Election Day 2021

[ronntaylor]

Just checked for the first time in a while. Murphy up in New Jersey by 16,617 votes with ~89% counted. He's pulling away, adding just under 17k votes since I last checked this morning.

 

[Herdfan]

Well McAuliffe did get 200K more votes than Northam got four years ago. (He just was too stupid with that education debate quote; doubling down on it at first and then waiting nearly two weeks to put out a tepid ad addressing it gingerly) As much as the GOP railed against mail-in ballots due to the Pandemic and lied about voter fraud via the same, it helped their party just as much, if not more. Who wouldathunk making voting easier would increase votes! Unlike Mango, Youngkin embraced mail-in ballots AND early voting. I believe I posted earlier that at some campaign stops he actually walked supporters over to early polling stations to vote for him.

And it could have cost him. You mentioned McAuliffe making the gaffe during the debate on education, well he did that after 2 weeks of early voting had already happened. Bet some of those voters may have wanted their votes back.

I am not opposed to early voting, but VA's was too long as too many things could happen in a campaign.

 

[ronntaylor]

I am not opposed to early voting, but VA's was too long as too many things could happen in a campaign.

Republicans will just have to gin up faux outrage sooner and more often to compensate.

By the same token, some voters may have been turned off by Youngkin's racist appeals and wished they hadn't voted for him. That's the chance you take when you early vote. For many African Americans, younger, poorer and elderly voters, mail-in or early voting is the only viable option available. They'd rather not spend hours on line or be turned away via targeted campaigns on election day.

 

[GermanSuplex]

From what I can tell, the state Superintendent sends out weekly memos to all the local school boards. This was the one from February 22, 2019.

https://www.doe.virginia.gov/administrators/superintendents_memos/2019/050-19.docx

Not sure how that link will work since it goes to a .docx file. (Is it that damn hard to create a pdf?).

Here is the main page it came from:

https://www.doe.virginia.gov/administrators/superintendents_memos/2019/index.shtml

Well, a weekly memo to school boards is merely just that. There’s a lot of discussion about CRT these days - a GOP response to try to clamp down talks about even DISCUSSING curriculum in public schools - so was the memo just to give folks an idea of what CRT is? It’s clear a lot of people don’t even know what it is.

A memo is just a memo.

It’s funny, we always say “maybe we can prevent abortions with proper education”, but many don’t want proper sex-ed taught in schools either. Then we get to racial unrest, so the discussion turns to teaching kids proper history and open them up to wider world views so they don’t become racist or hateful, and that is then branded as “CRT”.

Kids are smart. I actually agree we don’t need CRT in classrooms. We just need accurate history taught and they can figure out the rest. But many are happy with the status quo, so I see things getting worse before they get better.

We don’t seem to learn much, apparently.



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[ronntaylor]

It's really bad all around for the Dems in Virginia. The GOP has won at least 50 seats in the HoD. They lead one race by .9%, trail two by 2% and trail another my just .4%.

At the rate the NJ race is going, we'll have a final count early next year. Sheesh!

 

[shadow puppet]

New Jersey came through. Barely.

 

[Herdfan]

Well, a weekly memo to school boards is merely just that. There’s a lot of discussion about CRT these days - a GOP response to try to clamp down talks about even DISCUSSING curriculum in public schools - so was the memo just to give folks an idea of what CRT is? It’s clear a lot of people don’t even know what it is.

A memo is just a memo.

It’s funny, we always say “maybe we can prevent abortions with proper education”, but many don’t want proper sex-ed taught in schools either. Then we get to racial unrest, so the discussion turns to teaching kids proper history and open them up to wider world views so they don’t become racist or hateful, and that is then branded as “CRT”.

Kids are smart. I actually agree we don’t need CRT in classrooms. We just need accurate history taught and they can figure out the rest. But many are happy with the status quo, so I see things getting worse before they get better.

We don’t seem to learn much, apparently.

Here is my take on it and you can agree or disagree.

What is supposed to be taught or not taught in a classroom is wholly dependent on individual teachers. Pick an issue, any issue, and you will find teachers that present it based on facts and answer questions as honestly as they can. And you will also find teachers who use their positions to try and sway kids towards their beliefs on an issue. That is where I see a problem.

