Jennifer Wexton wins Virginia Senate special election to succeed Mark Herring

Democrat Jennifer Wexton bested two veteran Loudoun County politicians Tuesday night to earn a seat in the Senate of Virginia and almost assuredly give Virginia Democrats majority power in Richmond for the first time since 2009.

Ms. Wexton's victory over Republican John Whitbeck and former Republican state Del. Joe May, running his Senate race as an independent, caps a momentous two months for Democrats in Virginia, whom last November swept the top three offices in the commonwealth – the governor, lieutenant governor and attorney general posts – for the first time in two decades.

Hard to say that there was no impact because the Dem won 53% of the vote. If she’d won 60% you’d have a point, but numbers wise it was functionally a 6 point race. So fairly close.

What’s hard to determine is how many votes were siphoned off from a Republican candidate who found himself pincered and had to fight off TWO other candidates. You have, as others have mentioned, the possibility of disaffected voters who chose to stay home. You also have the possibility of disaffected voters who decided, reluctantly, to support the Dem candidate. There’s a very good likelihood that the GOP candidate couldn’t run an effective campaign because he couldn’t bring all his weight to bear against his main opponant.

Most of the immigrants I know are from India. Indian immigrants in US have the highest income per person of any other major ethnic group, including US born whites, Jews, Chinese immigrants, Native Americans, Hispanics etc. So the people I know are not on food stamps and other welfare. They are mostly all doing well economically and should be voting republican.

Yes the Indian immigrants are voting Dem despite their material success. Asians voted 73% for Obama, higher than Hispanics. As I indicated, we have entered the era of tribal politics. Minorities vote Dem. Why? They get special preferences over non-Hispanic whites.

For example, the Virginia Department of Minority Business defines a minority individual as “an individual who is a citizen of the United States or a non-citizen who is in full compliance with United States immigration law and who satisfies one or more of the following definitions:”

1. “African American” means a person having origins in any of the original peoples of Africa and who is regarded as such by the community of which this person claims to be a part.

2. “Asian American” means a person having origins in any of the original peoples of the Far East, Southeast Asia, the Indian subcontinent, or the Pacific Islands, including but not limited to Japan, China, Vietnam, Samoa, Laos, Cambodia, Taiwan, Northern Mariana, the Philippines, a U.S. territory of the Pacific, India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, or Sri Lanka and who is regarded as such by the community of which this person claims to be a part.

3. “Hispanic American” means a person having origins in any of the Spanish-speaking peoples of Mexico, South or Central America, or the Caribbean Islands or other Spanish or Portuguese cultures and who is regarded as such by the community of which this person claims to be a part.

Can you imagine any other country on the face of the earth who would give special preferences over their own citizens? These minority business set asides can be conferred on people with just green cards. These kind of preferences reinforce a group identity, hinder assimilation, and engender resentment by those not given such an advantage--an advantage supposedly to remedy past injustices.

We are going to Balkanize this country along racial, ethnic, linguistic, and cultural lines. We are sowing the seeds for our own destruction. No country is immune from such forces.

Thank you for exceptionally well researched posts.

You are exactly right about how the democrats are attracting minority groups by handing out benefits.

That is exactly why we need an exceptionally good communicator who can explain in plain simple English how all those democrat initiatives hurt every individual trying to advance economically. I have not seen any one doing that so far. There is data galore all over the world where socialistic agenda was followed and reduced prosperity.

The greatest example is China and India as well. China under Mao did not allow accumulation of wealth. Then China woke up and changed their thinking. Today there are 1.2 million Millionaires in China which did not exist under Mao.
And the result is China’s GDP has exploded, and on path to become world’s largest economy. India under Nehru was full of central (federal) planning Soviet style. Steel, Cement, Telephones, Machine tools, Railroads, Airlines, Insurance, Banks were run by the government. The idea was to take away money making abilities from individuals. Result was a disaster. Corruption up the wazu. Services awful. Economy stagnant.

I hope for that exceptionally good communicator to arrive soon, otherwise we are on the way to become a 3rd world country.

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