I don’t know why so many liberals are all gloom & doom tonight. The results are pretty close to what was predicted, with Dems taking the House & losing a couple of seats in the Senate. Governor’s races looking pretty good for D’s, too. Chin up, y’all. This is far from a bad night
— Laura Seay (@texasinafrica) November 7, 2018
I can help you out there, Laura. Here’s why I’m feeling a little doomy and gloomy: This mouth-breathing, quarter-witted, mini-Trump motherfucker will be my new governor:
And this Skeletor-looking, Medicare fraud-sucking motherfucker will join Marco Fucking Rubio to rep me and mine in the US Senate:
It’s true that the results are pretty close to what was predicted nationwide. And there are many genuine bright spots, including the defeat of odious Scott Walker, awful Karen Handel, treasonous Dana Rohrabacher and obnoxious Dave Brat.
But this shouldn’t have been a normal, predictable election, not with Mango Mussolini lying nonstop about America being overrun with fictional brown hordes and directly inspiring multiple deadly hate crimes within weeks of the vote. Not with a smirking crook like Brian Kemp openly rigging an election in his own favor.
America had a chance to resoundingly reject Trumpism. It had the opportunity to tell a party that has fully embraced racist demagoguery to go fuck itself, and it sent mild regrets instead. That’s not enough.
We’ll press on, of course. No choice. And it’s truly a wonderful thing to regain control of the House. I look forward to watching Paul Ryan pass the gavel to Nancy Smash. I’m thrilled that Democrats will chair committees that will issue subpoenas to expose this thoroughly corrupt administration. I’m relieved that Trump’s House stooges can no longer interfere with Mueller’s investigation.
But it’s going to take me a few days to stop feeling sick about what could have been. Please bear with me.
rikyrah
Good Morning, Everyone ???
WereBear
The cheating in Georgia could only have been more blatant if Kemp wore a sash like Miss America saying “I cheated.”
That takes a while to uproot.
prufrock
Cosign all of that, Betty. I watched Gillum speak at UCF over the weekend. He would have been a great governor. Instead, I wake up to Facebook posts stating things like, “Thank god socialism didn’t win.” How do you deal with an electorate that stupid? And incidentally, why do I still have people in my Facebook feed that post stupid shit like that?
Baud
I feel ya, Betty.
@rikyrah: Good morning.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
I will agree, it’s amazing Trump for all his incompetence and petty viciousness has any support at all But as I have seen pointed out, his base thinks this is big time wrestling and not politics, so stupid and evil at a plus are plus to them, because it just theater in their mind. I suspect that will erode after the next two years as it slowly sinks into people this is something real that effects their lives directly. Trump lost the popular vote in 2016 by 2% and now he loses by 9%, so hopefully it will be 16% by 2020.
And the senate does surprise me – it was always gerrymandered towards the rural.
Baud
I’m curious to see turn out numbers and the demographics that showed up.
Lapassionara
Good morning. I’m glad and relieved Dems have won the house, but the Florida results just plain suck.
Eural Joiner
“But it’s going to take me a few days to stop feeling sick about what could have been. Please bear with me.”
Absolutely – there were some very hard felt losses yesterday and it’s going to take days (weeks?) to get past that emotional toil, take your time…and take solice in that, aside from the Senate, our ship of state took a huge turn in righting itself. It will take time and several more election cycles but yesteday was a massive victory for the Democratic party across so many levels of government and across the geographic breadth of the nation. And winning the House – which controls committee chairmanships, appropriations, and legislative power – is so important it dwarfs all other setbacks at this point.
Breath deep, take care and keep fighting the good fight. Republicans didn’t build this monstorsity over night and it won’t come down in one election cycle either! :)
MisterForkbeard
I’m sad that we didn’t get a tsunami that blew the Republicans out of the water.There’s a number of heartbreaking events (Florida), and I’m sad about those.
I am, however, fucking pumped about the House results in the aggregate. We got about a 9.5% popular vote advantage there and took back the House. We had to win by A LOT to do that. due to election fuckery and gerrymandering. And we did it. Go us.
…And fuck Desantis.
rikyrah
One in four eligible Black folks couldn’t vote.
Felon re-enfranchisement changes that.
That is a Florida bright spot.
Amir Khalid
@Enhanced Voting Techniques:
Actually, his incompetence and petty viciousness is what makes him appealing to his base: like calls to like.
seaninclt
Sucks for you Florida peeps, but if you offered those results to me 2 years ago, I’d take them every day and twice on Sunday.
Suburban Mom
This is a good time to remember that the arc of the moral universe is long. Conservatives have worked for decades to engineer the structural advantage that led us to last night. Yet turnout was way up and new coalitions emerged in many suburbs. It wasn’t a blow out. But even in Florida we had a bright spot in the restoration of voting rights for ex-felons. We need to gather and build on the strength shown last night. Now we work on getting Betty a better governor and senator the next time around.
wasabi gasp
Hat City longhair here hating the ratio, but loving the Ned nudge.
OzarkHillbilly
@WereBear: Or a white robe and hood.
Betty,
I feel your pain. Here in Misery we just replaced Claire with the nimrod Hawley, a guy who barely spent 2 years in the AG’s office (I say barely because he was barely there) execrable Anne Wagner has been returned to DC and the GOP continues their stranglehold on the state House and Senate.
And yet…
Medical Marijuana Amendment 2 passed with nearly 2/3 of the vote, this was the good amendment, not the ratfuck amendment 3 or Proposition C. This is the one that taxes it at only 4% AND allows for the growing of up to 6 personal plants. (If one looks at the map here, and think blue for the green, it’s hard to not see the possibilities)
We finally raised the minimum wage, something the state GOP has refused to do since it was last raised in 1996, with 62% of the vote. It will climb from the current $7.85 to “to $8.60 an hour next year, then increase 85 cents a year until it reaches $12 an hour in 2023.”
We also passed Amendment 1:
So in Misery, where the corruption of state lawmakers has long been a requirement of governance, not so much anymore.
Add in the sound defeat of Proposition A back in August and it becomes quite clear that there is a very strong disconnect between what Miserians want, and what the people they elect will give them. I have no idea of how to break thru that barrier, but I have hope that somewhere in this state there is a young up and comer who can answer that riddle.
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
@Lapassionara:
Old white people is the reason.
Paul Ryan may be right about the positive effects of starving granny. I wouldn’t be completely adverse to a state-targeted termination of SS and Medicare, say for about five years.
Jeffg166
My condolences. What a nightmare of a new governor and senator. PA went blue bigly which makes me feel a bit better. Think Donald shouldn’t count on PA helping him in 2020.
Platonailedit
I was also initially depressed thanks to fucking floriduh, ohio and maryland (make up your mind MD, are you blue or a red state?).
But as the day wore on, more and more bright spots appeared and all in all, while not ecstatic, I am very happy with the results.
Unknown dem pols like Beto, Stacey and Gillum gave the thugs a run for their money. And the illegal squatter scum’s vile immigration agenda just hit the brick wall.
Baud
@OzarkHillbilly:
White identity politics explains the difference. What else could it be?
OzarkHillbilly
@rikyrah: A game changer.
Betty Cracker
Y’all are right about the passage of Amendment 4 in FL — that’s definitely a bright spot. Could even be a game-changer going forward. We’ll see.
One thing of the many things that worry the hell out of me about the results in FL are what will happen to the gun restrictions passed in the wake of the Parkland massacre. DeSantis has vowed to overturn them. He will also get to appoint three state supreme court justices.
Moving up the Eastern Seaboard, can any South Carolinians explain what the hell happened to Mark Sanford’s old House seat, now a Democratic pickup? Happy but puzzling news.
Dagaetch
So every year, my tax dollars get sent to Florida to help y’all recover from hurricanes because you choose to live in a stupid location, and you turn around and say thank you by electing idiot Republicans? Fortunately, climate change will soon make Florida uninhabitable. Can’t come soon enough.
wasabi gasp
@Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes: Take the blinders off. This is not an age thing.
PaulWartenberg
I am surrounded by evil Floridians.
I am seriously thinking of getting the hell out of here.
Any sane state hiring librarians? I am now willing to brave the cold north of I-10.
BlueDWarrior
@Betty Cracker: As a Red State Democrat, I understand your level of upset entirely; but you also know, as a Red State Democrat, when the hilljacks are motivated, we’re stuck because so many of our voters still have this learned helplessness when it comes to elections.
The biggest thing that Obama and Holder can do is to help get money down here for people to get their proper IDs and whatnot until Democrats win enough to overturn these bogus Voter ID laws. The gerrymandering of different seats will still be a problem but it could at least help with statewide competitiveness. And we just need to rebuild a lot of the Southern parties in general. Democratic parties in the Old Confederacy (minus Virginia) have become dilapidated institutions in dire need of activist rebuilding and the related monetary support.
The Struggle continues…
R-Jud
My aunt down in Fort Myers is also in a lot of pain this morning, Betty. Condolences.
