The MidTerm Elections thread (2018)

[Jeff V]

The elephant hunt in Illinois was largely successful. In my congressional district (IL14) there was quite an upset. In the state, the new donkey governor is going to have a super majority in the legislature.

Now, where to put these carcasses before they start stinking up the joint even more than they had been. I'm pretty sure Indiana is taking in GOP waste.

[The Meal]

Can someone please give a recap on:
House makeup
Senate makeup
Governors

Thanks bro, that is what I was looking for.

[LawBeefaroni]

The elephant hunt in Illinois was largely successful. In my congressional district (IL14) there was quite an upset. In the state, the new donkey governor is going to have a super majority in the legislature.

It's kind of hard to get excited about someone who bends the truth big time about being a practicing nurse (she's a legit RN but never discharged patients, as she said numerous times). She's the better candidate but having trouble rejoicing someone just because there's a D after the name.

I guess it's more fallout from 2016. The bar of ethics is now even lower on all sides and the name of the game is win power at all costs.

[LordMortis]

And yes, my biggest disappointment with the country in general is that apparently roughly half of us think racism, blatant lying, and misogyny is OK - or are at least willing to turn a blind eye to it. And it's especially disheartening to realize a good portion of those folks are my friends, family, and co-workers.

Me

This is me. That friends, family, and co workers are willing to turn a blind to institutionalized bigotry (usually to alleviate some nebulous or propagandized fear for their own security) makes me ill. And being put in a position to turn on them hurts my soul but not turning on them moves me closer and closer to turning a blind eye myself and not where we are right now. I can't. There is nothing more I'd like to do then live in a world where I don't see the fear of them expressed in ceding law to concentrate power to malevolence but it's in my back yard. I can't have that. I just cant'.

[LawBeefaroni]

By the way, while Illinois is deep blue now, the breakdown by county is kind is scary. Pritzker lost in nearly every county outside of the Chicago area counties (and he lost one of those 7). By my count he went 9-93.
Now obviously Cook county had over 1.5M votes while somewhere like Edwards had like 2,200. Still, that's a lot of rural angst. Hopefully he can win them over because there is a lot more division than the dark blue heat map would indicate.


Very illuminating county by county tallies for all Illinois races.

[stimpy]

The elephant hunt in Illinois was largely successful. In my congressional district (IL14) there was quite an upset. In the state, the new donkey governor is going to have a super majority in the legislature.

Now, where to put these carcasses before they start stinking up the joint even more than they had been. I'm pretty sure Indiana is taking in GOP waste.

Cmon, Jeff. You should know better. Nothing is gonna change or get any better as long as Madigan stays in charge. Donkeys, elephants....makes no difference. We're just as screwed today as we were yesterday, if not more.

[Carpet_pissr]

Been looking at the results and reading this, and I am actually disappointed in the D's here. They barely got the House back, up by a few now, when they were projecting more. Still a few races hanging in the balance. Losing Senate seats really hurts (i know tough races).

The big take away I still keep coming back to is that Trump is not as weak as we think he is. There is a strong base of support for him and he should never be underestimated again. A lot of these races had the tinge of Trump on it, and he pulled it out. Somehow the D's have to figure out how to reach voters in Tennessee, Missouri, and other red states. That may involved shifting some of the D's positions to the right some. I also think they need a house leader from the Midwest somewhere who can craft policies and agenda's that appeal to the mid west and conservative voters. Going the Bernie route of a far left is political suicide.

Going back to Trump he's obviously doing something right for the voters, because this was a referendum on him; and he came out with a win here tonight I think. He expanded the Senate #s, he won Ohio & Fl., and the losses in the House while bad could have been a lot worse. This should be a huge wake up call for the D's they need to do a lot better at harnessing the energy for 2020. They have to craft and hone a message to create a real alternative to the brand that Trump is selling.

Last night was a good night for the R's I think. This could have been a lot worse, a lot worse and they held serve, flipped a few senate seats and kept some vital governorships. The D's have work to do. A lot.

Who thought Trump was weak? He has single-handedly usurped, if you will, the Republican party, seated 2 SCOTUS's, has had pretty much free reign for the past 2 years, and is hugely popular among ACTUAL voters (not polls). Where he campaigned to shore up supposedly tight Senate races, his minion won consistently.