 

[lizkat]

It's really bad all around for the Dems

Fixed that for ya. Even in "deep blue" New York, and even in an off year, the Dem turnout was pathetically low.

But the Rs turned out in droves against the NY state constitutional amendments that were meant to broaden ballot access. The measures look to be going down to defeat by around 2 to 1. That's a typical upstate NY result when the question is do you want a Dem in the White House? No, thank you: 2 to 1.

But these are statewide counts, this tally of how those amendment questions are doing. So it's pretty clear that the Dems all over NY mostly sat on their hands, not only for their mayoral or council contests but for the amendment questions too.

So maybe Dem voters are demoralized by media focus on party infighting (which I regard as legit debate on policy), and also the distractive media focus on Dems having to wrangle the 2 blue dogs in the Senate into remembering which party helped them fund and staff their campaigns.

And so maybe some Dems weren't thrilled by the choice of local candidates. I'm sure some Virginia Republicans held their noses too! But the Rs turned out to vote anyway.

It's all and always about turning out the vote. If the Rs are outnumbered 4 to 1 but they turn out 90% of their vote compared to the Dems turning up 20 or 30%, the arithmetic isn't that daunting and the Ds will lose.

Especially as far as the NY constitutional amendment questions are concerned, general lack of enthusiasm for local candidates cannot excuse failure of Democrats to turn out a vote. In New York?! Just the fact that those questions on voting rights assurance are going down to defeat is a clear sign the Rs sure did get their base to the polls.

Steve Israel was right, he called this set of elections "a shellacking on a thumping" for the Dems.

 

[Herdfan]

And so maybe some Dems weren't thrilled by the choice of local candidates. I'm sure some Virginia Republicans held their noses too! But the Rs turned out to vote anyway.

It's all and always about turning out the vote. If the Rs are outnumbered 4 to 1 but they turn out 90% of their vote compared to the Dems turning up 20 or 30%, the arithmetic isn't that daunting and the Ds will lose.

Especially as far as the NY constitutional amendment questions are concerned, general lack of enthusiasm for local candidates cannot excuse failure of Democrats to turn out a vote. In New York?! Just the fact that those questions on voting rights assurance are going down to defeat is a clear sign the Rs sure did get their base to the polls.

Steve Israel was right, he called this set of elections "a shellacking on a thumping" for the Dems.

A better question, and I asked this earlier specifically about the VA election, but why are states doing this in off years? You want/need turnout, then do it in a Presidential election year.

 

[GermanSuplex]

Here is my take on it and you can agree or disagree.

What is supposed to be taught or not taught in a classroom is wholly dependent on individual teachers. Pick an issue, any issue, and you will find teachers that present it based on facts and answer questions as honestly as they can. And you will also find teachers who use their positions to try and sway kids towards their beliefs on an issue. That is where I see a problem.

That’s true. But parents are now saying “I don’t want my kids to be taught this or that”, and oftentimes they aren’t alleging teachers have an agenda or whatnot, just joining into the foray of “We don’t want CRT!”

What’s wrong with the book Beloved? I read the Grapes of Wrath in school, I didn’t feel like I was being attacked as a person of color by reading a fictitious account of a bunch of white people heading to the west. If there were blacks who aided slave masters or black tribes in Africa selling off their own to Americans, I wouldn’t feel attacked for learning truth.

But you and I are having a deeper argument than what Youngkin put forward, which was a promise to ban something that doesn’t exist. It’s the southern strategy, really, the oldest conservative playbook in American politics since reconstruction.


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[Herdfan]

Is a truck driver who spent $153 on donuts and flyers really about to unseat the NJ Senate President, who is also the longest serving legislator in NJ history?

 

[lizkat]

A better question, and I asked this earlier specifically about the VA election, but why are states doing this in off years? You want/need turnout, then do it in a Presidential election year.

We cannot focus well on all the elective office contests at once. Party leaders and workers, pollsters and field operators (and now the big donors and grassroots activists as well) can't spread their time, energy and money so thinly as to handle all the elective contests just every two or four years.

How may more ads per election cycle do we want to be subjected to, anyway?

Governors and judges, sheriffs and town supervisors would all seem to merit serious attention from voters, but presidential and congressional candidates take up all the media attention when they're on the ballot. So some states do decide to schedule those other slots for election in the off-years.

