Rossputin.com Rational Thinking About Our World

In Virginia, Republican Bob McDonnell beat Democrat Creigh Deeds by over 17%, more than all but one poll ever showed as his lead and 4% more than the final RealClearPolitics average of polls of the race showed.  The incumbent is a term-limited Democrat.

In New Jersey, Republican Chris Christie beat Democrat incumbent Jon Corzine by about 4.5%. Since September, only two polls showed Christie with a lead of over 4% and quite a few polls showed Corzine with a lead.  The final RCP poll average was Christie by 1%.  (I won a few bucks on this one…)

In New York’s 23rd Congressional District’s special election, Democrat Bill Owens beat Conservative Party candidate Doug Hoffman, with so-called Republican Dede Scozzafava, who gave up her campaign over the weekend and then endorsed the Democrat, nevertheless garnering over 5% of the vote.  The most recent polls had tended to lean toward Mr. Hoffman. The seat was just vacated by a Republican who went to work in the Obama Administration.

While people are generally looking at how Republicans did versus Democrats in these three elections, maybe there is a more consistent theme:  All three new job holders are from the party other than that of the current/prior holder.  In Virginia and New Jersey, Republicans took governorships which have been held by Democrats.  In New York 23, a Democrat won a seat which had been held by a Republican.  (To be sure, there are far more other dynamics in the NY 23 race than in the others and few people understand politics well enough to give a nearly full explanation of why it went the way it did. One of those few is Human Events’ John Gizzi, with THIS opinion.)

While many on the left will argue that the results in NY 23 should give comfort to “moderates” in Congress who may be on the fence about voting for Obamacare or cap-and-trade, I don’t see it that way.  The result of all these elections should be to scare the heck out of anybody current serving in anything but an absolutely safe seat. And given that the conservative candidate in that race was not running on the Republican ticket, it’s hard to say what this means for the GOP.

Additionally, the magnitude of the Republican victories in both Virginia and New Jersey does some damage to the political capital of Barack Obama.  It’s not so much that the votes are anti-Him, but are a signal against liberal, high-tax, big government policies overall.  Obama campaigned hard for Deeds and extremely hard for Corzine, spending almost a full day there just before the election – something essentially unheard of for a sitting president. The fact that he couldn’t save Corzine is a huge message to the 60+ Democratic members of the House who come from districts that were won by George W. Bush or John McCain.

Also, in both VA and NJ, the Democratic candidates got a lower percentage than Barack Obama got in 2008…by about 12 points and 13 points respectively.

By my count, in Virginia the Democrat won 20 out of 134 counties and independent cities.  Importantly, the Republican won the three large northern Virginia counties of Loudon, Prince William and, most importantly, Fairfax.  He won them by 22, 16, and 2 points, respectively.  These are counties that Barack Obama won by 8, 16, and 21 points, respectively.  For a Republican to win Fairfax County is extremely important and shows that mostly-rich, mostly-white suburbs can become so upset with high taxes and liberal over-reaching that even they can be turned away from their frequently robotic support of liberals/Democrats.  Jon Corzine won Democratic suburban stronghold Bergen County, NJ, by two points; Obama won Bergen by almost 9%. Not as dramatic a shift as in Northern Virginia, but still important.

One thing is certain. As I’ve said before, the NJ Governor’s race is the most important race of the day, and it was a disaster for a Democrat incumbent.  As to whether it was more because of Corzine’s being a Democrat or more due to his being an incumbent, we can only speculate.  I think it was both, but more of the latter than the former.  In any case, the New Jersey result must frighten Democrats in Congress.  If Corzine had won this race, then no matter what happened in NY23, the Democrats could have rightfully expected that even stupid leadership, raising taxes, and reforming essentially nothing, could still leave them winning elections.  And they could have come to believe that Barack Obama’s halo was broad enough to cover many or most of them.  New Jersey proves that neither of these is true and that the Democrats’ only defense in 2010 will be their record…not something likely to give them comfort today.  Given that Nancy Pelosi wants “moderates” to commit political suicide by voting for Obamacare and cap-and-trade, the next truly fascinating battle will be among Democrats – though there should be a longer and just as interesting battle among Republicans for the soul of the party, much in the way that there was in NY23.

