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We were sure as hell aren't gonna win the 10th or 8th but we don't need to be running people like Nybo who just lost.

The 14th (especially) and the 6th are much more important because we SHOULD (14th) and CAN (6th) win them back.

Hultgren better fade away.

I except Oberweis might run for the 14th. And I suppose I could live with that after his respectable Senate performance in 2014.

Bit of good news I didn't mention, Rock Island County State Senator Neil Anderson (our ONLY leg gain from 2014) narrowly won reelection. He lost Rock Island County but did well enough in the rest of the district (most of Whiteside, some of Carrol and Henry) to eke it out.

I think having crappy candidates for Governor that practically had the word "LOSER" tattooed on their forehead really hurt us in California and Illinois, as they just depressed turnout and provided zero help further down the ticket.

California Republicans must have smoking some good stuff to prefer John Cox over Travis Allen. Let's see... Candidate "A" is a proven conservative assemblyman and lifelong California resident who has won repeatedly in an ethnically diverse district that voted for Hillary. Candidate "B" is a carpetbagger from Illinois who ran half a dozen vanity campaigns where he never even came CLOSE to winning, and managed to come in LAST place and get around 0.08% of the Iowa caucus vote when he ran a laughable "campaign" for President. And oh yeah, he was a NeverTrumper who voted for Gary Johnson and vehemently opposed building a wall along the Mexican border, and opposes the death penalty in all circumstances. Well, no question, let's nominate candidate "B"!

I'm guessing some useful idiots who confused John Cox with CHRIS Cox might be the reason he was nominated. Every time I confronted his fan club with facts about why Cox was a weaker choice than Allen, the response was "you just want the Democrat to win. We GOTTA get behind Cox to STOP that!!"

As for Illinois, you had the "being a RINO magically makes him ELECTABLE in a state like this!" crowd, who completely ignored the fact that Rauner's approval ratings were in the toilet and he was literally the LEAST popular Republican governor in the country running for re-election. They honestly belived that even though poll after poll showed Illinois voters loathed him overall, they'd have a "come to Jesus" moment at the last minute and switch to Rauner solely by virtue of him being Democrat lite. The fact the RATs ran a completely tainted crook and he STILL beat Rauner in a landslide just shows you how weak Rauner was.

Had Travis Allen and Jeanne Ives being the respective GOP nominee in their states, I don't think the damage to their state parties would have been nearly as bad. They'd still have a huge uphill battle and would have almost certainly lost running in an entrenched RAT state during a RAT "wave" election, but they would provided an actual fight against the RAT and gotten decent numbers.... Allen would have probably ended up with around 46% to Newsom's 54%, for example.