Everything Is Great and Amazing

Bog
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Re: Everything Is Great and Amazing

Post by Bog »

Oh Ohio...you sonofabitch...why can't you be pronounced Iowa...embarrassment

As I'm drowning in my sorrows of Balderson and DeWine and a mostly all red state house...there is actually so much to celebrate...

Lizzie Fletcher!!

Sharice Davids!!

Abby Finkenauer!!

Abby Spanberger!!

Of course AOC never to be discounted!!

Antonio Delgado!!!!!!!

Kobach going down....hard!

Max Rose!!

Kendra Horn!!

And likely more to come...
Big Magilla
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Re: Everything Is Great and Amazing

Post by Big Magilla »

The Dems just got their 23 pickups. Now it's just a matter of by how much they lead. Looks like 7 more for sure.
Okri
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Re: Everything Is Great and Amazing

Post by Okri »

1.4 million people in Florida just got the right to vote back. That's pretty huge.

As for Sabin's question re: the new normal - I can see it, to be honest. Especially since these midterms aren't the ironclad repudiation of Trump many of us craved. The future is looking pretty challenging for this planet and I think the shocks of Trump and Brexit, alongside the most recent report of Climate Change speeding upon us like a locomotive, could trigger more engagement.
The Original BJ
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Re: Everything Is Great and Amazing

Post by The Original BJ »

And NBC just projected Democrats won the House.

So however disappointing other results end up -- and man, I really would like to see De Santis go down -- that's a huge sigh of relief.
Mister Tee
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Re: Everything Is Great and Amazing

Post by Mister Tee »

1) What a difference 45 minutes make. Dems have been winning House races hands over fist, and Fox -- of all places -- has already projected them to take control (something I had seriously begun to doubt). My mood is considerably up (especially after seeing Kobach lost the Kansas governorship!).

2) Neither Beto nor Gillum has lost yet. Gillum would hurt more, since he seemed to have a decent cushion.

3) I'd actually posit that Beto would be a better presidential bet if he missed by a hair, given he's promised to serve out his Texas term. A guy who got that close in Texas might look like a very strong national Dem candidate (seeing Texas is way down on the list of states Dems count on).

There is history, you know, for a guy losing a prominent Senate race coming back and winning the presidency soon after. Fella name of Lincoln.
Bog
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Re: Everything Is Great and Amazing

Post by Bog »

Hoping it's a dumbass Florida fuckers aberration...but Gillum was amazing! If Gillum and O'Rourke finish tonight without a job at all we sure are losing some seriously solid potential, extremely charismatic presidential candidates in my opinion.
Mister Tee
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Re: Everything Is Great and Amazing

Post by Mister Tee »

I have a similar sick feeling to what I had two years ago. We're not catching any breaks at all. This is not the repudiation we needed. I'm edging toward despair.
The Original BJ
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Re: Everything Is Great and Amazing

Post by The Original BJ »

A Tweet from Judd Legum sums it up pretty well: "Democrats may or may not take the House but I think one thing progressives are waiting for is the country to rise up and decisively reject Trumpism. It's not happening."
Big Magilla
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Re: Everything Is Great and Amazing

Post by Big Magilla »

Bog wrote:I haven't gotten home yet and stationed myself in front of Rachel and Brian yet...but is it already time to vomit?!?! Is this happening? I don't want to be dramatic or maybe I just have no other choice. Like I said I'm not seeing what's left...but at 95% please let it be all Dade and Broward or if the latest projections were this far off on Gillum then this night will just be a redux late into a drunken cussing night.
Mostly Dade and Broward with a little in the Panhandle.
Sabin
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Re: Everything Is Great and Amazing

Post by Sabin »

How can you be talking about 2020? I can barely talk about right now. I do not feel good about these numbers
"How's the despair?"
Bog
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Re: Everything Is Great and Amazing

Post by Bog »

I haven't gotten home yet and stationed myself in front of Rachel and Brian yet...but is it already time to vomit?!?! Is this happening? I don't want to be dramatic or maybe I just have no other choice. Like I said I'm not seeing what's left...but at 95% please let it be all Dade and Broward or if the latest projections were this far off on Gillum then this night will just be a redux late into a drunken cussing night.
Bog
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Re: Everything Is Great and Amazing

Post by Bog »

Politicized Vegas type sites and odds only really list Trump and Kamala Harris with the former roughly 2.5 to 1 odds and Kamala 8 to 1 odds. This of course does not include an actual matchup so hard to gauge. Warren, Biden, Beto, and Booker all come in at about the odds of the Brewers or Phillies or Rockies to win the World Series.
mlrg
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Re: Everything Is Great and Amazing

Post by mlrg »

I’ve been following your posts about the midterms and the media in my country has been covering this elections pretty intensenvily but one question I have is who will run for president in the Democratic Party. I don’t have the slightest idea on who can beat Trump in 2020. Who do you guys think is better positioned to run against Trump?
Mister Tee
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Re: Everything Is Great and Amazing

Post by Mister Tee »

My wait to vote wasn't much, but 1) I went at an off-time (about 1:30 PM, historically least-crowded time) and 2) it's not as if my district holds a lot of suspense -- not much chance Jerry Nadler or Kristen Gillibrand face serious challenge. I never even saw a TV ad for Gillibrand this cycle; I had to check and be sure she was running.