Racist and anti-democratic bullshit is baked in to the structure of our country, so any victory against it has to overcome incredible odds. It’s really depressing that those odds are about to become even more incredible in Florida.
OGLiberal
My expectations were low going into yesterday. They were not met. I haven’t had a chance to dig into the details but Gillum and Abrams losing is terrible. Nelson and McCaskill losing is terrible. This fucker and his party are open racists and the best we could do was flip a few governor seats and barely win the House?
9.4% popular vote win in House races means shit to me. That what we stand for polls well means shit to me. With this facist in charge we should have won all cloae races. We didn’t.
Scared white people rule this nation and I think the young ones among them either agree or don’t give a fuck or never will.
I’m not going to candy coat yesterday. It sucked. And I’m not in for a long hard slog. We’ve already had that…and the illusion of Obama in the WH for 8 years but with only 2 to do anything meaningful fooled us. We are a white power nation. And I’m as white as they get so would be OK with that if I were a purely evil and selfish person.
Y’all are going to bitch at me and tell me why yesterday was good and why didn’t I send postcards, etc. Yesterday was not good. Postcards mean shit. White people in this nation are scared and mean and selfish and waiting for them to die won’t matter because if the young ones disagreed and/or cared enough to vote, Gillum and Abrams would be governors right now and Nelson would have blown out Lex Luthor.
In the Trump era, if what he stands for isn’t enough to massively repudiate him then we either agree or are too passive and pussy to fight back. And don’t sell me voter suppression. Yeah, it’s real…but our numbers should be enough overcome.
Again, last night did not meet my low expectations. Yay, Nancy Pelosi, whom I love, is Speaker. What the fuck can she do to stop Trump from appointing some 47 year old lunatic to SCOTUS if RBG has an insurmountable cancer recurrence next year?
This barely meeting expectations shit will emboldened Trump world.
Sorry; folks, either our side sucks or we are on the losing end of many arguments.
And, again, fuck the voter suppression arguments. Russian ratfuckery in 2016 and whatever happened this year should not have happened if our positions were popular enough and enough people who agree with those positions voted. With an open facist in control we should have won all those close races in purple to lightly red states. We didn’t.
Yesterday sucked. End of story. Now go ahead and beat me the fuck up with stats that won’t change the fact that McCaskill and Heitkamp and Nelson lost. Yay, we won Nevada and Scott Walker lost. Means pretty much shit in the bigger scheme if things.
Maybe the Confederacy should have won if voters in this country loves them Trump and racism so much.
Fucking white people.
Mai Naem mobile
I wonder if the Dems need to stop spending money in Floriduh and spend it on Texas/NC/AZ. Floriduh is expensive.
hilts
Betty,
You have my deepest condolences for lunatic Ron DeSantis and lizard man Rick Scott.
Another Scott
We always knew that progress wasn’t going to be easy or linear. But overall it was a very good night. In spite of the GOP spin, we continued to pick up House seats – many more than 2016 and flipped control. The Senate was very tough as expected and we lost a couple. And we picked up some Governors that will be vital in redirecting battles that will have a huge effect in politics in the 2020s.
Let’s figure out what worked and didn’t, examine which races turned on cheating, and gather our forces for the battles ahead. And continue to groom strong new leaders for the future.
And enjoy our victories!!
Forward!!
Cheers,
Scott.
Platonailedit
BBC piece on this election worth a read.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-46121377
raven
@OGLiberal: What fucking horseshit.
BlueDWarrior
@Mai Naem mobile: Too many people still move to Florida so you need to at least get the state party back to parity, so you can get more House Seats. But investing into NC, Texas, and GA would be very much worth it, especially in the voter registration/engagement side of things.
terry chay
@prufrock: unfriendly them. they are telling you who they are and exploiting your social capital to normalize their shit. You don’t need them, but they need you.
As for why. The world economy hasn’t crashed yet. When it does, all bets are off. Florida is full of retiree rentiers who have not experienced the reality of their decisions because their 401ks haven’t collapsed and the Democrats passed Obamacare, so them trending right is to be expected. They will because bad economic policy, global warming, and overpopulation is creating a perfect shit storm of strife not seen since the great depression and two world wars.
I take heart in knowing LePage’s new home will be underwater, literally soon after he moves there.
Dog Mom
FYI, NY-27 at 12:55 am – After conceding last night, Nate McMurray tweeted “After examining the numbers, the margin is 1% and the will of the voters must be heard. We are demanding a recount. Mr. Collins is going to need another set of lawyers.” I knew it would come down to lawyers!
Lapassionara
@Betty Cracker: This is my guess about Sanford’s seat. He lost the primary to someone too crazy for that district, which was going to trend blue eventually.
BlueDWarrior
@Dog Mom: If nothing else, he is positioning himself for the special election if/when Collins gets convicted.
Which would be hilarious tbh…
Platonailedit
@Mai Naem mobile:
Yup. FL is a stinking sinkhole which sucks up too much dem energy, enthusiasm and money and gives zilch back in return. At least, these states are attractive electorally.
OzarkHillbilly
@Baud: Oh it is, very much, and guns, with a strong dose of religious fervor in there too. I know the nature of the disconnect but just as I an atheist can only discuss religion with a believer on the most superficial terms, or as I a gun owner who can see no reason to not have stronger regulations of them and an end to any kind of carry laws (here, any one can carry, concealed or not, without a permit) and an end of the private ownership of weapons nobody outside of *law enforcement* has any real life need for (AR-15s, AK-47s, etc etc), I as a non-racist don’t understand the white grievance.
I grew up in the 60s and 70s, my white privilege was front, center, and obvious every single day of my life. Time after time after time, I got breaks just because I was white. I heard those words coming out of my bosses mouths. Just because they don’t use those words anymore, doesn’t mean it is any less obvious now. A certain number know it is there and like it, a certain number refuse to see it because then they didn’t make it on their own, but a certain number don’t see it because they weren’t and aren’t paying attention or are too young to have lived as I have, or see it and just think it’s not as bad as all that or… etc.
People like to make excuses or just tell themselves it isn’t their problem, they should be reachable but I have no idea of how to get thru to them.
Platonailedit
@Mai Naem mobile:
Yup. FL is a stinking sinkhole which sucks up too much dem energy, enthusiasm and money and gives zilch back in return. At least, these states are attractive electorally.
FollyGuy
@Betty Cracker:
The incumbent, Mark Sanford, got primaried by a hard core Trumper. Her campaign was entirely the national platform – pelosi bad, brown people scary, etc. Cunningham ran by focusing on local issues, especially offshore drilling which Arrington was for and everyone in the lowcountry hates.
Also helps that Charleston county has grown considerably the last few years, with a large blue influx thanks to companies like Boeing coming in and bringing folks from out of state. Helped offset the 4 surrounding hard red counties that make up the rest of the district.
germy
I woke up this morning and started checking my local TV news stations.
One thing I notice. The republican reporters and anchors don’t have good poker faces. One of them, a young guy frowned when he reported on a democratic win. Then he brightened when he mentioned a republican win.
A correspondent standing in front of the state house, reported glumly that it was “all dem” now. A heavy sigh. “It remains to be seen how that works out.”
And this isn’t the sinclair station, which I purposely avoided. These are two other news stations that pride themselves on being the independent voice of our region.
Has anyone else seen their local anchors/reporters obviously disappointed with Democratic gains? I don’t mean local Fox affiliates, who of course are biased.
JPL
Betty, Did you have to put up their pictures? The Florida loss hurts.
Stacey and Beto ran great campaigns and I hope that all democrats learn from them. In two states where democrats shouldn’t have a chance they came close, because they ran as progressives. McBath is ahead in the 6th and it would be so sweet if she could pull that off. Neither candidate received 50 percent in the SOS office so hopefully that will go to a runoff. Republican SOS have screwed up the democrats right to vote in GA and that seat needs to flip. Democrats tend to stay home during runoffs in GA, but hopefully we can change that.
raven
@JPL: And John Barrow is a fucking douche bag.
OzarkHillbilly
@Another Scott: Hear, hear.
Baud
@JPL:
I’m not sure if that was the reason, or if it was their personal charisma. I’m certainly past the point of automatically believing that progressives do better than non-progressives when it comes to winning races.
A Ghost To Most
It’s a start, but preparations will continue. The Nazis will not give up. Neither will we.
Eural Joiner
@OGLiberal:
Sorry to hear your pain – but maybe you should learn how our government and elections are structured? I don’t know what you were expecting but your assessment is just wrong on about every level. Winning the House probably just saved our democracy in a way that will be studied for decades and was way more important than any single/celebrity race.
OGLiberal
@raven: Are you happy with the results overall? I’m betting you aren’t.
It ain’t horseshit. It’s reality. I’m all for our side but these results do not meet expectations in a world where Trumpism should have been repudiated overwhelmingly. It wasn’t. Do you disagree?
