*appears from nowhere*
Huh, where did that 5% margin that the polls underestimated the GOP come from, anyhow?
Oh, well then.
*vanishes into the abyss*
Reader Interactions
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Come for the politics, stay for the snark.
“Until such time as the world ends, we will act as though it intends to spin on.”
Too often we hand the biggest microphones to the cynics and the critics who delight in declaring failure.
There are more Russians standing up to Putin than Republicans.
Yeah, with this crowd one never knows.
Just because you believe it, that does not make it true.
You’re just a puppy masquerading as an old coot.
Anyone who bans teaching American history has no right to shape America’s future.
This is dead girl, live boy, a goat, two wetsuits and a dildo territory. oh, and pink furry handcuffs.
GOP baffled that ‘we don’t care if you die’ is not a winning slogan.
Some judge needs to shut this circus down soon.
rich, arrogant assholes who equate luck with genius
When I was faster i was always behind.
“They all knew.”
Republicans are radicals, not conservatives.
We do not need to pander to people who do not like what we stand for.
We will not go quietly into the night; we will not vanish without a fight.
They are not red states to be hated; they are voter suppression states to be fixed.
Fight them, without becoming them!
A sufficient plurality of insane, greedy people can tank any democratic system ever devised, apparently.
Something needs to be done about our bogus SCOTUS.
You can’t attract Republican voters. You can only out organize them.
Dear legacy media: you are not here to influence outcomes and policies you find desirable.
Everybody saw this coming.
I really should read my own blog.
You are here: Home / Well Now, Here’s Your Problem
Belafon
Looking at Arkansas and Georgia, people were going to vote for Republicans even if the candidates promised to eat a baby. Arkansas passes a minimum wage raise, and votes for the candidate that opposed it. Georgia sends a guy to the US senate that won an “outsourcer of the year” award. They’re not voting on policy at all.
Even though she lost, I was impressed with Wendy Davis’s GOTV effort. I got visited by someone at least three times over the last month. Someone even left a sticker on my door reminding me to vote. Hopefully, Democrats can build on that here.
And yes, I am an optimist. I’m a Democrat in Texas.
p.a.
Good point from Atrios
J.D. Rhoades
Across the land, referenda showed that the American people like Democratic policies. They just don’t like Democratic candidates. Guess “running away from Obama” didn’t work as well as they thought it would. I hate to say I told you so…wait, that’s wrong, I love to say I told you so. And I did. I e-mailed Kay Hagan at least twice to tell her to stand up for the policies she voted for and say “if that means voting with Obama, then i guess I did, but I did it for North Carolina.” Did she listen to me? Noooooooo….
Valdivia
glad someone said this:
salon.com/2014/11/04/it_is_all_still_about_race_obama_hatred_the_south_and_the_truth_about_gop_wins/
p.a.
Gah. Can’t edit on smotphone. here
FlipYrWhig
I don’t understand the significance of the statistic.
FlipYrWhig
@J.D. Rhoades: One alarming thing, to me, is the notion that people will vote for a Republican who smiles and says jack squat about anything, like Joni Ernst or Cory Gardner. The other alarming thing is the notion that people will still vote for a Republican who’s actively evil and odd-looking, like Rick Scott or Paul LePage.
Belafon
@J.D. Rhoades: As much as I think Democrats need to be more Progressive, I don’t think it would have mattered in this election. We are still dealing with the Angry White Voter, who still can’t stand that guy in the White House.
Shygetz
@FlipYrWhig: 5% of the electorate voted Republican AND said that Obamacare didn’t go far enough. Could be interpreted as liberal defectors hate-voting, I guess.
Knockabout
FTFY.
FlipYrWhig
@Shygetz: “Obamacare didn’t go far enough, so I’m voting for Joni Ernst,” thought nobody ever.
Betty Cracker
@J.D. Rhoades: Charlie Crist didn’t run away from Obama — quite the opposite — and he lost to a reptilian crook anyway. How does that fit into your unifying narrative for Election 2014?
Botsplainer
@Knockabout:
Jesusfuck, do you have some kind of special curse on the man, so that any post automatically becomes a summoning incantation?
