Cleanup in Aisle Lunatic (h/t romad1)

[mtutiger]

Nate Cohn is suggesting a lot of Dem leaning mail ballots out.

The fact that NJ is this close makes all the hot takes about VA moot... this is just a terrible environment for the Ds.

Edited November 3, 2021 by mtutiger

[mtutiger]

In other news, it appears the Dems somehow forced a draw in the VA House if Delegates 

[Motown Bombers]

A Democrat hasn't won back to back elections in New Jersey in 40 years. Looks like Murphy will scrape out a win. 

[mtutiger]

Yeah, he'll survive

[Motown Bombers]

I'll go out on a limb and say there will only be calls for audits in New Jersey and not Virginia. 

[Tigerbomb13]

11 minutes ago, Motown Bombers said:

I'll go out on a limb and say there will only be calls for audits in New Jersey and not Virginia. 

Democrats need to spend 6 months inspecting those VA ballots for bamboo fibers. 

[buddha]

37 minutes ago, mtutiger said:

Yeah, he'll survive

biden won jersey by 20 points.  that's quite a comedown.

[mtutiger]

19 minutes ago, buddha said:

biden won jersey by 20 points.  that's quite a comedown.

No doubt.

I'd almost argue New Jersey is a more alarming result than VA even if Murphy pulls it out, depending on where the margin lies when the dust settles.

Edited November 3, 2021 by mtutiger

[Archie]

New Jersey is a toss up still. Last count had the Republican up 1,200 vote with 88% in.

Even if Murphy ends up winning, this sends a clear message to the dems that what they are doing isn't going over with the voters.  Now that the writing is on the wall about their future will they try to jam through more of their socialist, racist and anti-American policies or go more for a moderate position and try to save themselves?

Congrats to all Virginia voters for putting the best candidate in office. Tmc was a horrible candidate and I think a lot his stances around education really hurt him.  The fiasco around the handling of the student getting raped in a girls bathroom by a boy in a skirt swayed some votes there too.  

[mtutiger]

New Jersey isn't a toss up, most of the remaining vote is mail and big Dem areas. Murphy will probably gain most of the remaining votes. Still a terrible result, but he's gonna win by 2-4% in the end.

In terms of why this happened, its pretty simple: President's party generally takes it in the chin during off year and Midterm elections. It happened to Trump, it happened to Obama, with the exception of Bush I first term, it generally happens to all of them.

[Motown Bombers]

26 minutes ago, mtutiger said:

New Jersey isn't a toss up, most of the remaining vote is mail and big Dem areas. Murphy will probably gain most of the remaining votes. Still a terrible result, but he's gonna win by 2-4% in the end.

In terms of why this happened, its pretty simple: President's party generally takes it in the chin during off year and Midterm elections. It happened to Trump, it happened to Obama, with the exception of Bush I first term, it generally happens to all of them.

This was the year I thought we would buck that trend given Republicans have been pretty transparent about their intentions to subvert democracy but instead Democrats didn't show up. Democrats in Virginia deserve everything that is coming to them from rollbacks on voting rights, to bounties for abortion, to micro penises being able to carry guns everywhere and everything in between. 

[Motor City Sonics]

So I guess the message is that BIden didn't fix everything in 10 months, so he's a failure.    Plus Dumbocrats sit out midterms like they usually do.   No wonder we're never going to move forward.      Meanwhile, with the year the Dems have left to set an agenda before the overwhelmingly Republican congress & senate logjam any and everything in 2023, they're going to fight over small things and get NOTHING done.   yeah, extremists, you didn't get everything you wanted, stop sulking and move it forward, it only really works in small steps anyway.      Keep sitting them out until one day you won't be allowed to vote even if you want to.  

Can't wait until Republicans PENALIZE car companies for building fuel efficient and electric cars.  

[Motown Bombers]

3 minutes ago, Motor City Sonics said:

So I guess the message is that BIden didn't fix everything in 10 months, so he's a failure.    Plus Dumbocrats sit out midterms like they usually do.   No wonder we're never going to move forward.      Meanwhile, with the year the Dems have left to set an agenda before the overwhelmingly Republican congress & senate logjam any and everything in 2023, they're going to fight over small things and get NOTHING done.   yeah, extremists, you didn't get everything you wanted, stop sulking and move it forward, it only really works in small steps anyway.      Keep sitting them out until one day you won't be allowed to vote even if you want to.  

Can't wait until Republicans PENALIZE car companies for building fuel efficient and electric cars.  

The progressives in the house could have passed the bipartisan infrastructure bill and waited to 2022 and flip senate seats to make Manchin and Sinema irrelevant and push for a larger bill. Instead we got nothing and will lose seats. The Republicans didn't get where they are because of one two year cycle. They have been working towards this since at least the 90's. I'm just so indifferent right now. I don't live in Virginia or plan to ever live there so I don't care anymore if they lose their rights. Go protest, wear a pink hat, and tear down a statue. That will show those fascists. 

[CMRivdogs]

One of Youngkin’s promises is to eliminate the sales tax on groceries. Cool, but where is he going to make up the revenue? Is he going to pull a Carlyle Group move and eliminate DMV employees? Raise the personal property taxes we pay on automobiles?  How about cut major social services?
 