We don’t have time for a long, hard slog. My kids don’t. If I’m waking up saying “meh”, last night sucked. Republicans facing the same results would be furious but we’ll find solace in nationwide popular vote results that mean shit with Ron Desantis as governor of Florida.
Our side needs to be as scared and pissed as the scared and pissed white people who will still vote GOP even with Trump running the show. We, apparently, are not. That’s reality, not horseshit.
I’d be happy to see reality change. Not hopeful. Fight voter suppression, yes. But if we aren’t changing enough peoples’ minds, and last night shows we aren’t, everything else means shit. There’s no fucking way Andrew Gillum and Bill Nelson should have lost. They did.
Suburban Mom
My local Fox channel had a piece this morning on how Beyoncé announced support for Beto on social media very shortly before he lost. Out of all the possible election news this is what they chose to cover. This is the kind of garbage driving the choices Betty highlights. It’s what we need to break through in more places.
John S.
As a fellow Floridian, I’m right there with you. But I take comfort in the fact that next election, 1.5 million more Floridians that the GOP was desperate to get rid off will have the ability to vote.
WereBear
THIS THIS THIS so very much.
But Betty’s dilemma shows we cannot write off any state, people there are people in it who need to turn the state blue. I was fortunate in that I had no ties that kept me from fleeing Florida when I was able, mostly because the Confederacy is no place for a woman.
Such abused voters who are easily scared because they are racist and sexist and fundamentalist in many ways, not just religion: they are taught to shut up and obey, and I don’t know if we can ever turn them around in any quantity.
I do think it is enough to stop the rampant Republican cheating.
raven
@OGLiberal: So slit your wrists.
SFAW
Well, it’s good to see a new House, but I feel for you, Betty. A friend’s parents moved from NY to FL, partly to add Dem votes where needed. I guess overcoming racist motherfuckers takes more than two persons.
One of the above-the-fold headlines at CNN.com was talking about “Pelosi detractors plot next steps.” Starting in already. Fucking awesome. I refuse to click on it. I expect Seth Moulton (MA-something, over near Anne Laurie I think) will be one of the ringleaders, as he has in the past.
Meanwhile, it will be interesting to see if ZEGS tries any fuckery before January. If we had taken the Senate, Turtle would certainly do whatever he could to fuck things up; I’m not sure Ryan is that venal. Well, he is, but maybe not in that way. On the other hand, he kept Nunes in place.
Fuck all of them, racist/fascist pieces of shit.
OzarkHillbilly
@raven: Why you botha?
Another Scott
@OzarkHillbilly: Some aspects of white grievance are easy to understand. My Dad bought a nice house in the Atlanta suburbs for about 2.5 times his middle class salary in 1973. Gas was about $0.30 a gallon. A cheap new car was about $2000. College didn’t cost a fortune. Raises was pretty much an annual event. Going to the doctor didn’t invite financial ruin.
Many, many people who remember things like that look around and wonder what the hell happened?? And are surrounded by people and politians who construct simple (and wrong) explanations.
We need better memes, and we need to find ways to make concrete progress when we do have power. People are impatient for progress.
My $0.02.
Cheers,
Scott.
Betty Cracker
@JPL: Oh crap, I read somewhere that McBath had won, but now I see the race is still “too close to call.”
@Lapassionara: Oh I figured it was because Cunningham is just so damned cute! So glad Arrington lost. Trump Jr. held a rally for her a couple of days ago, and the orange fart cloud recorded a robocall for her. I read that this is the first time the Democrats have flipped a House seat in SC since 1986!
SFAW
Re: the “un-dis-enfranchisement” ballot question: is there any way for the Florida legislature to prevent that from being enacted? Can they pass a bill saying “Fuck that, they’re still not allowed to vote”? I have no idea how that shit works in Florida.
Baud
@Another Scott:
They voted for Reagan.
OGLiberal
@Eural Joiner: Yeah, so no legislation we don’t like will be passed by the House. And 2 years from now, the majority of voters will blame the Dems for not fixing things.
Meanwhile, Mitch will continue to give lifetime appointments to wingnut judges.
I know how our system works. But this guy and the party that supports him are as bad as they get since Reagan and maybe worse. Reagan and his folks won on the strength of racist Southern Dems who switched their preference even if they didn’t switch the voter registration. Most of them are dead now. Why can’t we overcome that?
Sorry, I can’t candy coat this.
debbie
Same in Ohio, Betty. Bastards.
raven
@OzarkHillbilly: Georgia and Florida stayed they way they were, big surprise.I watched everyone get all in a tizzy about Ossof and the same thing happened. There was NOTHING more important than taking the house and we did. I guess that’s why.
OzarkHillbilly
One thing nobody has mentioned yet: Kris Kobach got kicked to the curb by Kansas voters in favor of DEM Laura Kelly.
That’s in Kansas folks.
debbie
@raven:
And with a passel of women!
raven
@debbie: Fuckin A!
OGLiberal
@raven: I’ll go tell my kids you said that at the same time I tell them that, yes, racist white people still rule our electoral world.
germy
Conor Lamb!
raven
@OGLiberal: You need to take a walk.
JPL
@Baud: The 6th district in GA was drawn to insure a republican win, and right now Handel is behind. She might end up winning but it’s going to be tight. McBath ran as an advocate of gun control and is pro choice. Those issues alone should have insured a Handel victory, but as of now it’s to close to call.
Baud
@debbie:
Passel > a binder full
Betty Cracker
@OzarkHillbilly: Another bright spot for sure!
John S.
@OGLiberal:
I agree with you that they shouldn’t have lost. I voted for them both. But I understand why they lost.
Bill Nelson was a thoroughly dull and uninspiring candidate. His performance in the Parkland town hall was pathetic, and his campaign literally resorted to “I was an astronaut”. Expecting more people to pull the lever just because someone has a “D” next to their name doesn’t work in Florida the same way as when someone has a “R” next to their name.
Andrew Gillum on the other hand was inspiring. But he lost for a very different reason. As much as I didn’t want to believe that the caricature of the scary, Negro socialist would work against him – it did. And combined with the bullshit about him being investigated by the FBI, he lost. But he came pretty damn close despite those headwinds, and had DeSantis not been able to attack him on being corrupt, I don’t think the racism alone would have been enough.
OGLiberal
@SFAW: I think better than half of the old folks – and young – who move to Florida are racist, scared white folks whose red votes didn’t matter much in Brooklyn or Michigan. In Florida, they do.
TriassicSands
@OzarkHillbilly:
Only if enough of them vote (and vote for Democrats) and that is far from guaranteed. It is an important statement to allow them to vote, but to make a difference they need to exercise that right. I hope they do, but I wouldn’t bet on it.
@raven:
I disagree. My feelings are a lot more mixed that OGLiberal’s, but his response is, I believe, understandable and defensible (even if I don’t share it).
Many of the important races that were polling neck and neck went to the GOP. Sadly, that feels like the norm, mostly because so many potential Democratic voters don’t show up, they never do, and they probably never will.
Trump is so extreme that the idea that roughly half the voters find him somewhere between acceptable and worthy of adoration ought to trouble and upset any decent person. This election, whatever it was, was not a clear repudiation of Trump. And that’s because tens of millions of Americans support him. That is disgusting and scary. They’re choosing fascism over democracy.
I think one way to characterize the overall results is to say that this country has cancer and we desperately needed an election that would have at least put the disease in remission. However, that would have required Dems to take the Senate, which I never considered at all likely. Instead of remission (a cure wasn’t possible in a midterm election) we ended up with a treatment that will slow the progress of the disease, but the cancer is still there and could easily break out once again in 2020. Slowing the progress of the disease is a cause for some relief, but with the situation on the SCOTUS Trump could easily get another two seats to fill before 2020 and the Dems have no way to stop that. So, I can understand why OGLiberal feels the way he does and I don’t think it’s unreasonable. People respond differently to an election like this. That doesn’t make their feelings “fucking horseshit.”l
OGLiberal
@John S.: In a sane world, both would have won. Not by much, but they would won. Our world is not sane.
germy
@OGLiberal: LGM comment:
OzarkHillbilly
@raven: I don’t understand why people get so upset when things happen as one could have expected. Claire lost, I was hopeful she would win. Cest’ la vie. Anne Wagner won. Cest la vie. I still have that self important chub of a human being Jason Smith “representing” me in DC. Cest la vie.
Amendment 1 passed. Corruption in the state lege is more illegal and it will be much harder to gerrymander.
Amendment 2 passed. People who need it will be able to use marijuana with a scrip, and they will be allowed to grow their own meds.
Proposition B passed. The state minimum wage is going up to more accurately reflect the economic realities of living in this state.
Sadly, Proposition D did not pass, so our roads and bridges will continue to degrade.
All in all, it was a good election for me. Not the one I wanted, but about as good as I could hope for.
