Some thoughts on the results of the 2009 elections in Virginia, New Jersey and New York
-There might be a lot of talk about what these races mean in the larger context of the coming 2010 midterm elections but those discussions don’t really mean anything without hard data from exit polling.
-Exit polls show moderates in both New Jersey and Virginia split their vote, self-described independents favored Republicans and Hispanics in New Jersey voted for Corzine 2:1. Call that good news, good news, bad news.
Republicans can’t afford to continue to lose Hispanics if there is to be any hope of a real GOP majority in the near future.
-I’d also like to brag about accurately predicting the disappearing support for the Ind candidate in NJ, both in the amount the support dropped and in who those voters turned to instead.
-Otherwise, neither NJ or Virginia really mean much other than they are representations of predictable historic trends of insurgent parties doing well against governing parties in midterm elections.
-Most of the talk about New York’s 23rd Congressional District is pure bunk. The Conservative Party is simply not going to win many two-way races.
-It should be noted it took a deliberate act of sabotage on the part of the GOP (or at least the GOP candidate) to give NY23 to the Democrats. In 2010, I think there’s a good chance the GOP, if they can avoid a Conservative Party spoiler, will win this seat back.
-It will be interesting to see how the Conservative Party in New York reacts to the race. New York is “different” because of past history and local political quirks. If anything, New York adds fun to following politics.
-Dede Scuzzface should be prevented from ever getting the GOP party endorsement for any race for her disloyalty. It’s okay to occasionally endorse Democrats, it’s just not okay to endorse them when they’re running against you in the same race.
-New York being “different” it’s quite possible Dede S. will become a GOP endorsed candidate again.
-My prediction is NY23 will have a GOP rep after the 2010 midterm, one more conservative than the previous occupant.
-Hoffman was a terrible candidate for such a high profile race. It’s a shock he came as close as he did.
-The GOP has an excellent opportunity to make up a lot of ground in the House in 2010. The number of seats they gain will be dependent on a successful strategy on the national level and sound tactics at the local level. Neither of which can be expected.
Filed under: Political
I respectfully disagree with your statement about the hispanic vote. George W. Bush campaigned vigorously for the hispanic vote and failed to nudge them in his direction. State and local candidates have not fared much better. Even the former staunchly Republican Cubans turned toward Obama.
Articles by Steve Sailer contradict the conventional wisdom that Republicans need the hispanic vote to win. In fact, pandering to hispanics cost Bush/McCain crucial moderate, independent white voters who are strongly in favor of tighter controls and enforcement of immigration laws.
http://www.vdare.com/sailer/041110_poll.htm
I am a great lover of Latino culture. I admire the work ethic of illegal immigrants and wish we could do a 1 for 1 trade of those workers for welfare recipients. But Sailer makes a persuasive case that the untapped demographic in the past two elections were people fed up with illegal immigration. Neither side played that angle. In fact, both sides pandered.
I understand that migration and birth rates will work to our disadvantage, but we won’t make much headway with hispanics any more than we’ll make headway with blacks.
I wish the contrary were true. I really do. No people have more to gain from Republican policies than blacks and hispanics who have suffered greatly from the welfare state and tolerance of crime from the leftists. Unfortunately, too many people from south of the border bring the state-centrist mentality of their homelands with them.
I don’t doubt there were some exit poll problems, especially when it came to deciphering national trends from state level data. But this shouldn’t be used to rationalize giving up on Hispanics.
Immigration has been a political issue for a very long time. But it’s an issue that provides only short term gains in limited geographic areas. Can the GOP develop a working majority on illegal immigrants? Call me skeptical.
Are there votes the GOP has left on the table? Sure, there are lots of Evangelicals who stayed home or bought into Barack’s anti-war changey lovey message. There’s evidence in some exit polls that a small percentage of conservatives didn’t vote at all.
The Democrats also have some bad news coming, young voters are back to their apathetic interests. There’s some indication that Black turnout is down w/o Obama on the ticket somewhere.
I’m not asking the GOP to pander to hispanics, but to engage them and moderate the immigration message. Learning Spanish might also be a good idea for conservatives.
I’m not going to create an Hispanic voter strategy for the GOP here, but I believe there is one that can work.
Ignoring minorities completely and focusing on attracting the same constituents back into the GOP fold will be a failed enterprise. The demographics simply aren’t on our side.
In the next two decades, any hope of winning based on illegal immigration will fail. To focus on that issue alone is to focus on trying to win a greater percentage of an ever shrinking pie.
By no means am I advocating writing off any group, including blacks, jews, and hispanics who vote heavily democrat. The word “neo-con” describes people who eventually woke up from their leftist delusions. Many of these people were black and jewish like Thomas Sowell and David Horowitz. That is why “neo-cons” are so hated by the leftists. They are important voices which will contribute to broad appeal for the GOP.
The best strategy for winning the presidency has nothing to do with ethnic groups per se, but rather with regional groups. If you look at the 2004 election results, the only thing Obama needed to win the presidency in 2008 was to win every state that Kerry won in 2004 and add either:
1. Florida
2. Ohio
3. Virginia + one other state
4. North Carolina + one other state
5. Colorado, New Mexico, and Iowa.
Obama was already leading in New Mexico and Iowa so the entire election came down to winning Colorado alone. Every other state was just gravy.
In support of your point, perhaps hispanics made the difference in Colorado, New Mexico, and Florida.
From a prospective analysis though, if McCain had maintained Ohio and swung the votes of either Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, or Pennsylvania, it would have been difficult for Obama to win. In retrospect, Obama made it look easy by winning every one of the states listed above (with Indiana and Nevada as a bonus and almost winning Missouri).
The point is that winning the white middle-class vote in the Midwest negates any and all advantage the Demon Rats get from hispanics. Winning the white middle-class vote in North Carolina and Virginia negates the black vote. The question is how to lock up that key demographic in those key states. Job losses due to illegal immigration was one factor in reaching those people.
Whereas the South was the Republican key to victory in prior elections, the Midwest is now the Demon Rat key to victory. The GOP simply cannot concede the Midwest and ever hope to regain the White House. It must also retake Colorado.
I still can’t, for the life of me, figure out why Obama was so popular in Iowa.
We’re going to start talking around each other here, and this isn’t the venue to formulate complex electoral strategies (though that’s always a lot of fun).
1) I agree, the GOP could do better, in the next few elections, in select swing states (basically every state you listed minus NM) by focusing on immigration.
2) I’m not talking about upcoming elections. I look at this from a longitudinal perspective. By 2030, the GOP could be dead as an opposition party if it can’t split Hispanics. It will be impossible to win 65% (rough guess) of the white vote in order to maintain two party competitiveness.
3) We can’t make too much of the 2008 elections and the Obama victory. Economic factors and an unpopular foriegn war combined with an inept PR crew in the GOP White House combined with the natural cyclic nature of American politics to create the perfect storm for a Dem victory.
4) I agree, in part, that regional political strategies are more important than racial (or more accurately, cultural) ones. Again, this is a short-term vs. long-term question.
5) I definitely agree the midwest is and should be a battleground.
For the GOP, despite it’s tactical, logistical and strategic problems, has a bright future ahead of it in 2010 and 2012. The Democrats are overpromising and underdelivering. (and really, the dream of a controlled and prosperous economy the Dems believe in so vigilantly is a joke).
Tactically, the GOP needs to be focused on candidate recruitment in the lower races (and, they have been, at least in Minnesota). I’m excited for 2010, whether I should be or not.
Before I forget, Thanks for the comments. It almost makes me want to start blogging regularly again.