He has also been able to purge the Republican holdouts who were not fully pro-Trump.

That, to me, is not a sign of weakness. He's terribly powerful, and that scares the shit out of me. He's LESS powerful today, of course, but still...I was hoping for more of a backlash to Trump than we saw last night.

[Defiant]

I'm hearing the estimates of 114 million votes cast. Which means something like 48 or 49% turnout, which would smash records for modern midterm elections.

[Jeff V]

The elephant hunt in Illinois was largely successful. In my congressional district (IL14) there was quite an upset. In the state, the new donkey governor is going to have a super majority in the legislature.

Now, where to put these carcasses before they start stinking up the joint even more than they had been. I'm pretty sure Indiana is taking in GOP waste.

Cmon, Jeff. You should know better. Nothing is gonna change or get any better as long as Madigan stays in charge. Donkeys, elephants....makes no difference. We're just as screwed today as we were yesterday, if not more.

This election was all about rejecting Trump and anyone who stands beside him. Stop trying to make it something it's not!

[Isgrimnur]

My district reported 295,205 votes in the Senate race.

It also reported 197,236 straight ticket votes, meaning that fewer than 1/3 of the votes were of a nuanced variety.

I voted straight ticket, with votes for Liberterian candidates where there was an opposed race with no Dem candidate. As expected, not one candidate won.

[Jeff V]

By the way, while Illinois is deep blue now, the breakdown by county is kind is scary. Pritzker lost in nearly every county outside of the Chicago area counties (and he lost one of those 7). By my count he went 9-93.
Now obviously Cook county had over 1.5M votes while somewhere like Edwards had like 2,200. Still, that's a lot of rural angst. Hopefully he can win them over because there is a lot more division than the dark blue heat map would indicate.


Very illuminating county by county tallies for all Illinois races.

They did comment on the news this morning that Pritzker does need to serve the whole state if he hopes for re-election. I'm not sure how much he bothered to campaign to the downstate rubes...most of that trailer trash are going to stand by their orange monkey god and do whatever he bleats. If Pritzker can improve some of the downstate urban shitholes (Springfield, Decatur, Peoria, E. St Louis for example) he'll improve his standing statewide. He might even have an in with the rednecks if he's able to find a new market for soybeans since Trump seems determined to destroy our largest cash crop.

[stimpy]

The elephant hunt in Illinois was largely successful. In my congressional district (IL14) there was quite an upset. In the state, the new donkey governor is going to have a super majority in the legislature.

Now, where to put these carcasses before they start stinking up the joint even more than they had been. I'm pretty sure Indiana is taking in GOP waste.

Cmon, Jeff. You should know better. Nothing is gonna change or get any better as long as Madigan stays in charge. Donkeys, elephants....makes no difference. We're just as screwed today as we were yesterday, if not more.

This election was all about rejecting Trump and anyone who stands beside him. Stop trying to make it something it's not!

That's not what is was all about to all of us. I live in Illinois. Living in Illinois sucks, mainly because of the shitheads in power. They can blurt on and on about how much they want to change stuff, but at the end of the day it will be bad business as usual, which means lining their pockets and keeping their rich buddies rich. Pritzker cant and will never be able to relate to us peasants.

[Carpet_pissr]

Silver lining for me personally, considering I'm a tiny small, blue dot in a sea of red. We got a flip in a pretty major upset! I didn't realize it until this morning, actually, so yay for the coast.

[Holman]

There are so many races to look at, it's easy to forget to just pause, take a breath, smell the flowers, and savor the special Fuck You delivered to Scott Walker last night.

[stessier]

The elephant hunt in Illinois was largely successful. In my congressional district (IL14) there was quite an upset. In the state, the new donkey governor is going to have a super majority in the legislature.

Now, where to put these carcasses before they start stinking up the joint even more than they had been. I'm pretty sure Indiana is taking in GOP waste.

Cmon, Jeff. You should know better. Nothing is gonna change or get any better as long as Madigan stays in charge. Donkeys, elephants....makes no difference. We're just as screwed today as we were yesterday, if not more.

This election was all about rejecting Trump and anyone who stands beside him. Stop trying to make it something it's not!

That's not what is was all about to all of us. I live in Illinois. Living in Illinois sucks, mainly because of the shitheads in power. They can blurt on and on about how much they want to change stuff, but at the end of the day it will be bad business as usual, which means lining their pockets and keeping their rich buddies rich. Pritzker cant and will never be able to relate to us peasants.