Gator90
@Mai Naem mobile: Florida is the third most populous state; Obama carried it twice; a liberal African-American just got 4 million votes for governor. Giving up on FL would be really dumb.
Baud
@TriassicSands: People wanted to believe that 2016 was all about Hillary’s awfulness. It wasn’t, and now we have no excuse for not realizing what we’re up against.
BlueDWarrior
@OGLiberal: When has it ever been sane? Democrats have been having the same problem in the South since Nixon by and large. Democrats who don’t bow to the sensibilities of white supremacy in the South bang their heads on that 48-49% ceiling. We thought we were changing things when electing Obama, and we did. Unfortunately the hilljacks got triggered by black guy in White House and Democrats winning the urbanized South so you are getting a bitter backlash.
But being an observer of political history says that this not out of line with how Southerners vote given the drift in the two parties’ psycholgies since the early 70s.
debbie
@Baud:
Nine-O! This is a pretty good consolation prize, to be honest. Takes the sting out of zero change in stupid Ohio.
J R in WV
@Dagaetch:
Dag, where do you live? How many Floriduh men do you want in YOUR neighborhood??? How bad will your local politics be with, say, half a million Floriduh folk voting for slime-ball Fascist Con artist candidates in your district?
OGLiberal
@raven: Sorry, but this guy and his party should have been repudiated much more strongly than they were. A walk ain’t going to cure that.
@TriassicSands summed up my feelings much less than emotional than I did.
BlueDWarrior
Also, and this is more meta but some people want to be bandwagon jumpers and feel like they are voting for a ‘winner’. So even though Democrats last night didn’t maximize their gains, we should still act like we won something of worth. If for no other reason than to solidify our gains in Surburbia and hopefully start breaking State Leg logjams for when redistricting starts after 2020.
OzarkHillbilly
@TriassicSands:
A betting fool and his money are soon parted. People worked hard to get these people back their rights. I’m pretty sure they are now going to work hard to get them to exercise those rights. It’s a long game.
JR
@Another Scott: Well, one thing is that the rest of the world rebuilt their industrial capacity after WWII. The US got a huge head start and we are still enjoying parts of it even today but it was not sustainable.
TriassicSands
@OzarkHillbilly:
“What’s the Matter with Kansas?”
A little bit less today. Kobach’s defeat, along with that of Walker in Wisconsin, is truly one of the highlights of statewide elections.
Other similar elections, but with disappointing results were Kemp’s win in Georgia and Cruz’s win in Texas. In both cases really excellent Democrats lost to truly despicable Republicans. Georgians and Texans know who those candidates are now, and either or both might return in the future to win after Republicans continue their decades long failure to deliver.
Another Scott
He makes a decent point…
https://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2018/11/tonight-was-one-of-the-great-political-blowouts-of-modern-history/
Cheers,
Scott.
debbie
@Another Scott:
I look forward to Trump’s acknowledgement that he’s taken a shellacking. //
Betty Cracker
@John S.: I agree with that assessment. Nelson should have passed the baton six years ago. Now we’re stuck with Skeletor for six more goddamned years. Ugh!
Barbara
A lot of the results were baked into the process in 2010. At least 4 states have taken real steps to unbake them over the last two years, including last night: MI, VA, WI and PA. It was a long night, I get the disappointment, but along with gerrymandering we are still in the generational wave that began with Reagan. And that is why incremental victories are more important than they seem.
OzarkHillbilly
@TriassicSands:
Neither should, and hopefully won’t, be done. Their political futures could be very bright indeed.
Another Scott
@JR: True, but I’ve seen the argument that the US didn’t really export all that much, so the post-war picture is more complicated than it might appear.
But independent of the “real” reasons, the point is that the other side has constructed memes that resonate with people that vote to prevent actual progress. “Your Taxes are Too High because The Godless Demonrats are giving Your money to Those People…” It’s a simple, easy to swallow bit of toxic sludge.
We have our own memes – “You can’t afford to go to the doctor or send your kids to college or buy a house because all of the gains in the economy for the past 4 decades have been unfairly taken by people at the top of the income and wealth ladder…” but it requires more thought and is contrary to other American memes (“work hard and you’ll get rich!!”). Much of politics isn’t ruled by logical arguments – it’s a creature of our tribal, lizard brains…
It’s not an easy problem to solve. (If it were, it would have been solved already.)
There are lessons we can learn from the successful economies and societies that rebuilt themselves after being decimated in the 1940s. But those societies were and are much more homogeneous than ours and they’re having their own problems these days (battles over immigration, etc.).
All we can do is keep working for progress.
Cheers,
Scott.
Betty Cracker
@debbie: That fuckhead has been taking victory laps since 4 AM or so. He sees this as a YUGE victory that is due solely to himself.
TriassicSands
@Baud:
2016 was one of the most complex elections in our history. Some people were tired of “the Clintons,” but most still voted for HRC. (A surprising number of Democrats have said that to me — one of them just last night.) But the Russian interference and Comey’s indefensible actions may have been enough by themselves to hand the election to Trump, and neither had anything to do with HRC’s “awfulness.” I agree, it wasn’t her awfulness that caused her defeat.
The real thing we’re up against is tens of millions of voters who are so stupid, ignorant, racist, or some combination of the three that they will vote for Trump and Republicans. Sadly, there is no easy fix for that — in fact, there may be no fix at all. Lots of us have discovered that it isn’t even possible to have an intelligent discussion about Trump with one of is supporters. The only way to defeat them is to get more Democratic voters to the polls and that has never been the strong suit of Democrats, though not for a lack of trying. This election people were ecstatic over the prospect of “massive” voter turnout, where “massive” can be defined as increasing turnout to the point where it is still a national embarrassment.
BlueDWarrior
@Barbara: And a lot of places where we’ve had gains, especially in legislatures, were in the places where we had maps get un-baked over the last couple of years.
Like i said earlier, the struggle continues…
germy
All the good news from the midterm elections:
https://www.thecut.com/2018/11/midterm-elections-2018-biggest-wins-for-democrats.html
OzarkHillbilly
@Betty Cracker: We’ll see how many victory laps he takes after cabinet member after cabinet member is forced to testify innumerable times before one House committee after another. McConnell will push his advantage to the limits and beyond but all of his partners in crime who have to run in 2 years will be using a different calculus than Mitch’s and it won’t be quite so easy for the turtle.
Baud
@TriassicSands:
I agree. All of our efforts need to be in organization and voting, and not just on the eve of the election. We need a party infrastructure again. That means that ideological purity has to take a back seat. I’m not sure if we have it in us to do that.
Emma
@Dagaetch: screw you, buddy. Florida democrats spend their lives fighting a rearguard action in a racist gerrymandered state and this is what we get? Sometimes I think that Democrats are our own worst enemies.
germy
http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2018/11/new-york-state-has-entered-a-new-phase-of-politics.html
SFAW
@OzarkHillbilly:
For example, Susan Collins will start voting with the Dems on stuff that actually matters.
I swear, I crack myself up sometimes.
TriassicSands
@OzarkHillbilly:
It’s definitely a long game. For their own sake, I hope felons recognize the importance of their restored right and take advantage of it.
Unfortunately, poverty plays a role in creating the conditions that help push people into crime and, at the same time, poverty contributes to the likelihood that people will be poorly educated and subject to debilitating ignorance. Ignorance, in turn, is one of the reasons why people who should vote for Democrats don’t vote at all and if they do vote, they vote for Republicans. So, yes, it is a long game and a difficult one, but one that is important to the future of this country. And one that Democrats must fight and win.
Citizen Scientist
@raven: Thank you!
Doom and gloom and negative thinking never got anyone anywhere.
What Have the Romans Ever Done for Us?
@prufrock: I really think the Democrats need to start un-vilifying Socialism. Say things like…the Republicans want a Putin style dictatorship/kleptocracy, but they want us to be afraid of becoming modern day Scandinavia? Yeah, right.
Given the results last night – Sinema somewhat underperforming, Gillum and Nelson somewhat underperforming…I don’t know. It doesn’t seem like we’re ever going to see Latino/Hispanics turn out in major numbers. We need an electoral strategy that doesn’t count on those votes materializing. It seems like every election cycle they’re supposed to be part of the Democratic wave that solidifies our majority and every election cycle…they don’t show up in numbers you would expect considering how the opposition constantly demonizes them. I guess maybe I’m wrong as I have not seen polling on Hispanic turnout but it seems pretty likely that if they’d turned out in a major way in Arizona and Florida would have gone more heavily for Democrats. Instead, the transplant oldsters from the Midwest have managed to completely cancel out their impact in FL.
Emma
@OGLiberal: Fine. Don’t let the door hit you on the way out.
wasabi gasp
Where them BIEs at?
SFAW
@Betty Cracker:
Maybe Charlie Crist can take him on in 2024?
