Posted on 12/12/2014 7:06:39 AM PST by SeekAndFind
The defeat of Democratic senator Mary Landrieu by Republican representative Bill Cassidy in last weekend’s Louisiana runoff ends an election year that has been very successful for Republicans — and has implications for 2016. Some observations:
(1) Democrats relied heavily on legacy candidates — and lost nevertheless. Mary Landrieu’s father, Moon Landrieu, was elected to the Louisiana legislature in 1960 and as mayor of New Orleans in 1970 and 1974. Her father’s anti-segregationist legacy helped Mary Landrieu appeal to black voters and win narrow victories in 1996, 2002, and 2008. It wasn’t enough in 2014.
Other defeated Democratic candidates this year — Mark Pryor in Arkansas, Michele Nunn and Jason Carter in Georgia, Mark Begich in Alaska, Mark Udall in Colorado — had forebears first elected to Congress or as governor between 1961 and 1972. But that wasn’t enough to overcome opposition to the Obama Democratic party’s liberal policies. Exception to the rule: Gwen Graham, daughter of a former governor and senator first elected statewide in 1978, beat a Republican House member 50.4 to 49.6 percent in a Florida district, which President Obama narrowly lost (52–47) in 2012.
The obvious implication for 2016 is that the frontrunner for the Democratic nomination, Hillary Clinton, is something of a legacy candidate, too. Her own record as senator and secretary of state is perhaps less of an asset than the record of her husband, who first ran for office in 1974 and won his last election in 1996. That’s starting to seem like a long time ago.
(2) Voters today increasingly vote straight party tickets. Begich ran 5 points ahead of Obama’s 2012 percentage in his state, Landrieu 3.5 points ahead in hers. In the 1970s and 1980s, personal appeal, local issues, and pork-barrel projects enabled similar candidates to run far ahead of their party’s national leaders. Not so any more.
In 2012, only 26 of 435 congressional districts voted for a House member of one party and the presidential nominee of the other, the lowest number since 1920. In 2014, the number of “split districts” rose, but only to 31, mostly because Republicans picked up seats where Obama approval fell below 50 percent.
This makes for more rational politics: Voters can choose between reasonably coherent sets of public policies. The corollary: It produces Congresses — and state governments — that will push against the policies of an unpopular president, as in 2006, 2010, and 2014.
The implication for 2016 is that Democrats will be at a serious disadvantage if Obama’s job approval stays at current levels or falls. Republicans will be at a disadvantage if it rises to 50 percent or above.
(3) Old political species — Blue Dog Democrats, Rockefeller Republicans — are pretty much extinct. Their constituencies have migrated into the other party. Affluent Californians are left-wing Democrats; the Jacksonian belt from Western Pennsylvania along the Appalachian chain and toward east Texas is increasingly conservative Republican.
Political scientist V. O. Key, author of the 1949 classic Southern Politics, hoped that economic common interest would produce a liberal block of blacks and poor whites in the South. Instead, voters are divided by their views on cultural, moral, and even religious views, inside and outside the South.
(4) Today’s political map looks static, but may be a little more fluid than many think. The South is not quite solidly Republican. Obama carried Florida, Virginia, and North Carolina, states which now have 57 electoral votes, in 2008 and the first two in 2012, and statewide Democrats were still competitive there in 2014. This, even though George W. Bush won between 52 and 56 percent in those states in 2004.
Similarly, Republicans may be competitive in 2016 in seven states with 71 electoral votes — Colorado, Iowa, Michigan, Nevada, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin — where Obama got between 51 and 54 percent in 2012. This year Republicans won statewide races and/or the House popular vote in each.
(5) Republican strength is at historic highs. The party holds more House and state legislative seats than it has since the 1920s and only one less Senate seat than its post-1920s high. The 2008 Obama coalition, which some argued would dominate politics for decades, has been fraying: Blacks and gentry liberals remain faithful, but Hispanics and millennials are falling away, while Jacksonians grow increasingly opposed.
The 2014 results don’t guarantee Republicans victory in 2016. But they show it’s certainly possible.
— Michael Barone is senior political analyst for the Washington Examiner
/johnny
They’re nutcases.
There is no such thing as ideological perfection.
Never has been. Never will be.
That is your characterization.
There is nothing sacrosanct about the two party system anyway.
I have made it my mission to politically destroy liberal republicans in the primary OR the general election.
If running as a liberal republican is a political kiss of death, then only conservative Republicans can possibly win.
That is working within the system.
/johnny
Romney is for abortion, gun-control, socialized medicine, amnesty, and bigger government.
That isn't imperfect, that is liberal.
That is Romney wanting the same policy as Obama.
You bragged about voting for that policy by voting for Romney.
/johnny
Never underestimate the Republicans’ ability to cast victory into the jaws of defeat.
