 PM EST John Steele Gordon’s observation that it’s not too late for an “October surprise” (albeit one that arrives in early November), and that “often the best time, from a tactical standpoint, to launch such a surprise is the Friday before the election,” may have been right twenty years ago, but I don’t think it holds true today. First, whereas citizens were once permitted to cast early votes only if they could establish a credible reason for needing absentee ballots—students away at college, senior citizens too infirm to travel to the polls, vacationers planning to be out of the country—today many states allow anyone to cast his or her vote weeks in advance of election day. An article in today’s Wall Street Journal explained that “early voting has grown in the past 15 years, from around 2% of the national electorate participating to about 20% in 2004. . . . Experts predict this year that 19% to 25% of the electorate will vote early at the polls or by mail-in absentee ballots. That compares with about 14% in 2002, the most recent midterm election.” In some states, the totals are even higher. I have it from a credible Democratic source working in Florida that upwards of 45 percent of voters in that state will cast early ballots this year. What this means is that October surprises really, truly, need to come in October. Friday, November 3, simply won’t cut it. Too many voters will already have cast their ballots. Granted, the undecideds are more likely to wait until next Tuesday, and the partisans are more likely to vote early. But given how close many of this year’s congressional races are likely to be, Friday is simply too late. Second, many journalists are unwilling to break last-minute scandals too close to an election, for fear that doing so might adversely effect the accused candidate without allowing him or her enough time to recover and clear the air. This past weekend, I was in Washington, D.C., for a wedding, and I took time out to visit a few friends who work as journalists and Hill staffers. They told me of some unbelievably wild but apparently verifiable rumors currently flying around the city, concerning GOP incumbents who have thus far managed to get through the election season unscathed. These stories are unlikely to break before next week. On a related note, I’m afraid that I’ll have to disagree with Mr. Gordon when he argues that “perhaps the most egregious case of an October surprise . . . was when the Iran-Contra special prosecutor, Lawrence Walsh, released indictments of former Defense Secretary Casper Weinberger and others . . .” Unless I’m mistaken, Walsh was a Republican, which casts some doubt on his motives. It’s possible that he was quite simply doing his job and, like many lawyers, had a tin ear where politics was concerned. Regardless, Nixon’s October surprise was arguably far more egregious. Acting as a private citizen, Nixon asked a foreign leader to refuse to participate peace negotiations in order to effect the outcome of a presidential election. Nixon’s actions cost lives (both American and Vietnamese), may very well have violated laws barring citizens from negotiating with foreign powers, and sabotaged the efforts of a duly elected government to conduct the nation’s foreign policy. That’s pretty egregious.
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