Sorry, I shouldn’t be making jokes when you’re in such (justifiable) pain. But, as a Masshole — thus, not as familiar with the state of the Democrat Party in FLA — I am amazed that the Dem bench in Florida appears to be so thin. I was amazed and please that Gillum was such a good, strong candidate.
OGLiberal
@Emma: In the way out of where?
Platonailedit
@Betty Cracker:
It’s high time the dems started framing and treating the shithead as a lameduck. His ‘tweet power’ has always been overrated and obsessed over. Focus on the thug’s and his corrupt regime’s actions than on his daily tantrum distractions.
BlueDWarrior
@What Have the Romans Ever Done for Us?: The biggest problem is still that in the Old Confderacy (minus VA), our voters still believe their vote is worthless. What a lot of these races are showing is “No, your vote isn’t worthless, please get up and come out.”
Some of that is going to have to come on the part of Liberal groups parachuting themselves into the South and organizing Black and Latinos just like they did during the Civil Rights era. And yes that will necessarily cause a backlash, but the potential gain is much more worth it.
No power is conceded without a struggle, as it has been said since time began…
wasabi gasp
@Citizen Scientist: It gets refugees moving pretty good.
Platonailedit
@SFAW:
Didn’t the massholes reelect a rethug govnor despite their reputation as a deep blue state? Not to forget that playboy model as a senator. Pots, kettles and all that.
Emma
@OGLiberal: The democratic party. America.The human race?
BlueDWarrior
@wasabi gasp: If you want to be a little morbid about it, you can say we have a lot of political semi-refugees packing up and leaving the South and chunks of the MidWest, meaning it’s hard to turn these states Blue on balance because we keep suffering bleedout.
In some respects, it might be easier to organize Texas because of all the low-hanging fruit that’s still on the tree than a Georgia or a Florida. NC is still a wild card, they just do whatever they feel like half the time.
I think Democrats in Virginia need to start going to these other big States in the South(east) and trying to figure what those state parties are doing wrong and seeing if anything is transferable from a mechanical standpoint.
SFAW
@OGLiberal:
I often get annoyed by the propensity of some commenters here to label others as “Eeyores,” because I perceive a lot of the so-called “Eeyore” comments as cynicism, not “fuck it, I quit.”
On the other hand, your comment is pretty much an amalgam of FIIQ and the typical purity-troll “if only those loser Dems gave voters more reasons to love them” bullshit. FSM spare me from purity-troll morons.
OzarkHillbilly
@SFAW: They will either push back, especially around the edges, anything so they can say, “See? I’m not that bad.” or just choose to retire. Mitch will have to play the game a little different now because the rules have changed and not in his favor. He won’t lose any of his zealousness, and he has more votes to work with for the next 2 years, but he is going to find a growing number of his members pushing back against taking unpopular votes, which means some things will get lost in the parliamentary maneuvers and never see the light of day. It may be a small victory, one that is ignored and unseen by the electorate, but I’ll take it.
ETA I shouldn’t have used the phrase “the rules have changed” when I mean that “the electoral math has changed, and not in his favor”.
OGLiberal
@Emma: I’m not planning on leaving any of them, thank you.
BlueDWarrior
@Platonailedit: What some of the results in the Northeast tell me is that voters would split their tickets more if Republicans (and the wider conservative movement) weren’t completely insane. At the same time, maybe we’d win more in the South if the Republican party wasn’t acting like the march of time was marching toward literal Armageddon.
Hard to say really…
SFAW
@Platonailedit:
Mass has a larger-than-one-would-expect redneck streak, and probably some misogyny, and has typically run weak (or perceived as such) candidates for governor. (And Martha Coakley kinda screwed the pooch when she ran against Scotty Brown.)
And, not to put too fine a point on it, but fuck off re” your pot-and-kettle idiocy. Or did Massachusetts suddenly become a Florida or Texas — instead of a mini-California — overnight, and I missed it? And, certainly, having an ALL-DEM CONGRESSIONAL DELEGATION doesn’t mean shit, because your fee-fees got hurt.
zhena gogolia
Great comment by Cole: “Our long national nightmare of having to read concerned statements from Jeff Flake is almost over.”
OzarkHillbilly
@What Have the Romans Ever Done for Us?:
I disagree. We need to work even harder on their behalf and work even harder at showing them we are making a difference in their lives.
Read an article recently where a young Latino said that nobody in his family ever voted because neither party seemed to care about them. Some will see this as a problem, others as an opportunity. I am among the latter.
SFAW
@OzarkHillbilly:
Good points. I hope you’re right.
ETA: In the meantime, I may look into accelerating our move-to-Maine timetable, so I can run against Collins.
Well, not REALLY run against her, but work for whomever does.
wasabi gasp
@BlueDWarrior: I know this won’t be a well received opinion here because this place is still a smoldering Clinton cul-de-sac pileup, but money is the best initial treatment for most of our ailments.
cope
What Betty said.
The “Hooray, we took Hamburger Hill” point of view is fine and dandy but the problem I see is that we face catastrophic, time sensitive issues that we don’t have the luxury of chipping away at over the next couple of generations. At 68, I know I don’t.
OGliberal
@SFAW: I am the complete opposite of a purity troll. I have no problem with Manchin winning. I celebrate it. Nelson and McCaskill and Tester toed the centrist line as much as possible. They should have. They lost. My problem is with the other sides’ voters propensity to vote no matter what and our side’s propensity to not vote enough. This guy should have had any soft Republicans running for the exits. They didn’t. And we should have come out in insurmountable numbers. We didn’t.
Don’t ever accuse me of being a purity pony. I am a cynical, pragmatic complete opposite of that.
Platonailedit
@SFAW: Can dish it and but can’t take it, masshole?
Raven
So if the Florida and Georgia results were flipped that means racism was vanquished and we would all live together in peace and harmony?
Another Scott
@BlueDWarrior: Dunno about the Democratic Party of Virginia being a role model for the rest of the south. Many, many people here argue that the party is broken and just as dysfunctional as in many other states. It’s just that the NoVA suburbs is overwhelmingly, and increasingly, Democratic enough to make up for it.
Take a look at BlueVirginia if you want more of the insidery view.
I’m all for expanding best practices, etc., etc., but each state party is going to have to be built by motivated locals who understand the state dynamics. There’s no one-size-fits-most model that will work.
Cheers,
Scott.
TriassicSands
@Emma:
Emma, please, lighten up.
In comment 99 Baud writes:
Baud worries that as Democrats we can’t remain united enough to accomplish what we need to do to win vital future elections. I think his is a legitimate concern. And here you are dismissing someone, not even because they aren’t ideologically pure enough, but because they have responded differently from what you apparently think is the acceptable way to respond to Tuesday’s results.
OGLiberal isn’t giving up on voting or the Democratic Party; he’s simply responded to the results in a different way than you have. Responses like yours are, I believe, too common here a B-J. A more productive response might be to try to encourage OGLiberal to not be so down — use the results to redouble future efforts to defeat Trumpism. Instead, you treat him like an enemy. People, even good Democrats, are different. This should not be an echo chamber.
Betty Cracker
@Raven: No. But it would have meant Florida would stop short of electing the digital age equivalent of an Imperial Wizard as governor in 2018 and Georgia wouldn’t countenance voting in an obvious crook who had his bony finger on the voting machinery during his own election for all the world to see. Any other fucking questions?
OzarkHillbilly
@SFAW: So do I, so do I.
Chet
I am happy with the house flip. That is going to really mean something in terms of stopping Trump on the legislative and oversight front. I would have liked to have stopped him on the judicial front, but alas, we fell short.
Emotionally, I wanted a rebuke to not just Trump but Trumpism. And we didn’t get that. Trump lifted Kemp and DeSantis out of their primaries, and then he pulled them across the finish line. So lotsa people in red states still love themselves some Trump. This is going to make Florida especially a tough lift for Dems in 2020.
Ohio too is going to be hard in 2020. Not sure what to make of the fact that a liberal Dem got reelected to the Senate handily, but a more moderate Dem got turned back in the governor’s race.
Retr2327
@rikyrah: yes. 1.5 million people restored to the voting rolls. With even minimal turnout, and a modest Democratic lean, those votes would have reversed the outcome last night. And they may well change the result in 2020.
OzarkHillbilly
@Chet: I think you are giving trump too much credit.
SFAW
@Platonailedit:
Pretty much able to take whatever you can throw, moron.
On the other hand, it helps if your “argument” is based on reality/truth, rather than “nyah, nyah, Massholes elected a middle-of-the-road northeast Republican incumbent, so suck it!”
Despite the aforementioned redneck streak, MA seems to be the only state/commonwealth with an all-Democrat Congressional delegation (i.e., of states with more than two Reps). So, yeah, it’s pot-and-kettle.
But my deepest apologies for hurting your fee-fees with my Florida comment(s). I’ll endeavor to make this a “safe space” for you from now on.
GregB
This is certainly a heightening of the contradictions election.
The GOP will have Steve King’s open sewer hole spilling his bile on a weekly basis.
