Economic Misery Is Driving Voters Right

It seems simple to write off the four elections that got much of the attention last month in New Jersey, Virginia, New York and California. Democrats and Republicans each won two, so what really changed?

They weren't indicative nationally and represented no more than local issues playing out locally, right? Wrong. They represented a conservative groundswell — ideologically and personally.

The table below shows the four races. The first two columns indicate the percentages of the vote total gained by each party in the 2008 presidential election and the 2009 state and congressional elections. The third column shows the difference between the two elections, while the fourth totals the differences from the 2008 Democratic baseline.

The difference is dramatic in three of the races — including the special election in California's 10th congressional district where the Democrat won by double digits. Even factoring in the NY-23 special election, where the official Republican candidate finished third, all four races show an improvement for conservatives.

Assuming Republicans are the more conservative alternative, a Gallup Poll taken Nov. 5-8 gave a national scope to the November sample. Its survey of 2010 generic congressional preferences produced a 46% to 44% lead for Republicans (48% to 44% among registered voters — reversing a 6% Democratic lead in July).

So how do we explain the conservative surge? Exit polling in the New Jersey and Virginia races provided a detailed voter breakdown.

In New Jersey, the breakdown by gender and race showed little change. The Democratic advantage in voter participation fell three percentage points (to 41%), while the Republicans gained the same amount (to 31%). By ideology, liberals remained at 25%, while moderates fell to 45% from 50% and conservatives climbed to 30% from 25%.

Interesting insight.

As far as I'm concerned, the biggest stories from last Election Day didn't get much national attention. We had the two suburban counties in New York adjacent to New York City (Westchester and Nassau) turn back on a 15+ year trend of Democratic dominance and return control of their county offices to the GOP.

These counties have been trending heavily to the left in recent years, and have played a key role in the complete loss of any GOP prospects on a state level across New York.

I see those two election stories as a very big indicator of serious voter discontent.

I voted for the McCain ticket. This crap now is killing me.

If I could have gotten a hold of a McCain/Palin bumper sticker during the campaign, I would have razored off the first half of it by now.

I will admit that I held my nose and crossed my fingers when I voted for McCain, hoping against every instinct that if he somehow won, that he wouldn't make me want to take a pitchfork to DC within a few months.

To tell you the truth, if Sarah Palin hadn't been on the ticket, I don't know that I would have even made it to the polls that day.

I’m very disappointed in our corrupted system but must believe we are still capable of having a free nation. The forces against us are great. Sarah Palin is a bright light that understands freedom.

I'm with ya. We cannot ever give up. The moment we do, this country is truly finished.

I very much believe that we can (and will) undo all of the damage that Obama and the commie congress has done in the last year, and unravel all of the previous 40 years of Socialist re-engineering of our government.

It just takes an electorate that is so pissed off that they're thisclose to erupting in revolution. And we are.

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