Evaluating Election Results
While I think you can't simply overlook the Republican wins in New Jersey and Virginia, I don't think you can blow it up to say that it is directly related to the president's popularity ["Democrats: Elections Not a Referendum on Obama," usnews.com]. It might have had some affect on the results but mainly this election was based on local issues and the desire for a balance between federal and local government, which I think is a good thing. The Democratic Party has a lot of work to do before the 2010 elections, which will ride on whether the economy improves and if they can get some sort of healthcare reform to pass. The NY-23 elections showed that the conservatives are rigidly divided by social issues and that leaves a great opportunity for Obama to move more toward the center and take these moderate votes.
Comment by Jessica M. of MA
What this election appears to say in a loud and clear voice is that many voters are sick to death of tax and spend or even spend, spend, and spend. How this impacts a given elected official or a party purely depends on where they and their party stand on those issues.
Comment by Dwight E. Howell of TN
This [New Jersey] election is a referendum on [Jon] Corzine, the most inept, unresponsive governor the state has had in a long time. The Dems would've been smarter to replace him with someone else. Anyone should be a shoe-in compared to Corzine. Let the Republicans go on thinking that these elections are indicative of some kind of a sea change with respect to Obama. It's delusional to think that after eight years of Bush's incompetence with a complicit Republican-controlled Congress for six of those years that people are going to swing back to that party anytime soon.
Comment by Mike of NJ
Virginia and New Jersey are non-issues. The voters in those states did what they have done for decades: They voted in a party opposite of the president. The real story is the meltdown of the GOP. The split is becoming obvious; the moderate Republicans versus the intolerant conservatives. Look at New York 23 as an indicator of things to come. Division and revenge against each other will prevent them from achieving their various agendas. The hard right does not have a chance; they are too indoctrinated in hate and division. The moderate Republicans cannot beat the Democrats without the fringe right's numbers (votes). While the GOP falls victim to its own philosophy, "win by dividing," the Democrats will grow in strength and dominate the political scene for years to come. They can still attract the moderate and independent thinkers out there who will be disgusted with the hard right and realize a vote for a neutered Republican Party is futile.
Comment by Davide of AZ
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Reader Comments
V.O.T.I.N.G.--there's more to come!
I'm not sure if a group actually exhists (yet), but the more I read and talk to others about, there seems to be feeling developing amongst voters that would be best represented by a group known as the "Vote Out The Incumbant Now Group" (V.O.T.I.N.G.).
Doesn't matter what office they hold; what political party they are associated with; how long they have been in office; who they are; or where they are. Just vote out the incumbants! Let the President work with a brand new House and Senate. If he can't, then we vote HIM out. But for now, at least, I support President Obama and the efforts he's making.
But the House and Senate got to go.
ANALYSIS OF THE ELECTION................
America was defrauded by Obama and they are taking the country back. Liberals are too stupid to realize that you cannot run a center right country from the extreme left, and Tuesday was the perfect example of this. Obama has filled the white house with abortionist, socialist and homo's and America just isn't going to tolerate that. 2010 will be a blood bath and 2012 will be the last time in American history that a radical liberal sits in the white house. Enogh said....check mate!!
Less spin, more win.
Well begun is half done. In each case the clear lesson of NJ, VA, and NY23 was candidate selection. Quality candidates coming in laterally from well- and favorably-known previous public service will topple incumbents with high negatives. Such quality candidates can be outspent in the election campaign and still win. But such lateral candidates cannot have an eye-rolling factor, as with Carly Fiorina. In that case, no matter how much you pump Fiorina, Boxer would still win.
The last thing republican or conservative party comissars should do is force a candidate, like they forced the RINO McCain, and like they initially forced the RINO Scozzafava. Owens would have beaten Scozzafava by a wider margin than he did Hoffman, so chew on that Gingrich.
At the same time, democrats must be dropping bricks that a shoe-horned carpet-bagger like Hoffman can come so close in such a short time. Hoffman was a loser candidate from the get-go but showed how vulnerable the democrats COULD be. The democrats have the glassiest of glass jaws, but republicans and conservatives are convinced that they can't take a body shot. So democrats further that notion, then lay back on the ropes and cover up and clinch to still win on points.
Also, marketable national distinction that benefits the local level is a winning quality. Congressional republican support for President Obama's 2009 Afghanistan war of Candidate Obama's 2008 necessity, along with Wall St. bailouts, show that the republicans have nothing distinct and better to offer simultaneously at the national and local levels. Such republicans will continue to be seen as wanting to take the children's bread and throw it to the dogs. Republican opposition to Obamacare while supporting Afghanistan and Wall St. is a prime example of that.
Overall, what a scream. The democrats couldn't be any more vulnerable and the republicans couldn't be any more inept.
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