Ahhh, the irony.

[Ralph-Wiggum]

The Dems taking the house and flipping at least seven governorships is great, but I really need to know what happened with the Chicago straw ban!!!

[LordMortis]

There are so many races to look at, it's easy to forget to just pause, take a breath, smell the flowers, and savor the special Fuck You delivered to Scott Walker last night.

I don't know much about Wisconsin politics but from my tiny perspective, Walker's election and the national attention paid to him on referendums of the will on the will of the people does make me, an otherwise disinterested party, feeling good about it.

I'm just smelling the flowers about the sweeping vote for sustained change in Michigan. Absentee ballots, audits, Marijuana, independent district drawing all put to the people and the people responded in a way that did not crush my soul. I'm not going to be a fan of much of our blue tidal change but being not a fan is a far cry from being angry under the last tide, that was bit by bit succeeding with their effort to destroy the moon.

So much to take a little bit to relax and be happy for a moment over.

[Jaymann]

The Dems taking the house and flipping at least seven governorships is great, but I really need to know what happened with the Chicago straw ban!!!

They took a straw poll, but it was only a straw man.

[stessier]

Silver lining for me personally, considering I'm a tiny small, blue dot in a sea of red. We got a flip in a pretty major upset! I didn't realize it until this morning, actually, so yay for the coast.

Man, it was 60/37 Republican in my district (145k vs. 89k). Almost 243k votes cast out of 308k registered voters, so at least turnout was good (78.8%).

[tjg_marantz]

People saying polls were off really need a refresher on how polls and margins of error work. Did the polls hit 100%? Of course not, but to say they were off is just ludicrous.

Any race within the margin of error, when the numbers are 51-49, can go either way. Pointing at 51-49 as a miss if it ends 49-51 is fucking obtuse.

[malchior]

Green party may have cost Arizona a Democratic seat.

[malchior]

People saying polls were off really need a refresher on how polls and margins of error work. Did the polls hit 100%? Of course not, but to say they were off is just ludicrous.

Any race within the margin of error, when the numbers are 51-49, can go either way. Pointing at 51-49 as a miss if it ends 49-51 is fucking obtuse.

The Abrams and Gillum polling were big misses generally outside the margin of error. Some are reasoning that the President's intervention changed the terrain and that may have been the case but they still missed.

[stessier]

Green party may have cost Arizona a Democratic seat.

I would contend the Democrats cost the Democrats a seat in Arizona.

[ImLawBoy]

The Dems taking the house and flipping at least seven governorships is great, but I really need to know what happened with the Chicago straw ban!!!

Passed with 55.2%.

[Isgrimnur]

There are so many races to look at, it's easy to forget to just pause, take a breath, smell the flowers, and savor the special Fuck You delivered to Scott Walker last night.

And Kris Kobach!

[malchior]

Green party may have cost Arizona a Democratic seat.

I would contend the Democrats cost the Democrats a seat in Arizona.

Maybe. But the Greens also put the Dems in a difficult position. Move left enough to get them and you lose the center perhaps. Instead the Greens are represented now by someone completely at odds on many positions they hold versus imperfect representation.

[RunningMn9]

And yes, my biggest disappointment with the country in general is that apparently roughly half of us think racism, blatant lying, and misogyny is OK - or are at least willing to turn a blind eye to it. And it's especially disheartening to realize a good portion of those folks are my friends, family, and co-workers.

They don't think that it's ok, and they aren't turning a blind eye to it. Many/most of them don't think it's racism, lying or misogyny. They think you're being an over-sensitive, hysterical snow-flake for interpreting it that way. It's just locker room talk (at a whites only country club).

[Trent Steel]

And yes, my biggest disappointment with the country in general is that apparently roughly half of us think racism, blatant lying, and misogyny is OK - or are at least willing to turn a blind eye to it. And it's especially disheartening to realize a good portion of those folks are my friends, family, and co-workers.

They don't think that it's ok, and they aren't turning a blind eye to it. Many/most of them don't think it's racism, lying or misogyny. They think you're being an over-sensitive, hysterical snow-flake for interpreting it that way. It's just locker room talk (at a whites only country club).

Which means that they ARE racists, liars and misogynists.

