What to expect after the election

The U.S. election is now only three days away and it looks like Obama once again has a clear, if small, lead. The popular vote remains extremely close but he is leading the polls in enough states that he has become a clear favourite.  Could Mitt Romney still win?  It is certainly possible.  National polls could turn out to be more correct than state polls, or turnout could favour Republicans more than expected.  But neither seems likely.  

It is easy to get caught up in the horse race of an election, and in American elections that is understandable.  There is a clear difference between Republicans and Democrats at present, and the structure of American government makes it unlikely that a President could follow through on any specific policies he proposes anyways.  Therefore, now more than ever, what is important in an election is to make sure your side wins.

Once the election is over, the attention of those of us who are interested will turn back to the issues.  The question will become, what can we expect once the election is over?  Should Obama win, he will be backed up, once again by a Democratic controlled Senate.  A year ago, it appeared the Democrats would lose their majority, but they have done surprisingly well and it is even possible they could expand their majority.  Not only that but they will likely be sending a more progressive delegation with possible newcomers like Elizabeth Warren, Chris Murphy and Tammy Baldwin.  With the possibility of filibuster reform, the Senate could help an Obama agenda more than before.

Any major change, however, will be unlikely as the House of Representatives will almost certainly still be under Republican control.  Already with a large majority, the expected handful of seats picked up by Democrats will change little to the composition of that legislative body.  What could change is the direction of the majority party, their strategy of opposing everything the President proposes proving to be ineffective in preventing his election.  But perhaps that is too much to expect.

That is not to say that important work will not get done.  The president will now have a chance to implement and entrench "Obamacare", which will significantly affect the health care for most Americans for the better, despite its many flaws.  He should be able to end the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy, putting the country in a much better position to get its deficit under control.  That policy will be a key part of a likely strategy that will be worked out to curtail the growing problem of debt.  It won't be a perfect deal, as there will likely be unnecessary cuts to important social programs, but it will be a much better strategy than would be implemented if Romney won.  As for the critical issue of climate change, I am not holding my breath.  From time to time people speculate that there may finally be an appetite to seriously deal with this issue, and each time they are proven wrong. Still, progress has been made under Obama, with increased investment in green technology increased substantially.  I expect there will be even more progress on that during a second term.

The most likely result of this election, therefore, is more or less an entrenching of the policies already implemented in Obama's first term.