Every week on Monday, the WoW! community and our invited guests weigh in at the Watcher's Forum, short takes on a major issue of the day, the culture, or daily living. This week's question: What's Your Reaction To The Special Elections?
Bookworm Room : The special elections mattered only because the Democrats had three erroneous beliefs: (1) That Trump voters and former #NeverTrumpers want to disable Trump; (2) that money can buy votes; and (3) that polling is credible.
The reality is that even those conservatives who don't particularly like Trump, including those, such as Paul Mirengoff who have moved from being #NeverTrumpers to reluctantly Trump supporters, are pleased with what the President has been able to do despite the Progressives' unrelenting efforts to sidetrack him and, if possible, destroy his presidency entirely. Trump is busy rolling back Obama's unconstitutional executive orders, authorizing federal agencies to enforce laws already on the books, repealing onerous regulations, appointing conservative judges, and leading from the front in international affairs. Compared to that, his occasionally confusing or bombastic tweets seem insignificant.
It's also nice to see that, when it comes to deeply held principles, Americans can't be bought. Progressives can run all the ads they want in Georgia using money from the San Francisco Bay Area, but it's just not going to work. Again, while conservative voters (especially college-educated conservative voters) may not like Trump's style, they sure like his substance.
Finally, who in the world is dumb enough today to put all their faith in the polls?
The reality is that each of the special elections played out precisely as logic would dictate: conservative voters voted for conservative candidates. Wise Progressives (all three of them) have figured this out; the rest of them are providing us with delightful entertainment by attacking Nancy Pelosi and insisting that they would have won if only they'd pulled even harder to the left. You go, guys!
Rob Miller: To borrow Kellyann's bon mot approprié, my reaction was to laugh my ossuff. More at the Dems and the media reaction than at the actual outcome, which I expected. The GOP totals alone in the election with 14 candidates running totaled more than Osssuf's with 1 other Democrat running.
What fascinates me more is the Dem reaction. It has split the party wide open. Not that the split wasn't there before, but this has exacerbated it.
Julian Assange, has an interesting piece on Twit More that I dissected that explores this in depth. He says that the Democrat party is doomed. As a Bernie supporter, Assange paints a picture of what he sees as the party's future.
Mike McDaniel: My general reaction to the special Congressional elections in GA-6 and SC-5 is: so? I’m not demonstrating indifference or apathy. In fact, I don’t care about apathy. My point is I expected both Republicans to win, and within the five-point range, which is exactly what happened.
I was secure in this expectation because for decades, it has been apparent, and even proved through research, which the media has endeavored to keep quiet, that polls tend to favor Democrats by no less than five points. Some suggest it’s because pollsters always oversample Democrats, because of confirmation bias, because some pollsters misreport--purposely--results that favor Republicans, because the media don’t report polls that favor Republicans, particularly by significant margins…the list goes on, and all are likely correct to one degree or another. Therefore, whenever a Democrat is said to be likely to win a close race, I expect the Republican to win by 3-6 points, and am rarely disappointed.
Do I need to point out how utterly unreliable the media are? Do I need to observe if they report it’s dark at midnight, I have to go outside to confirm it? Need I note if the media think the Dem is a shoe-in, I know who is going to win? Thought not.
In the Georgia race, the arguments of the candidates also told the tale. Jon Osoff, as pure a pajamaboy as the DNC could find, began as a doctrinaire Democrat, but as election day approached, he began tacking sharply toward the center, sounding very much like--gasp!--Donald Trump. Karen Handel hit Osoff hard for his earned carpetbagger status, and for the tens of millions of out of state money--mostly from California--that made the race the most expensive in history. Her frequent invocation of Nancy Pelosi was also telling. Americans aren’t fond of her; she’s the embodiment of the San Francisco liberal, clueless, entitled and self-imagined intellectually and morally superior to the flyover country deplorables about whom she and Osoff pretend to care. The comparison stuck to Osoff even as he frantically tried to present himself as just one of the working middle class Democrats love to call racists in particular and bigots in general.
These elections don’t demonstrate quite as much as Republicans and Democrats claim. The Dems have indeed lost four in a row, but in the 2018 elections, they’ll win some--law of averages. I doubt they’ll take back the House, but may slightly narrow the margin.
However, the victory, and the Dem’s bizarre spin(s) regarding it, indicate yet again that Progressivism cannot be falsified. It is akin to religious faith for the aggressively and angrily non-religious. No progressive policy or tactic can possibly be wrong, and no evidence can ever exist sufficient to prove it wrong. If a policy or tactic appears to fail, it’s because not enough money was spent: more than $30 million wasn’t enough, and besides, the Republicans spent lots of money too and didn’t win by as big a margin as they should have! Not enough time has gone by for the policy or tactic to triumph as it inevitably must: yeah we lost now, but just wait until 2018 or 2020; Americans will love our narrative then! Or inevitably, Republicans have been allowed to exist to oppose the righteous: they cheated; it was the weather; Republicans lied about us and our candidate; Russia!, TRUMP!
