“Outside of CA and NY, it still seems for the most part that voters do not want socialism close to home, but are ok with it in D.C. They rejected socialist governors like Gillum and Abrams and Garcia and Cordray.”
Larry, I think you might want to think some more about this. Nationalized single-payer and open borders did very well at the ballot box yesterday. Virginia, New Hampshire, Colorado, Minnesota and Nevada moved into the very solid blue state category yesterday. The Republicans in those states are now NOT competitive statewide. Gillum and Abrams - outright socialists - came within a whisker of winning in one supposedly “red” state and one toss-up state.
These are not good omens for the future. But Sinema in AZ is the worst message of all. An openly socialist, open borders candidate nearly defeated McSally in yet another western state turning from red to purple towards blue. Arizona very much looks like the next New Mexico...Colorado...Nevada. The west is going solidly blue.
I think your bright side view here is nice...but the storm clouds are gathering and they are looking like the perfect socialist storm.
Free anything will ALWAYS sound better than paying it yourself. That is why the younger folks naturally love to be signed on to Medicare immediately. Unlike the seniors who have been paying Medicare tax all their working life, placing every one on Medicare/Single payer will be a spending side disaster.
Republicans are poor communicators in general. I did not see many TV Ads explaining Medicare is already headed for bankruptcy, in spite of seniors having paid taxes all their working life. Oh no..we can’t do that because that will scare the seniors. I never saw a single TV Ad showing how exactly how many Trillions shortfall there will be if everyone is installed on Medicare/single payer.
But socialism is easier to sell than self responsibility. That is why so many countries became socialist, and none, zero, nada, became prosperous under socialism.
Russia now has a flat tax! Sweden now has tax breaks for corporations! India has changed drastically from Nehru’s central planning system to private enterprise capitalism. Sadly, United States could also go through the cycle of trying socialism, and as usual will require 3-5 decades to learn the hard way.
I see what you’re saying. But on the other hand, everyone thought Stewart was a bad candidate and that he dragged down probably 2 and maybe 3 House races.
The fact that these are socialists doesn’t mean that much because you could argue that we have moved “to the right” with Blackburn, Cramer, Braun, Scott, DeSantis, and even, if she survives, McSally who ran Trump/border commercials.
So I’d look at this as much more division as opposed to “drift” in the same direction.
Another issue I didn’t talk about: the economy is fantastic. But that ceases to be an issue in this day and age (vs. Reagan) after 2 years because of the accelerated news cycle. I think many Rs got NO “love” for the economy because it was just now “accepted.” SO that was a major issue that, in essence, was off the table. It is, in terms of a campaign, something to take into account.