Sounds right to me. In Kentucky teachers still have the good will of the public, and Bevin made enemies of that entire sector.
KY voters aren’t Republicans; they’re conservatives.
The real lesson of Kentucky?
Go after the pensions of unionized public school teachers....and they’ll kill ya.
Teachers unions are the closest thing that exists in this country to the old-school Mafia.
No one can say any more .... any more.
It's all been said ..... it's all been explained.
The time has come (you GO, Kentuckians !) to take the political stand first ..... because we all know what the SECOND is.
Zelikokovsky’s analysis is spot on. Of the choices presented to the KY voters, Bevin was the best. It’s irresponsible to vote for one candidate to spite the other. If you don’t like any of the choices available for a given office write in someone or don’t cast a ballot for that office.
Simplify your choices: never vote for a candidate who’s also a lawyer.
A massive crackdown on dope would serve those KY Liberaltarians right.
Legislatively, he was damn near a perfect conservative. People should have held their nose and voted for him. Of course Kentucky has had plenty of dem governors. Beshear’s father was gov for years.
The real lesson is to discourage Libertarians from siphoning off votes from the Republican candidate. Libertarians did not challenge the other state-wide candidates and the results speak for themselves.
Bevin was DOA... damn amazing Trump nearly pulled him over the finish line.. he was down over 17 points just a few shorts weeks before the election... 1 Rally from Trump nearly pulled him over the finish line.
But, hey, Trump is in “Trouble”.... Okay there MSN... Okay (rolling eyes)
A large part of the votes was for medical marijuana. This is a huge issue many are missing.
The medical marijuana vote is going to happen.
And how did that happen with (supposedly) low Republican turnout? They elected a Rat governor (low turnout) but demolished the down-ballot races. Doesn't pass the smell test.
I think the message should be: When you get elected, be ethical and above board when doing the things we elected you to do.
The Teacher’s pension bill was a GOOD bill. Yea, the teachers weren’t happy about it. But, they never voted for Bevin to begin with. Trying to sneak the bill through under the cover of darkness turned a lot of supporters OFF.
Still though, these results are HIGHLY suspicious. Just hard to believe THAT MANY people will vote D at the top, then turn around and vote for EVERT R candidate.
And this article doesn't even make sense on its own terms.
The author is totally all over the place. In the beginning he says:
"The true lesson lies in the overwhelming success of Kentucky's down-ballot election results for attorney general, agriculture commissioner, auditor, secretary of state, and treasurer, where Republican candidates demolished Democrat candidates by margins of 221,125; 276,319; 204,960; 64,562; and 300,935 votes, respectively."
OK. So the true lesson is that the down-ballot results were overwhelmingly good for republicans. But then in the very next sentence he writes:
If Bevin is certified the loser, it will come down to the fact that tens or hundreds of thousands of Kentuckians, who had no problem voting for other Republicans this year and Bevin four years ago, decided to stay home or cast their votes for Democrat Andy Beshear or the Libertarian candidate, John Hicks (who garnered 28,442 votes).
Sorry but the true lesson just one sentence earlier was about the success of the down-market races, which the people who stayed home had nothing to do with. By definition, they are not part of the true lesson. And the people who voted for the Libertarian only account for about 10% of the split votes.
The true lesson is that the author's candidate deserved to win the race for the office that he was entitled to hold, but then he lost, and now the author is mad at the voters because it's all their fault.
If only we could sic the equivalent of the Pinkertons on the teachers unions.
Many, many Republicans in KY didn’t vote in this election from what I understand. They seem not to have liked Bevin.
Someone from Pennsylvania does not do well in the South, even after years of training. Our memories are too fresh of when yankees were forced on us.
Good article. Enough with the virtue signaling. Kick ass.