My hat is off to BJ and Bog for doing active campaign work. I don't think I'd be up to knocking on doors and dealing with potential voter hostility. My little contribution to the effort this year was writing postcards for Phil Bredesen voters. They tell me this has been shown to have impact, so I hope I've done something to make America well again. As someone I know posted on Facebook today, it's like the country is waiting on a biopsy report.

About the Senate: 1) Lisa Murkowski is an actual maverick (unlike Collins, who only plays one on TV), but I still think the prospect of her tipping a 50/50 split are not that strong; 2) I don't think a freshly re-elected Manchin would turn on his party quite so quickly as Bog suggests; six years is a long time, and who knows what the lay of the land will be then; 3) it infuriates me that GOPers have convinced the media to accept their spin that holding the Senate while Dems take the House amounts to a split decision. If all hundred Senate seats were up this year, in this environment, the Pubs would be looking at a loss of up to ten seats; it's their extraordinary good fortune to be dealing with the class of Senators that Dems have won three cycles in a row (picking up five seats in 2000, six seats in 2006, and two more in 2012).

That we're even considering the possibility Dems could pick up 1-3 seats from such a tilted field is evidence of how deep the GOP malaise goes. A year ago, Republicans thought they could easily knock off not just Heitkamp, but also Donnelly/McCaskill/Nelson/Tester/Manchin. They thought they were going to make Bob Casey and Sherrod Brown sweat bullets. In their wildest dreams, they hoped to challenge Amy Klobuchar. Now they're reduced to being worried about holding Ted Cruz's seat, as well as one in Tennessee. It's maddening that it would take the Dems pulling off something of an electoral miracle to get the media to note how well they did.

About Sabin's thoughts on this turnout being the new normal -- as Hemingway would say, isn't it pretty to think so? I'm always dubious about mid-day turnout reports, but it sure seems like we're headed to as strong a mid-term showing as any in memory (there are long lines even in states that have already shattered early-voting turnout) -- a turnout driven by exactly those demographics (young and minority) who've long been blamed for lackluster voting totals. It'd be great if this means people have been shocked awake by the 2016 outcome and will take their voting responsibility seriously from here on.

But it might be just a one-time thing. In a way, this is an atonement election, for all those who presumed from polling and punditry that Hillary had 2016 in the bag and either stayed home or voted Stein/Johnson as their "protest". You could say that the 2016 election was America's Brexit -- a accidental outcome that, through voter inattention, didn't reflect actual citizen sentiment. I've argued to people recently (and received surprisingly little pushback) that, had a corrective election been called ten days after the 2016 debacle, Hillary would have won convincingly, as all those unmotivated or protest voters would have been there for her as they should have been were they not so blase. The vagaries of American elections being what they are, this is the first chance we've had to make that case, and it appears voters are taking advantage. Whether that lasts till 2020 -- and, particularly, through 2022 if a Dem wins the presidency in 2020 -- is an open question for the moment.
Last edited by Mister Tee on Tue Nov 06, 2018 6:40 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Sabin
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Re: Everything Is Great and Amazing

Post by Sabin »

It’s 7:45 am right now. I’m standing in line to vote in the midterms.

...that’s it. That’s all I wanted to say. 7:45. Standing in line. To vote. In the midterms.

There’s a lot I hate about this administration but what if this isn’t a passing phenomenon? The 2016 election and the Trump administration showed the country how the sausage gets made and maybe there’s no going back? My Facebook page and those of my friends have basically become freelance unpaid Politico. If this is the new normal, good.

There are countless incredible candidates to root for, but I find my hopes resting on three races: Texas, Georgia, and Florida. Cruz, Kemp, and De Santis represent the three most loathesome facets of the Republican Party. A defeat for De Santis is a rebuke of Trumpism. A defeat of Cruz is a loss for Tea Partyism. And a defeat for Kemp is all about Republicanism. Voter suppression. Lying. Corruption. Business-as-usual threats to democracy. In my heart, I know Stacey Abrams victory will feel the best. That said, I will need at least two of these tonight to feel good. I feel the surest of Gillum’s victory although that is largely due to the fact that De Santis is so visibly a clown.
"How's the despair?"
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