Turning The Ballot Box Against Republicans

"Awful news for Republican Senate candidates": Odds of GOP holding Senate suddenly collapse
Trump’s unpopularity will likely see Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell lose his power following the November e

TOM BOGGIONI JUNE 6, 2020 4:24PM (UTC)

According to an analysis by Politico's Jeff Greenfield, recent voting trends combined with Donald Trump's unpopularity with the electorate will likely see Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) lose his power following the November election.

First proposing, "It's a question as obvious as it is critical: How will the trio of crises—the pandemic, the economy, the demands for racial justice—affect the 2020 race for the White House," the columnist said it will be a major factor this election cycle and that is not good news for Republicans.

"History has some powerful answers to this question—and they leave Republican partisans with a strong case of agita," he wrote. "As a general proposition, when the nation is in a state of crisis, things do not go well for the President's party. When a war becomes a quagmire (Korea in '52, Vietnam in '68), when the economy craters (1980, 2008), voters look for a different leader. Far from a 'retreat to safety' or a 'rally round the flag' sentiment, there is an instinct to show the people in charge the way to the exit."

As Greenfield notes, the Republican Party won't be an exception in 2020.

"This year, the Senate Republicans hold a majority, again making them vulnerable to any vote to toss out the status quo. But don't voters make different choices when they vote for a President and then a Senator? Once upon a time, yes," he explained. "The potentially awful news for Republican Senate candidates is another historical trend: the increasing link between votes cast for a Presidential contender and votes cast for senators, which makes it harder to create distance from an unpopular incumbent."

"Turn to the Senate map, and it's clear how these factors combine to produce a migraine for any strategist looking to hold the Senate for the Republicans. Not that long ago, Republicans were a good bet to hold the Senate even though they held 23 of the 35 contested seats. Only two—Cory Gardner of Colorado and Susan Collins of Maine—were in states that Hillary Clinton carried in 2016. Even with Arizona and North Carolina as potential Presidential battlegrounds, that left at most four vulnerable Republicans," he continued. "And with Alabama Democrat Doug Jones a very likely loser, there was little breathing room for Democrats to pick up the three net seats they'd need to capture the Senate, assuming Biden wins in November."

Greenfield goes on to point out that handful of Senate seats in normally GOP strongholds may also be in play — in part because of Republican senator's support for the unpopular president.

"Now—at least measured by polls—a passel of states now seem within Biden's reach, many of them with incumbent Republican senators up for re-election, " he elaborated. "He's even in Georgia, where both incumbent Republican senators will be on the ballot; he's even in Iowa, where Joni Ernst is up for re-election. And if Biden is going to make a real fight in Georgia and Iowa, that means a get-out-the-vote effort that will bring a lot of Democrats to the polls there."

Equally important, he notes, is that it is difficult for incumbents to distance themselves from Trump over fears he will turn his base against them — meaning they are in a trap of their own making.

"Now put yourself in the position of one of these endangered incumbents, especially in states where Trump is particularly unpopular, like Colorado or Maine. If you're tempted to create some distance from President Trump, to assert your independence, you're facing one pesky obstacle: The Republican Party is effectively now a wholly owned subsidiary of Trumpworld, and independence from the President is a trait that all but guarantees instant and massive pushback from your own party," he explained. "You have only to gaze around the Senate chamber, where ex-Senator Dean Heller, ex-Senator Jeff Flake, and ex-Senator Bob Corker sat, to see what happened to colleagues who did not tug the forelock with sufficient enthusiasm. If you're Gardner, or Collins, the temptation to confront the President's behavior has to be weighed against the likely outrage from the party apparatus whose help you need in an election, to say nothing of the populist media that animates your rank-and-file voters."

'If you are playing the percentages, the odds say that if the President cannot persuade a rattled, fretful electorate to stay with him, he will take the Republican Senate down with him," Greenfield concluded.

People realize the Democrats politicized the crisis and did everything to stand in the way of any progress. They are also stupid enough to talk about defunding the police.

The Democrat's balloon will take on some serious lead in November

Trump is in the middle forties consistently. Deal with it.

My understanding is that they are actually doing it in Los Angeles.

What does a movement devoted to murdering police officers have to do with a common defense?



Godwin's Law. Livinglava wins the argument.

Congratulations Livinglava.

He’s the only president who has never broken fifty percent in any polling (except for in an occasional extreme right skewed poll - never mainstream , even Fox). Deal with that.

