I know Adam already talked about this, but it really is exciting. I fully expect Bevan to try to steal the election anyway, because that is what the GOP does. But Rand Paul and Moscow Mitch sure are going to be cranky tomorrow.
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frosty
Virginia is now bluer than Maryland. And Massachusetts!! I never thought I’d see that. Well done !!!
Mandalay
RNC Chair Ronna McNotRomney bravely tries to put some lipstick on the disgusting pig:
Whatever, dipshit.
You lost.
Major Major Major Major
Yeah those were both great! I wasn’t expecting Kentucky at all.
No surprises here in nyc, I don’t think.
guachi
17???
A poll from Sunday had Bevin up 5. So, according to the Trump and the RNC chair, that means Trump going to Kentucky on Monday LOST Bevin 5 points.
rikyrah
So true, Cole.
So true.
Just enjoy tonight?
CaseyL
The VA and KY results have made me very happy.
Here in Washington, however, I’m disappointed in the results-so-far of the two statewide initiatives. $30 car tabs, which will kick the legs out from under mass transit funding (again!) is winning; restoring affirmative action in state jobs and education is losing. This might change, as it takes a few days to count all the votes (Washington is a vote-by-mail state) and if it does, I’ll do a dance for joy.
tom
@Mandalay: https://twitter.com/atjeffholcomb/status/1191907980649926662
Mandalay
@guachi:
I know…that 17 number came from a poll in early October, so she pounced on that, and carefully ignored everything that showed that Trump had actually dragged Bevin down (and arguably lost him the race).
Cherry picking at its most absurd.
mrmoshpotato
@rikyrah: Yes, enjoy tonight, but continue the electoral beatings until
morale improvesthe Russthiglicans have no means to fuck our democracy.Kelly
Video of the Virginia Republican Party
https://twitter.com/ZonePhysics/status/1191760160227762178
psycholinguist
On the Mississippi race MS has essentially one “big” city, Jackson, surrounded by large white flight suburbs. Madison, the largest, most affluent, and most educated of those suburbs, went to the democrat this time, 50.6%. Clinton got 40% of the vote in 2016.
NotoriousJRT
Russkie Rand…
NotoriousJRT
@CaseyL:
Ah, the elusive Butterfly of love those $30 car tabs. Pay no attention to that nose we are sawing off to spite our collective face.
piratedan
if you take what some folks in the media have been claiming is going on in the US Senate, that there are Senators that were keeping watch on the races that were on the docket on election day to gauge the direction of the political winds and on the strength of the GOP at the ballot box as a collective, I have to wonder what the take away would be…
you see the Ky Gov tentatively going to a Dem in a state that Trump won by 30%, now is that a moratorium on Trump? On Bevin? both? sure, they still won on a majority of the down-ballot races but those we’re not seen in the national spotlight nor listed as elections with national implications…
Then in Virginia, where the state house and the state senate are now flipped, the gerrymandered advantage has been overcome, which should result in ERA passage, gun control legislation, less culture war bullshit and legitimate redistricting (I would like the Dems to play fair, but can also understand the desire for payback). It’s more evidence of Virginia being in the blue column.
Other votes are showing reduced margins in GOP strongholds, in areas that were once considered safe, they are less so now…
So… does the GOP see DJT as a winner to continue to hang their star on his fortunes or do these results allow them to perhaps reconsider the notion that what is good for Trump automatically means its good for them as well? I don’t expect this to make much of an impact on apparatchiks like McConnell, but are there enough rank opportunists to see this as a way out to shiv the President and potentially salvage their own careers? Or do they see, not just a blue tide rolling in but rather a tsunami and no matter how they vote, they’re doomed and if so, is there anything inside that would allow them to render a most public of service? Based on DJT’s behavior, there’s only so much room in the bunker, do all of these folks want to end their careers there now or perhaps wait a decade for people to forget and try once again? Maybe that’s more pragmatism than we would allow for the GOP, but I’m still skeptical about how many of them are high on their own supply.
Kent
@CaseyL:
Don’t know if it is still the case, but traditionally King County (Seattle) returns come in last in WA statewide elections due to the sheer volume. So who knows. But yes, the car tab defeat would be a blow.
I’m curious to see how the Amazon.com slate did in the Seattle city council elections. Amazon waded into the local elections (I think unadvisedly) and we’ll see how the Amazon-supported candidates actually did. My brother lives in Seattle and said there was a lot of anti-Amazon campaigning going on.