This makes it very unlikely that Democrats will be able to diagnose their failure and make adjustments. They’ve spent decades so stirring their base into derangement, the entire party is essentially socialist, leaning communist, will all the totalitarian tendencies of those ideologies. Some Dems are apparently recognizing at least some of their huge liabilities, but it’s unlikely the base monster they’ve so willingly created will allow them to move anywhere near the center of traditional American politics.
Thank goodness--and Nancy Pelosi--for that.
Oh, and what must life be like for such perpetually angry, hateful and aggrieved people? All people of good will must pray for such miserable people.
Doug Hagin:Well, I am pleased with the results, although not surprised in the least. And, I am happy that the Democrats still do not get why they lost. They really are in denial.
Don Surber: The special elections represented five open congressional seats, which are the best way to flip a district, especially this late in the 10-year redistricting cycle.
However, all five seats -- four Republican and one Democratic -- remained in their respective parties's folds. This shows the regional partisan split continues.
Rare will be the state that has a Republican senator and a Democratic senator in the future. Last year, there were 34 Senate races. Republicans took all 22 in the states Trump won. Democrats took all 12 in the states Clinton won.
At present, the double victory on Tuesday gave Trump a boost. Democrats are deflated. The party is becoming a coffee klatch run by a bunch of bickering, catty, little old ladies -- Hillary, Nancy, and Chuck Schumer. To keep the troops moving forward, they dialed up the rhetoric to 11. It isn't working.
Obama will try to rev up the base, but he split the base by playing racial politics for eight years. The return of the Black Liberation Movement under the alias of Black Lives Matter makes politics less fun for white people.Who needs the guilt? So he is turning off much of the base.
On top of that, Obama has the smell of loser now.
Trump let the air out of all of Obama's programs. We are not even six months into this administration. Even Michelle's carrot sticks and kale school lunches are gone. Trump is feeding the kids corn dogs and cheese puffs.
Ossoff's head is on the pike. Pajama Boy is this year's Wendy Davis. Abortion Barbie meet Planned Parenthood Ken.
The Karen Handel Forget Planned Parenthood Money Act is coming. Revenge is being served hot and spicy.
We may not get tired of winning, but surely the big Democratic donors are exhausted from all that losing. DNC revenues hit their lowest in 14 years last month. Adjusted for inflation that is, let's see (gets out calculator) pitiful.
At some point, losing no longer is fun. You do something else. I say this as a Cleveland sports fan. About this time of year, you assess the Indians record and calculate if the Tribe is worth the emotional investment. This year the verdict is yes. Other years no. I went through 35 seasons in which the Indians had only 6 winning seasons. A fair weather fan is a sane fan.
So it is with politics. If Trump lost, I would have quit blogging. It's that simple.
Imagine people more marginally involved in politics. Has anyone seen Jane Fonda lately?
So the short answer is Democrats are deflated, Trump is pumped.
Dave Schuler: The Democratic National Committee, with the obtuseness they've displayed for the last dozen years or so, chose to make the special elections a referendum on Trump. Now they're stuck with it.
No matter how much they wish it were otherwise, politics has been, is, and will remain local. The Democrats need to learn how to do retail politics again. Field qualified candidates who actually live in the districts they want to represent, who know the districts and are known by them. Formulate an agenda and run on issues. Build local organizations.
Don't expect the electorate at large to recoil in horror from Republicans the way you do. Other than in a few urban centers and college towns, most people just don't look at things that way.
Laura Rambeau Lee : The Democrats appear unaware the majority of Americans remain firmly center right. The Democrat Party of today offers nothing but nasty partisanship and hateful rhetoric. Their progressive Marxist ideology and identity politics appeal to a very small segment of the population. The American people do not want this continued chaos and division being stirred up by progressive agitators. We want good jobs. We want the opportunity to better ourselves and raise our families and for the most part to be let alone. We want less government intrusion into our lives, not more. We do not want a nanny state and we know that promises of free health care and college tuition are lies. We treasure our freedom and are seeing it slip away, particularly through policies implemented by the Democrat party.
The Democrat Party has no good leader and no message that appeals to the average American voter. These last special elections prove no amount of money or celebrity endorsements can buy our votes. As long as the Democrat party remains deaf to the needs of the American people and continues to push their radical agenda they will continue to lose support for their candidates.
As for me, I’m still laughing my Ossoff.
Well, there it is!
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