Belafon
@Betty Cracker: Both Le Page and Scott won. Ow.
bemused
Margaret Carlson shares on Morning Joe what she learned today, McConnell gave the most gracious acceptance speech EVER and he is showing his pre-teaparty side and will be willing to work across…
She said something else villagely recently that made me want to kick the tv, can’t remember what. Saying crap like that must be the only way she gets back on cable news because I haven’t seen her around in a very long time.
Betty Cracker
@Belafon: And Scott Walker! With the exception of a handful of bright spots, it was pretty much a worst case scenario election across the board. People are going to propose simplistic theories about why. They will be wrong half the time.
Knockabout
@Botsplainer:
Coming from you, that’s hysterical.
J.D. Rhoades
@Belafon:
It’s not just needing to be more Progressive, although I agree that’s needed. It’s standing up for what you’ve actually done. Republicans In NC painted Hagan as “the deciding vote for Obamacare” (funny how every incumbent Democrat was “the deciding vote for Obamacare”). In the last days of the election, they came right out and put it on the signs: HAGEN=OBAMACARE.
And not once did I hear her stand up and say, “Yeah, I voted for it, and here’s why: no pre-existing condition exclusions, no lifetime caps on coverage,” etc. You know, all the things people say they like as long as you don’t call it Obamacare.
A Humble Lurker
@Knockabout:
You do know that your posting makes me and probably many others here like Zander more and makes us go to his site and give him money, right? I mean, just so you know how counterintuitive you’re being.
J.D. Rhoades
@A Humble Lurker:
You can tell a lot about a person by who their enemies are.
Rex Tremendae
Where do you get 5% saying Obamacare didn’t go far enough and voting GOP? The poll wording was apparently “did not go not far enough”
Mike in NC
@J.D. Rhoades: I spent a week as a volunteer for Hagan, knocking on doors and handing out brochures. Time I will never get back. She was a DINO and that paid off well, didn’t it?
JoyfulA
But in Pennsylvania, Gov. Corbett, he of the “close your eyes if you don’t want to see the results of the wand you’re being raped with,” of trying to sell off the state lottery in secret, of pushing Voter ID “to assure Romney’s victory,” and I could go on, became the first PA governor to be denied a second term!
Now public schools will be funded and frackers will pay the taxes every other state charges. Incoming Gov. Wolf will try to graduate state income taxes (against the state constitution, which saved us from Voter ID) and will not appoint $150,000 do-nothing consultants or spend millions in legal fees to try to . . . something.
And New Hampshire comported itself well, too. (Scott Brown is moving to Maine next week, I heard.)
Mike E
@Mike in NC: Sorry. I feel your pain, having done 3 weeks of a gotv phone bank for an enviro group. I’m not sorry I did it: Wake Co. can now match the Triangle initiative for commuter trains, purchase Dorothea Dix to make a destination park right in the capital, and much needed infrastructure can go forward despite our TEA General Assembly and slimeball governor. And, the slate of progressive judges winning, for the most part, signals a really mature attitude going forward in the midst of rampant silliness.
I used to hunt for silver linings in the 80s thru early 90s…this is a huge win, no kidding.
Corner Stone
@Betty Cracker:
Expect to hear it about elebenty fucktons for the next several months.
Let’s be rational for a change. The R’s nationalized the elections and made every contest about Obama. They tied Obama around the neck of every candidate. It didn’t matter if the candidate loved Obama and said so proudly, and it didn’t matter if the candidate nailed a picture of Obama to a tree and shot it with an AR-15 for their ad.
All the electorate on the right heard was “Obama”. All the electorate on the left heard was “Obama”, but he wasn’t on the ballot when they went looking to vote for him again.
The R’s were always going to have a structural advantage this election, and any rational person understood that. They succeeded in nationalizing the election and our D candidates played situational politics in an effort to not give the other side what they wanted. In some cases that may have left D voters demotivated. In others it may have left the door open a crack for not doing self-harm.
Who here knows what policies Ernst or Gardner are actually for? Anyone? No, because they never said a damn thing about policy. They said Obama about 1000 times, then smiled really broadly into the camera.
The hilarious part is people voting know exactly what policies R Scott and Le Page are for – and they voted them back in anyway! And Brownback and Walker and Kasich!