Which is what I knew all along.

[RunningMn9]

Which means that they ARE racists, liars and misogynists.

Which is what I knew all along.

Of course they are. But they don't think so.

[Defiant]

Green party may have cost Arizona a Democratic seat.

Even worse, the green candidate withdrew from the race and endorsed the Democrat, and yet she still may have cost the seat.

[Kraken]

The "showcase" races (like Beto) are definitely unfortunate, but on the whole I think it's a huge win for the Democrats - particularity when you consider how insanely the Republicans gerrymandered the shit out of all the House districts that were just taken back.

Remember, too, that yesterday's D gains came during the strongest economy since the 1990s, and possibly the '60s, which most voters credit to the party in power. Imagine how they would have swept had this been a recession year. Now imagine the likelihood of a sluggish economy in 2020, if not an outright recession. Add two more years of Trump outrage fatigue and a more favorable Senate map. Looking ahead from today, I like Democrats' chances in the next election.

[Isgrimnur]

Mississippi senate special election will go to a runoff. Not really promising for the Ds, as there were two Rs running that split off 16% of the vote.

[Zaxxon]

Which means that they ARE racists, liars and misogynists.

Which is what I knew all along.

Of course they are. But they don't think so.

Sure, which means they need an education, not excuses.

[Skinypupy]

The "showcase" races (like Beto) are definitely unfortunate, but on the whole I think it's a huge win for the Democrats - particularity when you consider how insanely the Republicans gerrymandered the shit out of all the House districts that were just taken back.

Remember, too, that yesterday's D gains came during the strongest economy since the 1990s, and possibly the '60s, which most voters credit to the party in power. Imagine how they would have swept had this been a recession year. Now imagine the likelihood of a sluggish economy in 2020, if not an outright recession. Add two more years of Trump outrage fatigue and a more favorable Senate map. Looking ahead from today, I like Democrats' chances in the next election.

Difficulty: Trump/GOP/Fox News spends the next 2 years loudly blaming the House for any and all downward trends in the economy.

[Kraken]

The "showcase" races (like Beto) are definitely unfortunate, but on the whole I think it's a huge win for the Democrats - particularity when you consider how insanely the Republicans gerrymandered the shit out of all the House districts that were just taken back.

Remember, too, that yesterday's D gains came during the strongest economy since the 1990s, and possibly the '60s, which most voters credit to the party in power. Imagine how they would have swept had this been a recession year. Now imagine the likelihood of a sluggish economy in 2020, if not an outright recession. Add two more years of Trump outrage fatigue and a more favorable Senate map. Looking ahead from today, I like Democrats' chances in the next election.

Difficulty: Trump/GOP/Fox News spends the next 2 years loudly blaming the House for any and all downward trends in the economy.

True. But if the general mood turns to "throw the bums out," the R's still have more bums.

[Smoove_B]

Get some perspective on how rigged the system is:

In the outgoing Senate — the Senate that placed Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh on the Supreme Court — the 49 senators in the Democratic “minority” represent almost 40 million more people than the Republican “majority.” In the incoming Senate, the Democratic “minority” will still represent millions more people — despite the fact that Republicans grew their “majority” last night.

And this malapportionment is only going to get worse. By 2040, according to Baruch College’s David Birdsell, about 70 percent of Americans are expected to live in just 15 states. That means that the vast majority of Americans will control just 30 percent of the Senate, while the remaining 70 senators are elected by just 30 percent of the nation.

[Defiant]

I predict Pelosi will be Speaker. (at least, this term).

[naednek]

Trump tweeting thanking for the tremendous success. He does know how this all works right? RIght?

You realize he still thinks he broke records for having so many people at his inauguration despite photo evidence...

The guy will spin anything to feed his ego. He's absurd, and his supporters like absurd.

[Octavious]

Oh he's back to the tax returns being under audit again. Longest audit ever!

[Daveman]

This news conference has been on the radio and I had to turn it off while driving or I was going to cause an accident. Nothing but spin and comparisons to how many seats the Republicans won during Obama's midterms.

One journalist was asking if/how Trump will try and work with a divided Congress and he kept talking about how he'd love to but he's not treated fairly and fake news, etc. The journalist kept trying to interrupt, stating he hadn't asked about Trump's relationship with the media, but congressional democrats and Trump just kept ignoring it.