After the election, Republicans are ready to declare a mandate. Pundits are gushing about the fact that more people voted for President George W. Bush than for any other candidate in history. To hear some conservatives tell it, the American people are ready to pronounce the death of the Democratic Party itself.

Don’t believe the hype. What many pundits fail to mention are this election’s other records – that more Americans voted against Bush than any other candidate in history and that he won with the smallest percentage of any incumbent president since Woodrow Wilson.

As for the commentators who believe that the Democratic Party is from now on relegated to the sidelines of political life, history may hold some shocking news: It’s common for the losing party to make a comeback just four years later. If you want to see a real example, look at the first President Bush. He beat Michael Dukakis 426-111 in the electoral vote count in 1988 but lost re-election four years later to Bill Clinton by a count of 370-168. Even more amazingly, the Republicans garnered only 52 electoral votes in the election of 1964 and then took back the White House in 1968 with 301. By contrast, the 2004 election saw a close race that was decided by a handful of swing states, with the final electoral college vote coming in at 286-252. That’s hardly the trouncing that conservatives are crowing about.

Don’t expect the president to act accordingly, though. At a press conference last week, Bush declared that he had earned “political capital” during the campaign and that he intended to spend it. As priorities for his second term, he announced that he’s prepared to take on Social Security and tax reform. With majorities in both houses of Congress and a compliant Supreme Court, the president will probably have little trouble getting his agenda through.

And that’s a real problem for the Republicans because they won’t be able to blame the Democrats when they overreach. Whether it’s the privatization of Social Security, another Enron or Haliburton-type scandal with explicit links to the White House or some unfathomably harebrained scheme being hatched right now, the Republicans will have to take full responsibility for their poor stewardship of our country – and that’s what will cost them the public trust.

Even if the White House manages to avoid any further impropriety, there’s a good possibility the Republicans will begin eating their own. With the probable retirement of Chief Justice William Rehnquist looming, the Republicans have already started dividing along ideological lines within their own party about who should replace him – and abortion will probably be the issue that sparks the Supreme Court powder keg. When Republican Sen. Arlen Specter last week warned the president against appointing a conservative judge, the Religious Right furiously shouted him down in the national press, forcing Specter to issue a hasty retraction. Never mind bipartisanship; unless the president can heal the fractious divisions within his own party, the Republicans will form a circular firing squad all on their own.

In the final analysis, Bush’s 51 percent is no mandate; it’s just above the bare minimum, which should come as no surprise to those who have followed the life of George W. Bush.

Columns reflect the opinion of the author and not necessarily that of the Northern Star staff.