Aleta
The documentary is called Virginia 12th .
Cermet
Very encouraging news! A great way to start the day, too! The dem’s need to take this as proof that the orange fart cloud is posion and they can kick his wothless ass from now on till he is frog mached from the white house into jail.
Mary G
The photos of Democrat victory parties full of young, diverse people cheering their heads off are so good for the soul. Also the wins at low levels in cities and counties.
Damned_at_Random
I’m wondering if there are any exit polls indicating how any Republican women voted against Bevin – he has a abrasive, confrontational style not unlike Trump, and attacked Medicare expansion and public school teachers, which are more important than gun rights to suburban moms. The fact that all the other statewide races went (predictably) to the Repubs by mostly double digits indicates that Bevin was deeply alienating to a significant number of GOP regulars
206inKY
The Kentucky race has convinced me that the single best investment we can make as a party is ground operations. I hadn’t gone door-to-door since 2008 and had forgotten what a well-oiled canvassing drive can accomplish. The college-aged organizers who ran my local office struck me as different and more serious than my own cohort in 2008, when I was totally swept up in Obama and then did nothing in 2010. One key leader supported Adam Edelen in the primary, but then worked her butt off to organize for Beshear. I have no doubt she and the other young people who ran the office will keep organizing in the years ahead, unlike what I did after 2008. They ran a block-by-block campaign, collecting data for months and then flipping on the switch for a massive GOTV drive, squeezing a couple thousand extra votes out of our red-leaning district.
I’m so fucking proud of them. Our democracy is in good hands.
opiejeanne
@Kent: I read up on Eyman and his initiatives, and that $30 car tab has been his focus for a long time.
I hope you’re right because Seattle desperately needs better public transportation.
KrakenJack
I’ve had a bar tab, but never a car tab. Looks the initiative is a cap on the car registration fee, Eyman may have learned a lesson from CA. A restoration of the full vehicle license fee in California was one of the galvanizing issues in the Gray Davis recall along with the electricity scam of 2000 – 2001. Darrell Issa spent $2M on the recall thinking it was his ticket to the Governor’s Mansion.
?BillinGlendaleCA
OK, it’s November 6th, where’s the new Balloon Juice?
opiejeanne
@KrakenJack: I thought the trigger was the disappearance of the budget surplus but the whole thing was a joke, especially Isaa thinking he’d just snatch the golden ring on the carrousel.
My husband considered registering to run for governor that year, just so he could tell our grandchildren about it. He didn’t do it, and we have no grandchildren. .
HeartlandLiberal
Red Paul and Moscow Mitch are already probably in discussions on when to tell Trump he will be convicted in the Senate, and he better resign, duck, and run, because the mushroom cloud is on the horizon.
jon
Good News: ERA will probably be ratified!
(Bad News: and will be interpreted by Kavanaugh)
Ken
@HeartlandLiberal: What Moscow Mitch says:
“President Trump, you are going to be convicted in the Senate. For the good of the Republican party, you must resign and keep a low profile for the next two years.”
What Trump hears:
“President Trump, you blah blah blah blah blah blah. Blah blah blah blah you blah blah blah blah.”
(Yes, shamelessly stolen from Gary Larson.)
Betty
@206inKY: What an inspiring story. We have hope.
Kosh III
Dear Kentucky.
Congratulations; now get rid of Moscow Mitch and RANCID Paul.
BC in Illinois
@Aleta:
Fight like a mother. And win.
Uncle Cosmo
@piratedan: I think you meant “referendum” where you typed “moratorium.”
Yeah, they both end in “um”, but still…
Uncle Cosmo
@frosty: See my post about “Free State Syndrome” in the thread below for an explanation of why the MD Governor’s Mansion probably won’t change party anytime soon so long as the GOP can find a moderate (i.w., slightly left of Genghis Khan) white male to run.
(But who knows, Hogan’s obvious successor, Lt Gov Boyd Rutherford, is African American, & they might nominate some melanin-deficient BSI Trumpista [but I repeat myself] instead in 2022.
(ETA: Corrected an incorrect correction!)
KrakenJack
@opiejeanne: That’s right. There was a lot going on. The dot com bust was still in full swing. As you mentioned, the budget had a huge hole in it, which was a major reason for the exec order tripling the registration fee. There were still enough R’s around to prevent other rational tax measures. There was a major increase in the deficit estimate right after Davis was re-elected. Those things, along with some procurement scandals, pushed his approval ratings down into the 30’s.