GOP Nominee
Former Candidates
The bad news is that Childers’ victory in Mississippi-01 likely portends a Democratic uber-majority in 2009 at every level of government. We’re talking House, Senate, state houses, state legislatures, dog catchers — the works.
The good news is that the presumptive Democratic nominee, Barack Obama, won only 26 percent of the vote in today’s Democratic primary. His opponent, Hillary Clinton, bested him by over 40 points. Remember back when McCain was the presumptive GOP nominee and Huckabee kept overperforming in states that culturally favored the Huckster, like Virginia and Texas? Remember how worried we were that John McCain was only winning 60 percent of the GOP vote at the time despite being the de facto nominee? Well, just imagine how the political world would have exploded if McCain’s 20-point victories had been 40-point losses.
Moreover, only 53 percent of West Virginia Democratic primary voters plan to support Obama in the fall. Now, West Virginia is the sort of state with lots of DINOs. Heck, 30 percent of West Virginia Democrats voted for Bush in 2004. But something tells me that those Democrats hadn’t actually voted for a Democrat in 30 years, save Robert C. Byrd. But of West Virginia’s Democrats who voted in today’s Democratic primary, i.e., of those who actually want a Democrat to be president, only half will commit to supporting Obama in the general. Those are ruinous numbers.
What all of this means is that the GOP is such a miserable party that it’s going to get blown out of the water this November, and that Barack Obama is such a miserable candidate that he’s going to get annihilated as well. That means that the most likely result of the race for 2008 will be President McCain and a heavily Democratic Congress.
May 14th, 2008 at 2:25 am
I hope the Repubs don’t get blown out of the water in the Senate race, because then McCain won’t be much good on judges.
May 14th, 2008 at 2:27 am
I got the feeling I’m going to be in the position of hoping nobody retires for a few years.
May 14th, 2008 at 2:39 am
Dave, you have arrived at devine’s station, established 2006. Stay here.
May 14th, 2008 at 2:43 am
mccain should let vacant slots stay vacant if the senate will not approve alitos like the gop approved breyers and ginsburgs.
May 14th, 2008 at 3:36 am
Obama is clearly the fav let’s be serious for a second.
May 14th, 2008 at 7:13 am
I did not watch any coverage last night so I could wake up and look on Obama’s page to see how he played it. Guess what - you would think the only contest last night was in Mississippi because his statement is about Childers’ victory.
To be honest you would have to say that was the most important contest last night because it was a McCain-Obama proxy war on GOP territory. Anti-Obama ads using Wright were run and Cheney was there on Monday. Plus, the RNC invested over $1 million. If I’m Obama I would glady take getting whipped in a primary if it meant a house seat in GOP country.
May 14th, 2008 at 7:52 am
[...] DaveG of Race42008 breaks down the general election impact: What all of this means is that the GOP is such a miserable party that it’s going to get blown out of the water this November, and that Barack Obama is such a miserable candidate that he’s going to get annihilated as well. That means that the most likely result of the race for 2008 will be President McCain and a heavily Democratic Congress. [...]
May 14th, 2008 at 8:05 am
What DaveG says is probably true. Keep in mind the type of Democrats who won in 2006 were not like Barack Obama. They were moderates like Casey, Webb, and Tester. If you look at it race by race though, I don’t think the Congress will get really bad. The Democrats have already won most seats that they’re going to win. The Congress will stay about what it is now, with perhaps a tiny handful of Democrat gains.
May 14th, 2008 at 8:42 am
That’s nonsense and some of your claims are starting to sound ridiculous. What the hell does Obama care about a district in MS where the local Democrat won while running well to the right of the national party? What possible implication does it have on Obama’s campaign? I guarantee you that McCain takes the district in the general election - it won’t even be close.
If I were Obama I would be worried that I lost a primary by 41 points after a gleeful media was trumpeting that Hillary was dead for a week. Think about that. 41 points. Obama gained no ground among the very bloc he’s been having trouble with for months. They all know Hillary is going to lose and despite being forcefed by the media, regular run of the mill Democrats are engaging in protest votes for Obama by ridiculous margins. 74 percent of WV Democrats voted AGAINST Obama - knowing full well that he is going to be the nominee.