Also trials for Collins and Hunter and the liklihood that Gianforte assaults another person.
Plus Trump’s takeaway is to become more of a monster.
kindness
What is wrong with the majority of the voters in Florida? Are they all Florida man?
SFAW
@Chet:
I’m guessing incumbency for Brown, and name-rec/Rethuglicanism for (well, against, I guess) Cordray. But Kay is really the one to opine on that, because she knows her shit about Ohio politics.
SFAW
@kindness:
If they were all Floriduh men, they would have done something like steal all the voting machines in deep-red areas, and burned down the polling places (accidentally, of course).
Omnes Omnibus
@OGLiberal: Go blow a goat.
danielx
Commented last night that I felt sort of let down and numb, and that’s still true. Looking on the bright side, Scott Walker and the even more loathesome Kris Kobach lost. Not that both of them don’t have tickets already purchased for the wingnut welfare express; I fear we haven’t heard the last from either of them.
Platonailedit
@SFAW: Safe space? LOL. Nice projection, asshole.
OGLiberal
@kindness: White old transplants from northern states whose votes didn’t matter much in Brooklyn or Detroit. They voted against brown people there but now, combined with confederate jerks, their votes actually make a difference. Florida has, I believe, the largest number of folks in US States who were not born there. They are, mostly, not good people.
evodevo
@terry chay: Yes. My Ky county pretty much went repub for every race except one or two. Most of the county, and several surrounding ones, are employed by Toyota or associated industries, and they all belong to megachurches and vote reliably Repub. This county used to be solidly Dem when agriculture and small factories were the major employers. HOWEVER, when the economy sneezes, and Toyota catches a cold, this region will have double pneumonia. We’ll see how many whining white subdivision dwellers suddenly materialize then. Many have forgotten the economic debacle of 2008. And the national safety net is still mainly intact, though much frayed by the current denizens of the White House. NONE of the people I know could get along for a second if ANYTHING happens to that. Thankfully the House is now safe for a short while.
Barbara
@germy: Cuomo’s two faced gambit finally hit the wall. The example I like to cite is all the credit that Cuomo took for engineering the passage of the gay marriage law in the New York Assembly, when, really, that law would have been a given in New York were it not for Cuomo’s accommodation of Senate gerrymandering, and when that failed, the obscene power sharing arrangement that essentially parked power in the hands of three senators and himself. That’s how he has run roughshod over New York City in a way that is clearly intended to squash any competition for statewide power from the mayor other city politicians. So glad to see that period in New York politics has ended.
Platonailedit
@SFAW:
Even a traditionally red state like CO sent a majority of 4/7 dems to congress this time. As a ‘deep blue state’, sending your puny 9/9 dem caucus is the least you should do, given your ‘bipartisanship’, asshole?
Raven
@Betty Cracker: Don’t get chippy with me.
OGLiberal
@Omnes Omnibus: Shit, I don’t have a goat available.
Omnes Omnibus
@Platonailedit: You are being an asshole. Just saying.
Barbara
@Platonailedit: Baker is not what you would call a thug. He walks a fine line and his role, basically, is to assure people in Massachusetts that its tax and spend reputation doesn’t get too far out of hand. Others might disagree, but I doubt Massachusetts would have voted for Baker if there had been any threat of a majority Republican legislature in either chamber. I see Baker as roughly equivalent to Hogan in Maryland. LePage in Maine is definitely a thug.
Platonailedit
@Omnes Omnibus:
Yes. That’s blog norm and so, meh.
SFAW
@Platonailedit:
Oh, so sorry to have offended you, wisest-person-on-the-internet. I will now ask Cole to ban me because I upset you. I’ll make sure I use ALL CAPS when I e-mail him.
Please try not to have a breakdown because I’ve had the temerity to respond.
Platonailedit
@SFAW:
“Please try not to have a breakdown because I’ve had the temerity to respond.”
Again, what’s with the projection? Guess I will leave you with your safe space.
Omnes Omnibus
@Platonailedit: Blog norm? Not so much. But you be you.
Platonailedit
@Omnes Omnibus: Meh.
SFAW
@Platonailedit:
Yes, yes, we’re all impressed by Colorado, and by your super-insightful analysis and ignoring of reality. Sorry that MA is not (in your “mind”) 100 percent “deep blue.” It probably also offends you that we also have some state reps and state senators who have an R after their name(s). So I guess that means, in your world, that MA is not really a blue state.
You seem to be trying to compensate for something, can’t imagine what it would be.
SFAW
@Platonailedit:
You seem to be using those terms a lot. You seem not to understand their meanings.
As they say about your type: “every accusation is a confession.”
Omnes Omnibus
@SFAW: Beats being a Jets fan.
OGLiberal
@Barbara: I actually have no problem with Baker or other past GOP Mass govs but given that it’s a very blue state, are the Dem alternatives so terrible or voters just like a check on the inevitable Dem state legislature majority? Asking from NJ, where we often pull the same shit.
Barb 2
@wasabi gasp:
Lots of us old folks were out there fighting. And even older folk were teaching us about global warming and dirty politics long before many of the granny starved advocates were born. Earth Day – where we learned about the human caused global warming began decades ago. Fighting the GOP started ages ago with Nixon etc.
There are some younger jerks who are out there loving on their Trump messiah. The Trump cultist. But this doesn’t mean the young Nazi wannabes makes all young males bad. Ageism is a prejudice that is stupid.
Many old white guys spotted Trump as a b*’ll sh*ing jerk as soon as he opened his mouth. Not all old folks watch Fox bs inc. Trump appeals to a specific personality and it isn’t so much as age but rather education (or lack of education) and low intelligence. Trump appeals to person with types we know because they are family members of neighbors.
Fox viewers are a cult – and they all are not old retired old folks. I don’t know how Fox can be changed – but if you want an organization to blame them let it be Fox.
germy
tobie
@Baud: Much to my surprise Carville made an interesting point last night. Trump won the Presidency with 46% of the vote. The popular vote yesterday was roughly 45% Republican, 55% Democrat. The revelation for me was the you can’t win with Trump-publicans. No argument reaches them. So you just have to do everything in the interim to expand the electorate.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@What Have the Romans Ever Done for Us?:
That would be instantly denounced as extremisn. More importantly I think it’s a matter of the most of the old guard Democratic politicans are simply incapable and unwilling to do stuff like this.
sherparick
@OGLiberal: Well, I agree with your last sentence. At least 65% of white men and 50% of white women, and whatever else we can say about Trump, he sure has brought out the rural, ill-educated white guy to the polls in massive numbers (which from what I understand turned the elections in Florida, Georgia, and Texas). As the man says, he loves the ill-educated.
As to why they vote the way they do. Well, as a white guy, I can tell you that psychological benefits of privileges of whiteness and maleness in America cannot be understated. And then they hear from the radio and Fox News a constant harangue of outrage at Blacks, Browns, Women, and hippies trying to take that all those privileges away and further, if they have problems, well its those People’s and the Government’s fault, not their rich, white bosses. So it is sort of a chicken or or egg situation. Was the audience always there or did Fox and Rush create it over the last 25 years? I will note that no Democrat has received the majority of the White vote in a national election since LBJ was reelected in 1964 and that if the White vote had the same proportion of the electorate in 2008 and 2012 as it had in 1988, Obama would have lost as badly as Michael Dukakis. Nevertheless, that is what we have deal with and we do need to keep fighting the good fight.
We need to organize, we need to connect voters in solidarity with others, and we try to listen to those who like Trump to see if their is a crack in their adoration.
Lincoln said it best in his reply to Douglas at Alton, Illinois (definitely Douglas country, with slave holding Missouri across the river and where Elijah Lovejoy was murdered twenty years earlier for printing abolitionist broad sheets.)
“…That is the real issue! An issue that will continue in this country when these poor tongues of Douglas and myself shall be silent. These are the two principles that have stood face to face from the beginning of time; and will ever continue to struggle. The one is the common right of humanity and the other the divine right of kings. It is the same principle in whatever shape it develops itself. It is the same spirit that says, “You work and toil and earn bread, and I’ll eat it.” No matter in what shape it comes, whether from the mouth of a king who seeks to bestride the people of his own nation and live by the fruit of their labor, or from one race of men as an apology for enslaving another race, it is the same tyrannical principle.”
J R in WV
@OGLiberal:
@raven:
This OGLiberal guy’s nym is mentioned in about 162 posts to B-J, and most of those are people replying to the troll. He is NOT a liberal, not a B-J jackal, he’s a troll working to put down this somewhat successful Democratic resistance movement.
He mostly shows up around election time, and is consistently bitter and hateful towards everyone, liberals and rednecks alike. Just pie him, guys, and soon he will go away again, until October, 2020. Unless they keep him on payroll the whole cycle, but he isn’t that good, so I don’t expect it.
That’s how he got the job.
