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ELECTION TIDINGS 2019: There is no sugarcoating yesterday’s results: Republicans had a bad day
Powerline ^
| 11/06/2019
| Steven Hayward
Posted on 11/06/2019 12:27:59 PM PST by SeekAndFind
There is no sugarcoating yesterday’s election results: Republicans had a bad day. Their losses especially in many suburban areas (such as around Philadelphia) are not a good omen for next year. They were trounced badly in Virginia, despite the supposed Republican-friendly gerrymander. (And let’s see how fast liberals forget about how gerrymandering is an “offense to democracy” when they are in charge of it in more states two years from now. Gerrymandering only became a “scandal” when Republicans got good at it.)
There are still good reasons to think Trump will be re-elected next year, and I’ll return to that subject in a separate item. Beneath the headlines about yesterday’s results, however, are a few things that ought to give Democrats some pause. First, while Republican incumbent Governor Matt Bevin lost in Kentucky, it is likely this had more to do with him personally than with declining Republican fortunes in the bluegrass state. Republicans swept the down ballot statewide races (the rest of the GOP field ran 10 points ahead of Bevin). So all of the triumphant talk among Democrats today that they’ll beat Mitch McConnell next year looks like a great rope-a-dope to get liberals to waste a lot of campaign money on a lost cause.
You’ll note in the table below that the Libertarian candidate, drawing 2% of the vote, accounts for more than Bevin’s margin of defeat. This is not the first time in recent history where a Libertarian candidate may have cost the Republican a close election, though there is some reason to doubt that all or even most of these voters would have gone for the Republican if a Libertarian was not on the ballot. There is considerable evidence that many of these voters wouldn’t have voted at all (this goes for Green Party candidates, too).
Second, while Republicans were getting hammered in Virginia, you aren’t seeing much about how Republicans fared in New Jersey, which isn’t exactly Republican-friendly territory. You have to get to the ninth paragraph of the New York Times election roundup today to find this:
In New Jersey, a state that seemed to be shifting increasingly blue each year, Republicans were on the cusp of their first legislative gains in nearly a decade. With final results still being tallied late Tuesday, Republicans looked likely to pick up two seats in the Assembly and one in the Senate, powered largely by a surge along the southern part of the state where Mr. Trump won easily in 2016 despite Democrats local advantage.
This is perhaps evidence that even in deep blue states, there are limits to how much “progressive’ governance voters will tolerate.
Further evidence of this point comes not from party battles but from some ballot initiative results. In increasingly purplish Colorado, voters rejected an attempt to water down the state’s Taxpayer Bill of Rights (TABOR), which liberals have been gunning for ever since it passed almost 30 years ago.
In Washington state, voters rejected the state legislature’s attempt to repeal the state’s prohibition (previously exactly by ballot initiative) on affirmative action quotas. From the Seattle Times (though note the choice of phrasing in the lede):
OLYMPIA With Referendum 88 trailing by a slim margin, Washingtonians appeared like they might, for the second time in two decades, vote against affirmative action.
With most counties reporting results Tuesday, voters were rejecting the measure 51.3% to 48.7%, in an election that tested ideas of fairness and discrimination. Many more votes remain to be counted. . .
[T]hroughout the campaign, opponents of affirmative action led by a group of Chinese immigrants said the policy gives the government the power to discriminate. They criticized a commission that would have been created to oversee diversity efforts at state agencies, and they argued existing benefits for veterans were at risk.
I think when you add all those together, voters dont like it, Linda Yang, a leader of the anti-affirmative-action campaign, Let People Vote, said Tuesday night.
Bonus! Jim Geraghty of National Review reports: “In Seattle, the self-proclaimed socialist city-council member appears to have lost her seat to a pro-business challenger.”
TOPICS: Government; Politics; Society
KEYWORDS: ky2019; ms2019; nj2019; va2019
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To: SeekAndFind
Republican friendly gerrymander in VA?!? What?
To: SeekAndFind
No they didn’t. They did just fine. It’s that asshat Bevin who had a bad day and for good reason.
3
posted on
11/06/2019 12:34:40 PM PST
by
Bullish
(My tagline ran off with another man.)
To: SeekAndFind
4
posted on
11/06/2019 12:34:55 PM PST
by
pnut22
To: pnut22
I agree with you.
Matt Margolis of PJ Media observes:
There were six statewide elections in Kentucky on Tuesday, and here are the results:
Governor: Democrat +0.4
Attorney General: Republican +15.5
Agriculture Commissioner: Republican +19.6
Auditor: Republican + 14.6
Secretary of State: Republican +4.4
Treasurer: Republican +21.4
Does that look like a state that is turning blue? Or does that look like a state where the GOP candidate was uniquely unpopular? Spoiler alert: According to a Morning Consult poll from last month, Matt Bevin was the second-least popular governor in the country with an approval rating of 34 percent. Yet, Bevin only lost by 0.4 percent. It’s safe to say that Trump’s 11th-hour involvement in the race helped Bevin, just not enough. Yet, the left is deluding themselves into thinking anti-Trumpism has turned the state blue.
