GOP suffered the political equivalent of premature ejaculation.
However, I would like to call out a few others who while calling themselves allies of our cause, were also dancing on our graves:
Ruy Teixeira - dude has been publishing Substack articles for two years singing the demise of the Dems and its refusal to "move to the center" on social issues, we are too liberal, Latinos are leaving the Dems, etc. After the election, he tried to walk it back, seemingly claiming that the Dems have moved away from being the working class party and are now the party of the educated elite, and somehow that is why we won (its like he was sad about it).
Bud - YOU WERE WRONG!! Please STFU and go back to doing what all other previous center-left pundits who fall out of favor do: get a gig on Fox News and shit all over Democrats. Doug Shoen and Dick Morris are keeping a seat warm for you.
Charlie Sykes - Oh I have not forgotten about you. Yes, Mandela Barnes lost, but in losing he helped the other statewide Dems win overwhelmingly. Turnout increased in Madison and Milwaukee, its just that the racists, drunk Wisconsinites from WOW and the middle of nowhere who gives a crap (the kind that pollute Minnesota during Packers-Vikings games) split their tickets to support Johnson. Again - no other Dem could have done gotten the increased turnout like he did. Nobody in Madison or Milwaukee is coming out to sit in line for Sarah whatever the hell her name is, or some rich kid whose dad own's the Bucks. No one even remembers the other dudes. I curse the state of Wisconsin and its two football teams. May Aaron Rodgers break his leg, and may the Badgers lose to my Hawkeyes (oh, too late :)).
Bernie Sanders - please go away.
Now for positive shout outs:
Props to Bill Galston, Linda Chavez and Bill Kristol, who early in the summer called it correctly on the Dobbs decision. It definitely had an impact; GOP was stupid enough to believe that somebody is going to vote to give up their own personal freedoms because gas is 20 cents more than it was last year during a friggin recession. GOP, thy name is stupid.
Mona - because I just find her extremely pleasing. She reminds me of one my baseball moms from my younger days.
JVL - for always keeping real. Tim - you too brother.
SVL - I will give you props, but I am still keeping you at arm's length. You seem so forlorn that the GOP is full of RW bigots. News flash - it was always the case. You just ignored it. At least Tim and JVL admit it, heck even Charlie. Stuart Stevens said it best: there is no way to save the GOP. It must be burned to the ground and destroyed because it is rotten. It is out of ideas, and now running out of voters. That is why it is getting more and more desperate.
Last but not least - The American People, for always doing what is right at the latest possible moment. Once again, we rose to the occasion when we needed to. Well done.
If you mean 2010 as “long”. That’s when the Rs played their biggest games with gerrymandering and proceeded to turn the whole state blue and now have an R-majority legislature (and governor) since that just ignores anti-gerrymander laws Ohio voters voted in in 2016. And by end of 2016 we found how many looney-tune voters our state has with their love affair with Donny Dimwit. It’s dispiriting to say the least. I thought once laws are voted in it’s criminal not to adhere to them. But watching the past 6 years, that appears not to be true - not even subpoenas are adhered to.
If I live to be 100, I will not understand the seemingly universal dislike of Biden. I see him working the government diligently, professionally, and good humoredly. He's not an all-powerful potentate, but my understanding has been that that's not what we want in a representative democracy. The exit polls astonished me, as does the daily carping in the media left and right.
Dems got the results they wanted in Florida. Charlie was not a strong, upcoming candidate. And with Zero Party fund raising they elevated DeSantis. Division among the MAGAS is happening.
I was prepared to vote for Sarah Godlewski. I thought she'd destroy Johnson. Don't get me wrong, I like Barnes but I also know my state (I grew up in a rural area that is now ultra-MAGA) and I take electability into account in the primaries
Other interesting things: Michigan's state legislature will be D, Pennsylvania has a reasonable chance of flipping the state house (first time since 2010). This is Dobbs. This is women. This is young people.
