Prologue: Why midterms matter

Given what we've learned from the 1994, 2006 and 2010 midterms about how partisanship, divisiveness and polarizing presidents all affect both midterm elections and the powers of the presidency, we ask if Democrats can flip the House in 2018.

2010 was the year of the Tea Party, the year of backlash against Obama, and the year of the biggest shift of power in the House in a century. But it’s also the year that Republicans executed a little-noticed strategy that cemented their place in power.

To understand the identity crisis within the Democratic Party, you could look to the 2006 midterm election … and the story of a junior congressman named Rahm Emanuel, who needed to win 15 seats in the House to restore his party to greatness.

Since childhood, Bill Paxon was a diehard Republican – a Nixon fanboy who watched House Republicans lose midterm elections for decades. Then he became a member of Congress. And he was finally in a position to help them get the 42 seats they needed to win.

In the last 60 years, the House of Representatives has changed political control just three times: in 1994, 2006, and 2010. What do those midterms tell us about what it takes to flip the House? And about why midterm elections matter?