5
posted on
11/06/2019 12:37:04 PM PST
by
SeekAndFind
(look at Michigan, it will)
To: pnut22
The headline doesnt seem to match the content. But again, I have read that the map in VA is anything but a pro-GOP gerrymander.
To: SeekAndFind
Anybody who actually followed pretty closely while I was getting drunk have an opinion on how it went for Rs?
NJ pick ups are a good sign.
Kentucky gov loss COULD have been the libertarian.
Maybe they’re leaving out the bad stuff because what I read on this page seemed kinda good.
thanks in advance.
7
posted on
11/06/2019 12:38:03 PM PST
by
dp0622
(Radicals, racists Don't point fingers at me I'm a small town white boy Just tryin' to make ends meet)
To: SeekAndFind
This guy is a clown and has no business being an analyst for anything.
Lets look at Virginia first. This was NOT a GOP gerrymander. The 4th Circuit redrew the maps and made it a Democrat Gerrymander. The fact that this moron doesnt mention that disqualifies all of the rest of his analysis.
The GOP tallied more votes Statewide for both the House of Delegates and the State Senate.
The total votes for the HOD was:
860,794 Republican
823,369 Democrat
55,184 votes for other
For State Senate it was:
843,576 Republican
808,605 Democrat
112,917 other.
The Democrats won by getting a Kalifornia Communist Professor to gerrymander the maps to benefit the Democrats. Gerrymander is good when it benefits Democrats, it is bad when it benefits Republicans.
Mississippi, the GOP cleaned house. Winning ALL statewide offices and gaining seats in the legislature and getting a super majority in the State Senate.
Kentucky: the GOP EXPANDED their margins EVEN in the Suburbs for all of the offices except for Bevin.
New Jersey: the GOP made several gains in the State Legislature.
All in all the GOP had a B night. Would have been a B+ if Bevin had won. A if they had held on to one of the gerrymandered houses in Virginia.
Im sick of self important worthless clowns who cant analyze anything spewing their trash and getting paid for it.
To: SeekAndFind
Bad Day? Why? because an unpopular candidate who was down 17 points in the polls just a few short weeks ago lost by 5k after a single Trump visit, and every other R in that state won their statewide races by larger margins than last time?? Oh no... what a horrible, horrible day (/sarcasm)
Because we retook MS and LA Governorships?? Hold me back... take my belt away and put me on suicide watch....
Yes VA is disappointing, but not surprising... if you get elected simply because you give someone the bird, clearly the state is lost, and will have to screw itself for a decade or two before it wises up.
To: SeekAndFind
10
posted on
11/06/2019 12:39:40 PM PST
by
Beowulf9
To: SeekAndFind
Bevin lost because he sucked. It is what it is. Says nothing about Trump, if anything, Trump made it closer than it would have been.
11
posted on
11/06/2019 12:39:59 PM PST
by
dfwgator
(Endut! Hoch Hech!)
To: FlipWilson
Yep. The fact that this clown apparently didnt realize the 4th Circuit changed the maps disqualifies all of the other nonsense he is spewing.
The GOP would have absolutely held at least the HOD in VA on the old maps. No question about it. They had 37000 more votes Statewide than the Rats.
To: SeekAndFind
What a bad lede. Im surprised I even read the rest of the story, seeing its coming from Steven Hayward, a Never Trumper. He totally missed the fact that Tucson rejected the proposition to become an official sanctuary city. That town is the bane of our existence as far as rationality in our otherwise logical state.
To: Bullish
Just 1% separates the win. Bevin did catch up but too late..no matter. What can a Dum Gov do when the entire majority of the senate is Republican.
14
posted on
11/06/2019 12:41:43 PM PST
by
max americana
(Fired ONE libtard at work at every election since 2008 because I enjoy it. I hope every lib die.)
To: TexasGurl24
Well said. And the MSM retards if it was Trump’s fault that Ky voted for a Dem Gov.
That’s all they talked about. They didnt realize across the board, the GOP increase their seats in KY.
15
posted on
11/06/2019 12:43:25 PM PST
by
max americana
(Fired ONE libtard at work at every election since 2008 because I enjoy it. I hope every lib die.)
To: SeekAndFind
That was absolutely NOT a “Republican-friendly gerrymander.” WTF is that fool smoking?
16
posted on
11/06/2019 12:43:51 PM PST
by
ScottinVA
(Every liberal should be red-flagged.)
To: Prince of Space
17
posted on
11/06/2019 12:43:55 PM PST
by
SeekAndFind
(look at Michigan, it will)
To: SeekAndFind
Yesterday had something for everyone to gloat about.
As for next the November election, only God knows.
18
posted on
11/06/2019 12:46:29 PM PST
by
rollo tomasi
(Working hard to pay for deadbeats and corrupt politicians)
To: SeekAndFind
It does not matter if Washingtonians vote against affirmative action. Just like in CA, it will be RAMMED DOWN THEIR THROATS by a Federal judge.
19
posted on
11/06/2019 12:46:41 PM PST
by
backwoods-engineer
(Enjoy the decline of the American empire. Notice, this is not an impeachment vote. It is a continuat)
To: TexasGurl24
What was the source on those voting numbers for VA?
20
posted on
11/06/2019 12:46:48 PM PST
by
ScottinVA
(Every liberal should be red-flagged.)
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