Raven
@J R in WV: Cool, fuck him.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Barb 2: It isn’t old, it’s Bommer Generation – they grew up with an easy time of it compared to any other generation of Americans and now are dying. You look at the driving themes in the Trump bases – fear of change, fear of the others, fear of everything, why can’t you just get your dad’s job, we need to go back to the good old days, it’s all the ID of the Bomers.
TriassicSands
@Barbara:
Barbara, I don’t know anything about Baker, and you may be right, but I kind of doubt if very many Mass voters are sophisticated enough to actually make that calculation. That’s just not who the typical American voter is. It’s a kind of strategic voting and thinking that is probably pretty rare.
Spanky
@J R in WV: He’d respond, but his shift just ended in St. Petersburg.
Miss Bianca
@PaulWartenberg: plenty of library jobs in CO. And a trending-blue state, praise Jeebus, altho’ it looks like I will still be represented (so to speak) by the odious Scott Tipton. Get Adam or Anne Laurie to send you my email addy if you are serious, or just Google the Colorado State Library Jobline.
Omnes Omnibus
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: Drop the generational things. They aren’t helpful. And learn to spell. Dipshit.
Spanky
As regards Maryland, Jealous ran a terrible campaign. I’m not sure which was worse, that he was nearly invisible or that what I did see was so uninspiring.
Maryland is pretty red outside the urban enclaves, and it didn’t help that a number of local (white) Dems endorsed Hogan. Particularly in Confederate Southern MD.
OGLiberal
@J R in WV: Fuck you and fuck raven and fuck anybody who thinks I’m a fucking troll. My name is Jamie Nieradka and look up whatever shit you can find about me. I live in NJ. I work for AllianceBernstein. I’m not Russian and I’ve never voted for a Republican or a third party shit like Sanders. I’m on your fucking side. I comment frequently but mostly during elections because that’s when shit matters. So, whatever..,
Fucking stop it.
Barbara
@OGLiberal: We see the same phenomenon on my county board, although we tend to refuse to vote for Republicans but will vote for Independents. Basically, when a critical mass of people starts to feel like the board is taking voters’ pocketbooks for granted, an independent candidate will gain traction. Even getting elected is usually enough to discipline the remaining majority of Democratic members. So yes, I see it as wanting a check, but also, in the case of an official who is reelected, voting for the stability of an arrangement that has worked out reasonably well.
One thing that was clear from last night was how much easier it is to attack an open seat than the incumbent occupant.
pinacacci
What the hell is wrong with you guys? I don’t see bitter and hateful. What I see is despair and anguish, maybe because as a fellow Floridian I feel that way too. EVEN IF we won the house, which is !!!AWESOME!!!, those of us in Florida and Georgia have to live in a place where what should not be, is. It is very hard to grok that you live surrounded by racist assholes when elections turn out like this. Give us some time to grieve FFS.
tobie
@Spanky: Jealous was not a good candidate. It was always going to be an uphill battle against Hogan because the state’s economy is in good shape right now and whether or not he’s responsible for the prosperity, he gets the credit for it.
Barbara
@Spanky: Jealous was not ready for prime time, bringing home to me just how much people in his mold are also not likely ready for prime time in a statewide office. Make of that what you will. Nonetheless, the election was much closer than predicted and again, there was an incumbency effect.
Barbara
@pinacacci: Unlike in the Midwest and the West, where I feel like we made real progress, you have to live in a place where state officials have the will and power to continue to impose de jure and de facto voting restrictions and to continue to gerrymander both state and federal offices. I get it. I am very disappointed too, both on my own behalf even though I don’t live there, because of the echo effect on the national landscape, and also because the people living there deserve better. Not being any kind of an expert on Georgia or Florida politics, I think of the usual rules, start local and expand outward. There will be no magic solution.
OGLiberal
@Spanky: All if you throwing shade and calling me a troll…call me at 646-298-4014 and we can talk about my troll credentials. Yes, that’s my real number.
Melusine
I feel you, Betty. So Democrats can investigate Trump – so what? All the evidence any rational person would need to conclude that he is a racist, treasonous, rapey, criminal piece of shit has been out there for years. Too.many white people in this country just don’t give a shit. They have power and/or privilege and they’re by god going to keep it. As a white person, I find it incredibly depressing.
If we’d taken the Senate, actual accountability would be on the table. But we didn’t. Can’t block his appointments. He controls the Senate and judiciary and will continue stacking the courts and government offices with asshats who refuse to hold him accountable. Investigate all you want – without the ability to impose consequences it doesn’t matter. White conservatives will keep supporting him no matter what, the media will keep insisting “both sides”, and the rest of the white population will continue to shrug and refuse to vote and expect brown people to save their asses yet again. Which is a) insanely unfair and b) going to be harder and harder as the courts are stacked with more judges who hate voting rights for minorities, and the Dems can’t pass any legislation to protect them.
If they had taken the Senate, they could have at least limited further damage to civil rights.
Unless enough white people in this country wake the fuck up and start supporting democracy, we’re just going to continue our downward slide. There has been no attempt to protect our elections from foreign interference. There is no penalty now for stealing elections. Including the Presidency.
Maybe if Mueller can indict him soon, there’s a chance we can right things. If not….crimes without consequences lead to more criminality.
And Dems taking the House will just be an excuse for more violent rhetoric from the wanna-be Furhrer, which will lead to more violence.
All the “wins” people are talking about today would be true in a normal timeline, with normal people in charge. In this one I’m afraid that they don’t mean much at all.
I really, really hope I’m wrong. But shit never, ever, EVER should have gotten this far, and yesterday should have resulted in a massive blue tsunami driven not just by minorities, but by enough white people waking the fuck up. The fact that it didn’t means the rules no longer apply, and I don’t know where we go from here.
Kathleen
@germy: Yes. I couldn’t even turn on local news this morning. They gush and slobber over Rethugs.
chopper
@pinacacci:
you’re not toeing the line, comrade.
Emma
I. Can’t. Even. OGLiberal, stop doing stupid things. No Jackal will go after you but there are trolls on this blog from time to time that would.
As for the despair, angst, and sorrow, indulge for a couple of days. Then it’s time to fight again. This time we have the power of the purse in the House and a number of states that turned either semi-or-fully blue, so republican gerrymandering can be pushed back. Is it the best scenario? No. Is it the worst? No. But it’s good enough to get some things changed.
Mostly I want you — all of you that see only the worst — to understand that American politics have always been this way. It is worse only by degree now because white people are panicked by diversity and inclusion. The more Democrats look like the actual country, the more they will push back. We need to fight them off enough to take demographics take its course. Yes, it will be ridiculously painful and infuriating; but it’s all we’ve got.
dww44
@OGLiberal: When those moving combine with the natives, your analysis seems to be on the money. Plus Latinos in Florida don’t seem to me to be progressive or liberal.
The Moar You Know
@OGLiberal: Das vidanya, brand-new defeatist comrade. Straight to the pie filter with you.
OGLiberal
@Emma: I don’t need people calling ne a troll for expressing my well founded and grounded despair. I basically reiterated what Betty said.
I’m not going to stop fighting but when things are so bleeding obvious snd white people still vote like tribal idiots, it’s very difficult to be calm. And the last thing I need is for people I agreenwith calling me a troll. Would you like that?
raven
@OGLiberal: I think you are a fucking punk.
OGLiberal
@raven: call me. We can discuss my trolly punkiness.
SFAW
@Omnes Omnibus:
I don’t even have a half-witty riposte for that.
It seems that (outside of the FTFYankees) NY owners are fucking useless. Woody Johnson, the Wilpons, the Dolans, Prokhorov (Brooklyn Nets) have no business running a team, should sell off to someone like Bob Kraft. [Note: Although I’m not a Pats fan, to put it mildly, Kraft has been a pretty good owner for them. [His shenanigans with the NFL (and I’m guessing he’s part of the Kaepernick blackballing), not so much.]
Yeah, I know you weren’t looking for that type of response.
On a (hopefully) more pleasant note: has Evers officially beaten Scotty the Fascist Kochboy? Last I saw, Evers was leading, but it hadn’t been called yet.
OGLiberal
@The Moar You Know: That’s about the only Russian I know. I’ve been here for years, pal.
Emma
@OGLiberal: No. But blatantly offering public information even on a friendly blog isn’t a really good idea these days.
Gvg
@OGLiberal: delete real numbers. Bad practice with fraud and all out there.
You are a real downer. Get help for yourself.
You depress other people and so they react angrily in self defense. Many here already have issues with depression and you make things worse. There is no useful benefit in dispair so don’t bother. It’s not just that you are down, it’s that you project an air of meanness like how dare some of try to keep going. That is why you aren’t getting any sympathy. If you don’t intend that affect, then you need to work on your writing skills.