When this moment comes, the banks will close for a while. The bank accounts, pensions and 401k's of the American people will be bailed in or will disappear entirely. Banks will raid the safe deposit boxes of Americans to find the money to survive. American sovereign debt will go into default, and the dollar will crash. We will degenerate into a full police state as Americans are disarmed by their government.
This will be disastrous for the GOPe and the DEMe. In order to survive, they will have to merge to form the Democratic-Republican Party with a Bush and a Clinton on the ticket. The Occupy Wall Street movement will form the New Socialist Party, and the Tea Party movement will form the New Federalist Party.
We will experience a 3-way race in 2016, and both the Democratic and Republican parties will go onto the ash heap of history. In this debate over the budget, we're seeing Tea Partiers and OWS types in agreement as to how Wall Street owns this country. The two movements agree on where we are, how we got here, but they differ on how we get out of it. That difference will be the key issue of the 2016 election.
After what happened in the House last night, it becomes critical that the Tea Party movement give up on the GOP -- the party Establishment will never let anyone like Ted Cruz anywhere near the nomination -- and start a new party. The money raising and party building must begin now if we aren't to be governed permanently by the oligarchy.
That’s all true, but you left out the single most important ingredient to a GOP win. The Dems must spectacularly screw the pooch.
Would you rather eat dog food or cat food? Personally I think NOW is the time for the Tea Party to rise up, select OUR candidate and eagerly escort him to the finish line.
Most here can make that claim.
IMHO there is not a chance in hell of getting a Conservative elected as POTUS. The second they come out against "choice" or shipping all the Illegal "children" back south, they would be toast. Our only shot is to pack the congress with a veto proof majority, and JonBon is doing everything he can to put the squash on that as we speak.
Nice. Have it your way then. As more and more conservatives feel betrayed or insulted by your precious GOP, they become angry and vote third party or sit out elections. Either way, you will lose elections. Increasingly, there damn little difference in outcomes between Democrats and Republicans. Too bad Republican drones can't see that.
Barone must have written this BEFORE the House Bill passed last night.
There isn’t a snowball’s chance in Hell that I will ever see a Republican President, especially a Conservative in my Lifetime. In fact, unless a Miracle occurs, the Republicans will lose the House and Senate in 2016 because of this.
Boner just gave the Democrats a gift. He fed their mantra that Republicans only care about Corporations and the Rich with the Bill’s increased allowances for Campaign Contributions.
So much for the “Loyal Opposition”.
I was pretty satisfied with last month’s election results.
But I also know we can’t win every election.
So what you are saying is the regardless of the Republican parties behavior they have your vote. If I am the Republicans then I totally ignore you 24/7/52. You have indicated you are their slave so why would they consider any change in behavior or worry about the direction they take the party or country.
Your perfectly willing to drive off the cliff with them and will do so and not raise a fuss whatsoever. You are perfectly content with socialism light as to full blown communism as long as the Republicans are in charge. Again why would I bother to listen to anything you would have to say if I know I have your vote regardless.
I’m saying I always vote conservative in the primary.
I always vote Republican in the general.
The Republican candidate isn’t always 100% perfect, but in each and every election I’ve ever voted in is always better than the Democrat.
Not voting is not for me.
Third part voting not an option now that we have the blanket primary in effect.
Our choices are not always perfect, but they are always easy.
That’s all I’m saying.
You just haven’t come to the conclusion yet that we are not being offered a choice and you still believe in the Republican party. Reagan recognized in the 1970’s when you don’t give people a choice, why are they going to waste their time.
You, me and every other conservative out there have no choice currently. We have socialism lite or communism, that is not a choice. Some of us refuse to be taken for granted and play the rigged game.
It may be rigged a game. But it’s the only game in town. We’ve been pretty much a two party system for nearly two hundred years. We’re not a parliamentary system where minor parties can win seats just by winning a certain percentage. Here in the US, it’s winner take all, that’s why we have two dominant parties.
It's the GOP way of doing things...insult conservatives.
Then its time to change the game. If I am gambling and the other players are cheating I’m either going to bust them up or walk away but I’m not going to keep playing and losing. Just because it’s a 200 yr. old tradition doesn’t mean it can’t change. The federalist, no-nothings and Whigs all died because they refused to change or offered no choice to the public. You are suggesting the very definition craziness and insanity.
Well, when I analyze the election results from last November, I see that the GOP is now stronger than at anytime since the 1920s. I don’t think it is going away any time soon I’m sorry to say.
Fine.
let’s stop using insults.
I don’t like being called a liberal.
I’m a life long Republican. I’m life long Catholic.
No, my party isn’t perfect. No my Church isn’t perfect.
But I am NOT a liberal and I ain’t changing nothing.
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