Another reason I think the mood is tremendously anti-incumbent is the result in New York City’s mayor’s race, in which Michael Bloomberg won a much narrower victory than any poll had predicted, despite his being relatively popular and his having spent an unbelievable amount of money (reportedly $100 million of his own money) to win.  That said, part of the antipathy against Bloomberg is that he had the term limits rules changed so he could run again.

In my view, there is a mixed message for “Tea Partyers".  The major message is that tea parties work…when they’re local and grassroots.  There is no doubt that Tea Partyers helped build enthusiasm for the conservative candidate in Virginia.  But in NY23, the massive influx of clearly non-local activists, including Colorado’s own Brian Campbell, and endorsements by conservative leaders such as Fred Thompson, Dick Armey, and particularly Sarah Palin, was unable to push the conservative over the line.  (Again, the fact that the conservative ran on the Conservative ticket rather than as a Republican could have made a big difference.  We’ll see if Doug Hoffman – or some other non-liberal Republican – ends up being the Republican nominee one year from now, and if the results are different if that happens.)  I would also suggest that the result is a body-blow to the Conservative Party and to proponents of third party candidacies in general. The very weak showing of Chris Daggett in New Jersey, getting fewer votes than any poll during the last two months predicted, reinforces this view. I maintain my belief that the only way we will be able to return to a government that even pretends to be guided by the nation’s Founding Principles is to force the Republican Party to go back there, not to rely on the Conservative or Libertarian parties – as much as I wish this weren’t the case.

And while I’m arguing that these elections might be more anti-incumbent than pro-conservative, there is certainly some of the latter going on with local elections in other states going noticeably toward Republicans.  To the extent that you want to characterize issues voting, such as in Maine, I’d say it’s more libertarian than conservative, with (as I write this) Maine voters rejecting their own legislature’s legalization of gay marriage by about 5% but supporting medical marijuana by 17%.  Maine voters decisively defeated a Taxpayer Bill of Rights (TABOR) measure which would have limited the growth of government…and against which unions spent large amounts of money and frightened voters by arguing that the measure threatened public schools (giving lessons to both sides of the argument in future similar situations.)

Another  interesting vote was the huge victory of Measure 71 in Washington State.  It’s billed as an “everything but marriage” measure, allowing “domestic partners” to have essentially the same rights and responsibilities as married couples, but without being called “married".  Washington is mostly a rather liberal place, so the vote is not a surprise…nor is it one that bothers me.  I would love to see government get out of “marriage” entirely and let any two people make any contract they want (that doesn’t violate the rights of others), but that’s a topic for another day…  Again, it’s a result that offers lessons to both sides of the debate.

Overall, this was a bad night for Democrats but maybe a worse night for incumbents, particularly incumbents in federal or statewide office. (It appears that incumbents in local seats didn’t do too badly, which may argue against my proposition…we’ll see.) To the extent that there are a lot more Democrats than Republicans in Congress, however, a bad night for incumbents gives Democrats a lot to worry about.  All that said, I wouldn’t buy into GOP rhetoric that this means the GOP are popular again.  Americans are solidly conservative, but we’re fed up with Republicans.  Until they give us something to vote for, they’ll never have a large or stable majority.

Finally, the real key to today – and I don’t have the numbers yet – is how independent voters voted.  A Fox News exit poll showed 58% going for the Republican versus 33% for the Democrat, in New Jersey.  Others report exit polls of independent voters going almost 2 to 1 for Republicans on the night.  When the final numbers come out, they will be extremely important.  Fox also mentioned that in New Jersey, the percentage of the voting public which were among the youngest legal voters was about half of what it was in 2008.  The idealistic youth were not energized to vote for just any Democrat, i.e. Jon Corzine (and who can blame them)?  If the young get turned off and independents lean solidly Republican in 2010, our next elections will make 1994 look like a walk in the park for the Democrats.  On the one hand, I’d like to say “we should be so lucky", but on the other hand, I’m not convinced that the GOP has learned its lesson, nor that they will learn the lesson if they regain a majority without making major changes, including throwing out big spenders, those who believe in man-made global warming, and those who chase “bipartisanship” over liberty.