I do not agree that those polls have extreme skewing, but just for the sake of argument let's say they do have extreme skewing and are therefore unreliable.

Why would Coldjoint be bothered by the President's poll numbers not going over 50%?

I'm personally not at all bothered by the possibility that Mr. Trump has never broken above 50%. I can't imagine that Coldjoint would be bothered by it either.

I don't...and they seem to be backing off that report!

Then you have a weak imagination. A thinking person would at least wonder why their man is the only one not to exceed that mark. It’s a reasonable thing to at least consider. Especially if you’re going to brag about consistently polling in the mid forties.

I'm a thinking person, and I don't care a bit about whether he does or doesn't go above 50%.

That’s understandable. You also don’t care that he lies constantly, or that he handled the pandemic outbreak incompetently, or that he fans the flames of division rather than working to heal them. You don’t care, or you deny it all. It’s part of what makes you and coldjoint do thoroughly irrelevant to any reasonable discussion.

I blame the pandemic on Democrats disrupting government with an impeachment sham for the entire first month when it was spreading.

I don't accept progressive claims that he lies constantly. Progressives always refer to the truth as a lie.

I put all the blame for divisiveness entirely on progressives and their boundless intolerance.

There's really not much to discuss. Progressives are evil. Vote for Trump.

Entirely opinion not fact/ And most of your OPINIONS in fact fly in the face of demonstrable fact. Snood hits it, you miss it.

BINGO!

or

Well said.

Your choice, Snood. Both apply.

What’s up, Frank Apisa!? Good to see you back around here lately. And, thanks.

Black Lives Matter Protesters Tear Down Slave Trader Statue In Bristol And Dump In Harbor
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/black-lives-matter-protesters-tear-down-slave-trader-statue-in-bristol_n_5edd0adec5b6442ed046ab63



Comment:
Here are some white men protesters to be proud of.

I just want to take a moment to protest how A2K shut off my "Black Lives Matter" thread... Because of trolls...

This is a top news report over here . The Home Secretary has called it an act of vandalism. The (black) mayor of Bristol is currently being interviewed. He has agreed that it is criminal damage and he can’t condone it, but he said the statue was an affront to him and people like him. He is being challenged for why he hasn’t taken it down. He is the first elected black mayor in Europe and said he couldn’t start knocking statues down because he does not have that freedom.

The slaver did donate most of his wealth to the city on his death. The statue wasn’t erected until 1895 and a plaque calls him as wise and virtuous. There was talk about changing the plaque or putting the statue in a museum.

What happens now will be interesting. I don’t know if the protesters will be charged or if they will try to put the statue up again. We’ll just have to see how it goes.

Wow, I'm impressed by how reasonable this post is.

I wouldn't say that giving your wealth to the city when you die makes you a hero, though. When a slaver or other capitalist creates wealth in the form of an exploitative business of whatever kind, it doesn't solve the exploitation to give that money to exploited people who then spend it on the things produced by the exploitative economy and thus perpetuate the economy that exploited them to begin with.

For real change to happen, the means of production don't need to change hands, they just need to change so that they aren't exploitative. That could mean that everyone gets less money and privileges in the long run, but at least what we do get will be gotten without exploitation (and ending exploitation doesn't mean paying workers more to compensate them for their exploitation so they can afford to buy more of what other workers are being exploited to produce).

Making the economy non-exploitative means taking the fears and pressures out of economic participation and making it possible for people to voluntarily take jobs based on what they believe is right and good and how they can take responsibility for the things they consume, such as housing, food, etc.

Currently the economy involves a lot of burden-shifting away from yourself by seeking the best job you can get and avoiding the jobs that someone else has to do because you spend your money (and/or pay taxes) for those things. There should be a way for everyone to take a shift doing the dirty jobs so they don't all end up on certain shoulders due to economic burden-shifting.

Here is a perfect example of a progressive denying reality. This is why all the claims that Mr. Trump is lying have no credibility.

No matter how true a statement is, a progressive will still say it isn't true.

You confuse your opinion with fact. That is the fact. Your opinions are not. They in fact spring totally from your own mind, which is largely out of touch with reality. Get out of your bunker and spend a little time in the real world for a change.

You really said that? Talk about an elite attitude. Reasonable to you means nothing to me, because you do not set those parameters for me or Oralloy..