I for one am looking forward to my nieces and nephews learning that slaves loved their masters and spent their spare time singing and dancing. Just like they taught us in the 50s and 60s. And now poor 17 year olds in advanced studies classes won’t be triggered by stories about slave mothers killing their children so they don’t want them to go through the horrors she was suffering

 

[Motor City Sonics]

5 minutes ago, Motown Bombers said:

The progressives in the house could have passed the bipartisan infrastructure bill and waited to 2022 and flip senate seats to make Manchin and Sinema irrelevant and push for a larger bill. Instead we got nothing and will lose seats. The Republicans didn't get where they are because of one two year cycle. They have been working towards this since at least the 90's. I'm just so indifferent right now. I don't live in Virginia or plan to ever live there so I don't care anymore if they lose their rights. Go protest, wear a pink hat, and tear down a statue. That will show those fascists. 

I am a middle aged white guy,  everything they do is in my favor, but I do care about other people and their rights and I hate racism, sexism and homophobia, but if they aren't going to participate and stand up for themselves,  there's nothing I can do to help.    Lets fight over stupid things now.   Lets get offended and distracted because Dave Chappelle, a comedian with a history of offensive humor,  made some offensive jokes.     Lets get offended over every little thing so we can be distracted from the big issues.   

[Motor City Sonics]

3 minutes ago, CMRivdogs said:

One of Youngkin’s promises is to eliminate the sales tax on groceries. Cool, but where is he going to make up the revenue? Is he going to pull a Carlyle Group move and eliminate DMV employees? Raise the personal property taxes we pay on automobiles?  How about cut major social services?
 

I for one am looking forward to my nieces and nephews learning that slaves loved their masters and spent their spare time singing and dancing. Just like they taught us in the 50s and 60s. And now poor 17 year olds in advanced studies classes won’t be triggered by stories about slave mothers killing their children so they don’t want them to go through the horrors she was suffering

 

This is from w/Bob & David.  It's a parody, obviously.   This will be shown as a documentary in the South,  the laughs will be removed.      And that shit is working it's way here too. 

 

[Motown Bombers]

Another reminder there is no such thing as a Never Trump Republican. 

 

[Motown Bombers]

 

[mtutiger]

1 hour ago, Motown Bombers said:

This was the year I thought we would buck that trend given Republicans have been pretty transparent about their intentions to subvert democracy but instead Democrats didn't show up. Democrats in Virginia deserve everything that is coming to them from rollbacks on voting rights, to bounties for abortion, to micro penises being able to carry guns everywhere and everything in between. 

Everyone has  a take on what this means and it'd probably be wise to hold off until Catalist or some other group does a post-mortem on these elections. But my gut tells me that is that all the other stuff - Critical Race Theory, Insurrection, Abortion, etc. - is noise to most people. What it comes down to is that you have a President that is anywhere from 10-12 points underwater on average, and candidates that stood for the Ds last night in the two big races (McAuliffe, Murphy) are going to do around 10-12 points worse than the President did in 2020. It's a more nationalized environment, and it shouldn't be surprising that his unpopularity at the moment is having an impact on fortunes for his fellow Dems.

And I suspect that unpopularity comes down a combination of economic pressures (such as inflation), concern that COVID isn't behind us and/or some fatigue with COVID restrictions, and to a lesser extent Afghanistan (not so much for the withdrawal - but rather that how it played out didn't reflect well on how the President campaigned on competence).

The formula is pretty simple on paper but hard in practice.... if Ds want to at least reduce their losses next cycle, Biden's approval rating is going to have to go up. I think it's possible depending on whether inflationary pressures subside and if COVID increasingly becomes a distant memory in 2022 (I'm more confident in the latter than the former), but who knows. Everything they collectively do as a party though should be done with that in mind. And Biden himself should probably adjust how he is doing his job accordingly as well.

[pfife]

I think the Democrats have a lot of issues in their strategies, but one glaring one is this:

They think elections are about policy, and run as such.   The GOP knows elections are about emotions, and run as such.

[Motown Bombers]

When the Democrats do run on emotions, they come up with the worst possible slogans such as defund the police. 

[mtutiger]

One thing I'd love to know is how, given all that transpired here, how did Gavin Newsom basically match his 2018 numbers in the California Recall Election.... Biden's #s weren't quite as bad in September, but they weren't exactly good either.

Could just be the fact that Larry Elder was that bad of a face for the recall effort, but who knows.

[Motown Bombers]

5 minutes ago, mtutiger said:

One thing I'd love to know is how, given all that transpired here, how did Gavin Newsom basically match his 2018 numbers in the California Recall Election.... Biden's #s weren't quite as bad in September, but they weren't exactly good either.

Could just be the fact that Larry Elder was that bad of a face for the recall effort, but who knows.

California used Texas. It almost seemed a referendum on Texas than on Newsome. I'm not sure why Virginia didn't use Texas more. I think Elder also factored in. New Jersey is a blue state, while not as blue as California, and is fighting for it's life against a less offensive Republican. 

[Motown Bombers]

I'll also add that COVID was spiking more back in September and California was doing better than most states. The whole point of the recall was over mask mandates. 

[CMRivdogs]

4 minutes ago, mtutiger said:

One thing I'd love to know is how, given all that transpired here, how did Gavin Newsom basically match his 2018 numbers in the California Recall Election.... Biden's #s weren't quite as bad in September, but they weren't exactly good either.

Could just be the fact that Larry Elder was that bad of a face for the recall effort, but who knows.

I think it’s a combination of things. Election fatigue, the aftermath of Afghanistan (I honestly believe Biden was setup to fail here no matter what he did). COVID and it’s restrictions. The endless squabbling and foot dragging of the Democratic Party factions, both sides refusing to budge. Throw in the GOP’s media mouthpieces, no matter what you hear from so called conservatives there is no liberal media, and what little is left of honest journalism has been bought out by hedge fund companies and plundered.

It’s a perfect storm.we’ve met the enemy and Pogo was right