OGLiberal
@Emma: Agree, but you can find all those things out by a simple online search. I’ve tried it. Even my nym will tell you who I am. Telemarketers call me anyway.
louc
I feel your pain, Betty. As a former Floridian I was so disappointed with my home state. I blame The Villages, a nightmare of a hellhole retirement community. It’s a blight on I-75 and Florida’s Turnpike and has made a formerly blue-ish area, or at least purplish, red. I hope all those old people in that craptacular development die ugly deaths.
chopper
@Gvg:
honestly, the “how dare you” attitude seems to be coming from a bunch of people. it’s okay to be disappointed in the results of this election.
also, the “you’re a russian troll” shit was already overdone 6 months ago, but here it’s mindnumbingly stupid.
OGLiberal
@Gvg: The owner of this blog and Betty have expressed similar concerns…I’m supposed to be all cheery? Do we have a job as commenters to always look at the bright side of things? Didn’t read that in the job description.
If you are happy with the outcome yesterday, debate that. But don’t fault me for thinking it sucked.
Telemarketers call my number non-stop and I ignore them. Who I am is readily available to anybody who tries for more than 2 seconds. It’s what I do…I know the risks.
dww44
@TriassicSands: This is exactly what my daughter said on the phone last night:
She and her husband, both high school teachers with 4 kids. are so busy they barely found time to vote. Both of them voted straight Democratic on their ballots and left blank those races where there was only a Republican on the ballot (I did the same thing). We tend to have a lot of those. We had no Democratic candidate for our Congressional Seat and no Democratic candidates for either the State Senate or State House. Like with the lotto, you can’t win if you don’t get on the playing field.
We’re both in Georgia and they recently moved from Gwinnett to Fulton for better teaching situations. The nice neighborhood they live in had more Abrams signs than Kemp ones. And, the neighborhood is a diverse one with lots of Eastern European transplants. This is the district with McBath in a tie with Handel.
I’m as sick about having Kemp as my governor as Betty is Desantis.. However, just maybe Abrams will run for the Senate against David Perdue in 2 years and she’ll win. The two elected Republicans here I most want gone are Perdue and Kemp. But, we HAVE to get our hands on the levers at the SOS office in order to stop the voter suppression because we are not gonna get any relief or fairness from the Supreme Court. This is a long fight and I need a break for a bit.
Ladyraxterinok
@sherparick: Graet quote!
Aleta
My sympathy Betty, Floridians and everyone recovering from a local blow to the heart.
Our racist gov is leaving the job, but I know he’s still here for the worst things he can do to us. Now seeking money and another podium for as long as his health lasts.
There’s no good feeling from a constant beating about the head, impossible to protect yourself. (I recall how his first act as gov was to reward the NRA and liberts, his first proclamation was to endorse racism and insult prominent AAs. Then an attack on labor and people of color, and on to environmental law and then to harm and debase low income families and families of addicts.)
I hope the commitment at BJ to candidates in other states might transform to keep on supporting the people fighting evil on the ground in Fla, Georgia, ND, etc. Mainers needed outside support and encouragement to fight the Kochs, and got a few better election results this time.
ellie
@Baud: THIS.
Ben Cisco
@Emma: Thank you for this.
PaulWartenberg
@Miss Bianca:
I’ve tried looking for jobs in Colorado before, back in the bleak days of 2009-2013 when I was painfully unemployed. It is tough for an out-of-stater to get considered for jobs that get 60-100 applications every time. :(
So if anyone can nudge-nudge wink-wink save me a spot, PLEASE keep me in your prayers for effective library service.
pinacacci
@Emma: It’s literally been one fucking day. I think we’re still in the acceptable window of being allowed to express our grief. Nowhere did I see anybody say their sorrow would prevent them from standing back up.
germy
Emma
@OGLiberal: Mine too, since my nym is simply the most common “anglisization” of my name. But don’t do it yourself. It turns it from someone going out of their way to find your personal information to your offering it freely. Never give the bastards an opening, no matter how small.
chopper
@pinacacci:
exactly. it’s okay to feel some fucking feelings from time to time. christ.
Spinoza Is My Co-Pilot
Christ, anymore the way this place turns on anyone with the temerity to express what many regulars consider wrongthink or insufficient positivity is — after being around here (mostly lurking) since before Cole’s conversion in ’05 — pretty astounding to me.
OGLiberal comments in longer form essentially what Betty wrote in her post
And he gets ripped to shreds by most responding to him. Read TriassicSands take on this at comment #74; that’s the liberally-minded approach, not tearing into someone on our side (calling OGLiberal a troll is lazy and stupid) cuz they see the glass half empty. At least we seem to have avoided the moronic “you’re not helping, you’re making it worse, oh no you might even cause someone to commit suicide with your negativity!” attacks seen here before.
I don’t know, maybe back off the self-righteous, vicious routine more appropriate to the fascists and extend to OGLiberal the consideration Betty requested for herself at the end of her post:
I’m pretty much where Betty and Triassic are on the overall results, and not quite as far down as OGLiberal (though I don’t think there’s that much difference). I’m very glad we Dems have the House — that was by far the most important goal and we reached it. If we hadn’t, the slide into fascism would have been inexorable, I think. Might still be, I’m afraid, but at least we didn’t go over the cliff just yet.
On the other hand, I am personally very bummed about Kyrsten Sinema, whose run for Flake’s AZ Senate seat took the bulk of my volunteer efforts and campaign $$ this cycle. Really thought she had this, and she did come oh-so-close, but she’s down by about 1% (about 16,000 votes) with 99% in. It’ll go to recount, sure, but we use optical scan ballots here, which are both hard to fuck up and even harder to misread. Highly doubt she’ll make up the difference in the recount.
Oh well, back in the harness, the fight’s never over, the fascists we have with us always.
OGLiberal
Since I haven’t yet provided my street address, here it is:
Oleg Vlastikonov
323 Voznesenskiy Avenue, Unit 245
St. Petersburg, Russia 196631
pinacacci
@OGLiberal: =-D
Emma
@pinacacci: I did say indulge your grief. Didn’t I? *scurries off to check* Yep. I did.
Steve in the ATL
@OGLiberal: haven’t read but the tail end of this thread, but I suppose that people calling you a Russian troll are half correct? (Joke)
Funny that telemarketing calls are a problem in Russia just as they are here. Never thought about that. Can’t Putin stop them?
pinacacci
@Emma: Sorry I @’d you in response to the whole thread, really. Not personal.
JimL
Don’t let down too long, Betty. You Florida Democrats have about a million and a half NEW voters to get registered and enthused for 2020. In a place where state-wide elections are won or lost by around 100K votes. Or do you think that felons who have paid the price will vote Republican?
OGLiberal
@Steve in the ATL: Putin can only stop big bear with his huge pecs and love of animal. Telemarketers much feared.
Summer
@BlueDWarrior: “And we just need to rebuild a lot of the Southern parties in general. Democratic parties in the Old Confederacy (minus Virginia) have become dilapidated institutions in dire need of activist rebuilding and the related monetary support.” Cheering this in North Carolina.
Spinoza Is My Co-Pilot
@OGLiberal: Ah, a sense of humor. That’s the spirit!
tybee
@raven: i never had an issue with John Barrow. voted for him repeatedly before he got gerrymandered out of his congressional seat.
PJ
@Summer: @Emma: I was reading a very good book recently, Democracy in Chains (about the libertarian/Koch movement to constrict democracy from the 1950s until now), and something like less than 15% of eligible voters were permitted to vote in Virginia in the 1950s (and it was even lower earlier: http://www.virginiaplaces.org/government/byrdorg.html). In the past 60 years, Virginia has gone from being one of the most conservative (then racist Democratic) states in the country to almost being liberal (now not-so-racist Democratic). It took a long time, and a lot of it was driven by educated people coming from out-of-state and settling in NoVa and the Norfolk area, but it happened. Would Andrew Gillum or Stacey Abrams have come this close in FL and GA just four years ago? I think how well they did, given the “Southern Heritage” of those states, is a sign for hope. That doesn’t help the residents of those states now, but if people keep fighting, it will in the future.
TenguPhule
@Melusine: The fact that it didn’t means the rules no longer apply, and I don’t know where we go from here.
Raven Onthill
Yeah. There never was much chance of that, but we could hope. That hope is gone.
If we win over the fascists, it’s going to be some grinding thing. At least, we still can fight.
rsginsf
I’m right there with you, being sick about Scott & Desantis. Two of the most despicable people on the planet, and Florida elected ’em.
I’m surprised, when they show up on the TV, the black worms & goo don’t ooze out of their ears & noses, and gush from their mouths when they open them. I’m surprised their heads stay on their necks, and the flesh doesn’t slide right off the bone.
Shape up, everybody, and behave! Remember: if you screw up & go to hell, these two will be right there to take the first bites out of you, with their scummy teeth, stinking breath, and slick, click-clacky jaws.
And right next in line, tongues slathering, bilious eyes rolling, pushing & shoving to get their bites? Cruz, Kemp, King, Nunes, Hunter…
Well. Back to that Democratic House. Yay!