I’d be much more worried about what that says than what can be gleaned by any local race in Miss. - or the congressional elections as a whole. If the election were today Obama would lose. Unless or until he can show even a modest ability to unite his fractured party that’s not going to change.
May 14th, 2008 at 9:30 am
Emotion often distorts analysis. If we look honestly at last night’s results to determine what they portend for the Fall we see that the GOP brand is greatly damaged and that Obama at the top of the ticket will not hurt conservative dems. The MS election was for an actual seat in congress, not a primary where voters could voice frustrations without having any actual effect. And while Childers is pro-life and pro-gun he was still running under the democratic banner with Obama as the prohibitive favorite as the standard bearer (who also endorsed Childers). So important was the race that the Vice President made a campaign appearance, a rarity. Thus, democrats, particularly superdelegates, wanted to see how a conservative dem would fair under such conditions. Childers’ victory refutes Clinton’s lastest argument why she should be the nominee, which bolsters Obama’s standing. So any way you look at it MS was way more important than WVA.
May 14th, 2008 at 9:38 am
I don’t disagree with you in the abstract. But it wasn’t more important for Obama . The reality is that given the media narrative that Obama has already won the nomination there is no excuse for him to lose a primary by 41 points. He should been able to close that gap based on inevitability alone. Instead, anti-Obama forces came out in droves just to vote against him, whether they used Hillary or Edwards as a vessel. Where have we ever seen such horrific losses for a “presumptive front-runner” before? And when have they ever occurred this late in the primary season? The fact that Edwards magically got seven percent and a majority of WV voters think that Obama shares Wright’s values shows that these are not simply droves of people that can be dismissed as pro-Hillary voters. They are clearly anti-Obama.
To be truthful the MS-1 loss was bad for the GOP. No question about it. But the reality is that the House is already lost. The Democrats have it and the GOP was never going to get it back this year. When the pendulum shifts the other way and the GOP is on the upswing (and they will be whether it take 2 or 5 or 10 years) it is precisely Democrats like Childers that will be the first to defect or be defeated.
May 14th, 2008 at 9:50 am
Look at Childers views on the issues. This just helps show that the Democrats are taking a line from the Karl Rove 2002 playbook — endorse anyone within the party and they should be able to win on party support alone with no regard to a person’s personal politics v. the national party’s politics. Allow your candidates to mold to the situation their in to the point where they might as well be independent of party. That’s what happened here…Childers is a DINO in most senses of the word and I think it’ll be interesting to see how the DINO’s in Congress fare when they’re up against the rather liberal leadership of the party.
May 14th, 2008 at 10:07 am
MattyN,
You’re right. It worked in 2002. But we’ve all seen what happens once the political winds change. Once they do, there are going to be a whole lot of vulnerable Democrats.
May 14th, 2008 at 10:17 am
Here is something interesting from the NYTimes:
“[T[he Republican strategy of trying to link Mr. Childers to more liberal national Democratic figures fell short, as it did in Louisiana. Indeed, voters here were bombarded by advertisements equating Mr. Childers with Senator Barack Obama, a tactic intended to turn conservative whites away from Mr. Childers and which some politicians said played on white racial resentments… In the end, tying the white Democrat to the black presidential candidate may have helped Mr. Childers more than it hurt him, as campaign aides reported heavy black turnout, heavier than in a vote three weeks ago when he came within 400 votes of winning.â€
May 14th, 2008 at 10:29 am
Pablo,
MS-1 is 26 percent black - twice the US average. I don’t think that tying Childers to Obama was the best strategy. But you can’t extrapolate whether or not it will work based on MS-1 and it’s peculiar demographics. Even in NC, the GOP is well-positioned to pick up a governorship based on the latest Rasmussen. The state party is trying the same thing there.
May 14th, 2008 at 1:37 pm
McCain is a dem.
May 14th, 2008 at 2:54 pm
Let the GOP have WVA’s 5 electoral votes. Time and money saved on Obama’s end. Poor whites have been with the GOP ever since the southern strategy. The Dems will make up for this with a win in the REAL VA.
May 14th, 2008 at 11:27 pm
I just researched Congressman-elect Travis Childers, and he is actually a very conservative Democrat, kind of like their other Congressman Gene Taylor, who is basically like a Republican. Childers’ win, for all practical purposes, means nothing. He is probably more conservative than Christopher Shays, the only Republican from New England.