Abortion mattered as an issue in states where it was under threat. Us commentators said this repeatedly, the authors here regularly discounted it based on beltway commentary. It mattered. Not everywhere, but it mattered. Men don't get it because they don't feel it viscerally like we do. Pro-lifers can't see it because it's too close as an issue. Gen Z cared too. Young people turned out.
Unfortunately true. I am a boomer born and raised in Ohio. My state will not start improving till all the boomers are gone. They’ve dragged down our state for years now with their constant insistence that any people in need are ripping them off while not seeing how their own party (R) has been robbing them blind for years. My oldest sibling accuses every group that doesn’t look like her of doing so EVERY TIME I see her - which I try to make less often. She watches AON religiously. Sigh….
Well I guess The DPW has found out the hard way that a majority of Wisconsinites do not want Bernie and the squad. I have lost all respect for Tammy Baldwin. Lasry would have won the Senate seat and been good for the Party. Barnes was a predictable and predicted disaster and the shenanigans with our primary were affront to the majority of Democrats in the state. Ugh.
I was pleasantly surprised by last night. And I liked the fact that in exits polls, Dobbs and Democracy ranked 2 & 3 in voter concerns. Inflation was top, clearly, but, 2 & 3 showed that big chunks of the nation's electorate was not as shallow and Fox Prime Time wanted you to think. I am ambivalent at best on abortion, but, I am a full throated supporter on women controlling their medical lives. Abortion was just the thin end of the wedge (as Sir Humphrey would say)...once one type of medical decision is taken from a woman's control, it is not hard to see OTHER medical decisions taken from her control. On another note, people *DO* care about democracy. The quality of government and candidates for office *DOES* matter...whether certain media figures acknowledge that or not.
GOP suffered the political equivalent of premature ejaculation.
However, I would like to call out a few others who while calling themselves allies of our cause, were also dancing on our graves:
Ruy Teixeira - dude has been publishing Substack articles for two years singing the demise of the Dems and its refusal to "move to the center" on social issues, we are too liberal, Latinos are leaving the Dems, etc. After the election, he tried to walk it back, seemingly claiming that the Dems have moved away from being the working class party and are now the party of the educated elite, and somehow that is why we won (its like he was sad about it).
Bud - YOU WERE WRONG!! Please STFU and go back to doing what all other previous center-left pundits who fall out of favor do: get a gig on Fox News and shit all over Democrats. Doug Shoen and Dick Morris are keeping a seat warm for you.
Charlie Sykes - Oh I have not forgotten about you. Yes, Mandela Barnes lost, but in losing he helped the other statewide Dems win overwhelmingly. Turnout increased in Madison and Milwaukee, its just that the racists, drunk Wisconsinites from WOW and the middle of nowhere who gives a crap (the kind that pollute Minnesota during Packers-Vikings games) split their tickets to support Johnson. Again - no other Dem could have done gotten the increased turnout like he did. Nobody in Madison or Milwaukee is coming out to sit in line for Sarah whatever the hell her name is, or some rich kid whose dad own's the Bucks. No one even remembers the other dudes. I curse the state of Wisconsin and its two football teams. May Aaron Rodgers break his leg, and may the Badgers lose to my Hawkeyes (oh, too late :)).
Bernie Sanders - please go away.
Now for positive shout outs:
Props to Bill Galston, Linda Chavez and Bill Kristol, who early in the summer called it correctly on the Dobbs decision. It definitely had an impact; GOP was stupid enough to believe that somebody is going to vote to give up their own personal freedoms because gas is 20 cents more than it was last year during a friggin recession. GOP, thy name is stupid.
Mona - because I just find her extremely pleasing. She reminds me of one my baseball moms from my younger days.
JVL - for always keeping real. Tim - you too brother.
SVL - I will give you props, but I am still keeping you at arm's length. You seem so forlorn that the GOP is full of RW bigots. News flash - it was always the case. You just ignored it. At least Tim and JVL admit it, heck even Charlie. Stuart Stevens said it best: there is no way to save the GOP. It must be burned to the ground and destroyed because it is rotten. It is out of ideas, and now running out of voters. That is why it is getting more and more desperate.