 

[lizkat]

Is a truck driver who spent $153 on donuts and flyers really about to unseat the NJ Senate President, who is also the longest serving legislator in NJ history?

Why not? AOC is in Congress today because a few years ago as "a mere slip of a girl" she caught Joe Crowley napping and took him down in a primary. He had been chair of the House Democratic Caucus and was 13 years running the Queens Democratic Party. It was one of the biggest political upsets of 2018.

A guy in the Massachusetts congressional delegation ran into a similar situation a few years earlier. No reason it couldn't happen in a general election these days as well. Gerrymandering can make a long term incumbent overconfident for today's politics. It's still harder to unseat an incumbent governor or a US Senator though, than a member of the US House, never mind someone in a state legislature.

 

[ronntaylor]

A better question, and I asked this earlier specifically about the VA election, but why are states doing this in off years? You want/need turnout, then do it in a Presidential election year.

That's just the schedule based on past elections and electoral changes. For instance, this year most council seats in NYC were term-limited. So most of those that won seats this year are up for re-election in two years, not four. Yes, the year before the 2024 Presidential Bonanza.

Is a truck driver who spent $153 on donuts and flyers really about to unseat the NJ Senate President, who is also the longest serving legislator in NJ history?

Why not? AOC is in Congress today because a few years ago as "a mere slip of a girl" she caught Joe Crowley napping and took him down in a primary.

Incumbents win so routinely that they often take re-election for granted. Low turnout and dedicated voters amongst those that show up can ruin your political career.

I'm surprised Crowley didn't run on other lines against AOC. A Dem leader in NYC (and the House), he had some many favors he could have cashed in to get enough voters to keep his seat. I think he probably saw the writing on the wall. That and probably tons of $$$ waiting for him for his "expertise" to be exploited for the highest bidder. Witness what's happening in Buffalo with the the incumbent Dem mayor mounting a write-in campaign that looks like it's successful to thwart a DSA candidate with tons of progressive support, including Bernie.

Progressives can take seats from blowhards if they work hard enough. That's what happened with the Tea Party wave election amongst some more mainstream GOP reps and purple districts held by Dems in 2010.

 

[Herdfan]

Progressives can take seats from blowhards if they work hard enough. That's what happened with the Tea Party wave election amongst some more mainstream GOP reps and purple districts held by Dems in 2010.

I will give AOC credit for that. She hit the streets and SM and worked the voters. Not sure what this guy in NJ did beyond filing and hanging some flyers.

 

[shadow puppet]

If true, this is depressing AF. I hope Dems get it together before it's too late.

https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1456273594527277058/

https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1456042161263321100/

 

[Eric]

I think we need to be realistic about midterms, the sitting president's party nearly always loses seats. None of this is bombshell news.

 

[GermanSuplex]

Is a truck driver who spent $153 on donuts and flyers really about to unseat the NJ Senate President, who is also the longest serving legislator in NJ history?

Was just reading about this.

Time will tell what this guy is like as an actual lawmaker, and I get that people are sick of career politicians, but that doesn’t by default make someone else a better choice.

That said, I don’t know much about him so we will see how he does.

 

[GermanSuplex]

I think we need to be realistic about midterms, the sitting president's party nearly always loses seats. None of this is bombshell news.

Yeah. We need to temper expectations. We had a good 2020, but this is generally how the game works.

That said, it is refreshing to hear democrats ponder what to do next year. If we acted like the republicans, we’d just demand audits and deny losing. Must’ve been rampant voter fraud by corrupt radical conservatives.

Seriously, republicans had no such soul-seeing after losing the house, presidency and senate.

 

[SuperMatt]

Yeah. We need to temper expectations. We had a good 2020, but this is generally how the game works.

That said, it is refreshing to hear democrats are ponder what to do next year. If we acted like the republicans, we’d just demand audits and deny losing. Must’ve been rampant voter fraud by corrupt radical conservatives.

Seriously, republicans had no such soul-seeing after losing the house, presidency and senate.

Their base is motivated by rage. So the fake outrage about voting fraud keeps them angry and energized while giving legislatures an excuse to make it harder for minorities to vote.

The base would see such soul-searching as weakness. They want an authoritarian leader who favors white people. Period. They don’t want to “expand the tent” of the GOP at all.