Last but not least - The American People, for always doing what is right at the latest possible moment. Once again, we rose to the occasion when we needed to. Well done.
If you mean 2010 as “long”. That’s when the Rs played their biggest games with gerrymandering and proceeded to turn the whole state blue and now have an R-majority legislature (and governor) since that just ignores anti-gerrymander laws Ohio voters voted in in 2016. And by end of 2016 we found how many looney-tune voters our state has with their love affair with Donny Dimwit. It’s dispiriting to say the least. I thought once laws are voted in it’s criminal not to adhere to them. But watching the past 6 years, that appears not to be true - not even subpoenas are adhered to.
If I live to be 100, I will not understand the seemingly universal dislike of Biden. I see him working the government diligently, professionally, and good humoredly. He's not an all-powerful potentate, but my understanding has been that that's not what we want in a representative democracy. The exit polls astonished me, as does the daily carping in the media left and right.
https://twitter.com/caseydesantis/status/1588539069243473924
The message here. GOP: We love our democracy, stop fucking with it. Dems get out of your bubble and do better.
Dems got the results they wanted in Florida. Charlie was not a strong, upcoming candidate. And with Zero Party fund raising they elevated DeSantis. Division among the MAGAS is happening.
There is a lot to be thankful for. Very proud of us Bulwark folks who care so much.
I was prepared to vote for Sarah Godlewski. I thought she'd destroy Johnson. Don't get me wrong, I like Barnes but I also know my state (I grew up in a rural area that is now ultra-MAGA) and I take electability into account in the primaries
Give yourself some props too Bulwark. This is as much your doing as anyone else's
Other interesting things: Michigan's state legislature will be D, Pennsylvania has a reasonable chance of flipping the state house (first time since 2010). This is Dobbs. This is women. This is young people.
Abortion mattered as an issue in states where it was under threat. Us commentators said this repeatedly, the authors here regularly discounted it based on beltway commentary. It mattered. Not everywhere, but it mattered. Men don't get it because they don't feel it viscerally like we do. Pro-lifers can't see it because it's too close as an issue. Gen Z cared too. Young people turned out.
Unfortunately true. I am a boomer born and raised in Ohio. My state will not start improving till all the boomers are gone. They’ve dragged down our state for years now with their constant insistence that any people in need are ripping them off while not seeing how their own party (R) has been robbing them blind for years. My oldest sibling accuses every group that doesn’t look like her of doing so EVERY TIME I see her - which I try to make less often. She watches AON religiously. Sigh….
Thx Charlie for a great newsletter, very well sourced and put together, my faith in the average American voter is starting to be restored…
Well I guess The DPW has found out the hard way that a majority of Wisconsinites do not want Bernie and the squad. I have lost all respect for Tammy Baldwin. Lasry would have won the Senate seat and been good for the Party. Barnes was a predictable and predicted disaster and the shenanigans with our primary were affront to the majority of Democrats in the state. Ugh.
It seems, in the end, that the women and the youngs did save us. Thank you.
I was pleasantly surprised by last night. And I liked the fact that in exits polls, Dobbs and Democracy ranked 2 & 3 in voter concerns. Inflation was top, clearly, but, 2 & 3 showed that big chunks of the nation's electorate was not as shallow and Fox Prime Time wanted you to think. I am ambivalent at best on abortion, but, I am a full throated supporter on women controlling their medical lives. Abortion was just the thin end of the wedge (as Sir Humphrey would say)...once one type of medical decision is taken from a woman's control, it is not hard to see OTHER medical decisions taken from her control. On another note, people *DO* care about democracy. The quality of government and candidates for office *DOES* matter...whether certain media figures acknowledge that or not.
Title for column:
Republicans Created Trump to Own the Libs, Now He Owns Them.