David A. Graham
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Nov 18, 2009 10:16 AM
Perhaps as an antidote to Sarah Palin's media domination over the last two weeks, frequent Palin critic David Brooks offered on Thursday a different presidential contender for 2012: South Dakota Sen. John Thune. And Tuesday, Washington Post political guru Chris Cillizza picked up the tune.
"For months—if not years—the Republican/conservative smart set has been
looking for a fresh face on which to hang their hopes and dreams,"
Cillizza wrote. South Dakota Sen. John Thune may be that person."
Wait, really?
Brooks's rather guileless New York Times column doesn't make
a compelling argument that Thune has anything new to offer, but simply
that he is reliably conservative, affable, and not likely to say
anything dumb:
His positions on the issues are unremarkable. He is down-the-line
conservative on social, economic and foreign policy matters. What’s
notable is the way he talks about the issues and jumps off from them
... He doesn’t have radical plans to cut the federal leviathan. He just
wants to restrain the growth of government to bring deficits down. He
doesn’t have ambitions to restructure the tax code. He just wants to
lift burdens on small business.
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Katie Connolly
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Nov 4, 2009 12:28 AM
Make no mistake: tonight’s losses in Virginia and New Jersey should worry the Democratic Party. Just one year after their historic presidential victory, it turns out that ballots without the name “Obama” don’t have the same magnetic allure for voters, especially if said voters are young, black, or Hispanic. That’s a problem for Democrats heading into 2010, particularly members of Congress who were elected in traditionally Republican districts. But be careful about reading too much into these results. It wasn't a referendum on the president.
Recent history tells us that both Virginia and New Jersey gubernatorial contests tend to be won by the party that has just been kicked out of the White House. In 2001, Democrats Jim McGreevey and Mark Warner soundly beat their Republican opponents in New Jersey and Virginia, respectively, where the GOP had held both positions. And in 1993, Bill Clinton’s first year in office, Christine Todd Whitman in New Jersey and George Allen in Virginia wrested the governorships from Democrats.
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Howard Fineman
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Nov 3, 2009 11:29 PM
Election Day 2009 was not a repudiation of Barack Obama, but it sure wasn't a vote of confidence, either. Exit polls in Virginia and New Jersey showed that fewer than 40 percent of voters factored the president per se into their polling-booth equation. But the deep skepticism that the (shrunken) electorate showed toward Democratic candidates can't be interpreted in any other way than as a vote of not-quite-confidence in the man in the White House. The fact is, as the exits showed, voters are overwhelmingly worried about the economy—and the president has done little or nothing, it seems, to allay that fear. That presents an opening to the Republican Party next year, if they can take advantage of it.
Two gubernatorial elections do not a new national party make. Nationwide, the GOP currently has the allegiance of only one in five voters—the lowest percentage since Abe Lincoln was building the party a century and a half ago. If the Republicans are going to build on the momentum they acquired today, they are going to have to present credible alternative plans for economic revival. The national party might take a look at what Bob McDonnell did in Virginia. He had specific, detailed plans for transportation, education, and other bread-and-butter concerns in the state, especially in the swing-voter suburbs near Washington.
As for Obama, he needs to pass—and convincingly sell the virtues of—legislation that helps real people in real ways.
Howard Fineman
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Nov 3, 2009 11:17 PM
This election was as much about who didn't show up as who did. Obama
World took the day off. As a result, the races in Virginia, New Jersey,
and New York were largely left to the old school—older white folks—and
they yanked the results back in their own (generally conservative)
direction.
If this was a rebellion we were watching, as some
Republicans suggested, it was a rebellion of an antique America—in
both the literal and figurative sense—against the dawn of a
demographically and perhaps philosophically new country.
I don't
have much exit-poll data in hand (they are very tight with such things
over here at NBC, where I am camped out), but from what I can glean,
the minority turnout in Virginia and New Jersey was relatively
light—certainly compared with the tsunami of 2008. (There are few
persons of color in the North Country of New York state, where a House
special election also drew attention.)
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Daniel Stone
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Nov 3, 2009 08:21 PM
With enough precincts reporting to make it official, Virginia Democratic candidate Creigh Deeds was handed a defeat Tuesday night, having lost his bid for governor by double digits. Of all the closely watched races of the day, it’s fair to say that the one in Virginia would have the most obvious outcome. Deeds trailed GOP opponent Bob McDonnell by an average of 10 points across several polls more than a week ago. Even after President Obama campaigned for him two weeks ago, the Democrat still couldn’t recover.
Pundits have tried for weeks to tie the Deeds-McDonnell race to a larger national significance, specifically a coast-to-coast referendum on President Obama’s first year since his election. And understandably so—editors and TV producers like it when you can turn local news into national headlines. But that’s nothing compared to how much the Republican Party, which won two other state offices in Virginia on Tuesday, wanted to frame McDonnell’s win as a public, national rebuke of Obama.
It might be good for ad sales and partisan politics, but it’s not the most accurate way to interpret McDonnell’s win.
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Katie Connolly
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Nov 3, 2009 09:24 AM
It's
Election Day, and although none of the contests has a real national
impact, political strategists will be analyzing every minute detail for
clues on national trends. As the results come trickling in, here are
five things to watch for.
1. In Virginia, things look pretty dour for Creigh Deeds. Although Obama won the state last year, Deeds has few of the traits
that excited Democrats to vote for Obama in droves. But Republicans
will quickly celebrate a poor showing by Deeds as proof that the
president's star power is waning. Watch for the White House to subtly
distance itself from the Deeds campaign, likely in the form of blind
quotes on Politico or in tomorrow's Washington Post.
2. In New Jersey,
incumbent Gov. Jon Corzine and Republican challenger Chris Christie
will be duking it out till the bitter end. It's a close race, but as
the man formerly known as Stumper wrote last week,
Jersey politics is often decided by the strength of the Democratic
turnout machine. Tonight's vote will be an indicator of whether the
base there is politically motivated enough to vote for a guy they're
not that excited about just to prevent a GOP win. A Corzine loss would
be the most worrying outcome of the night for Democrats. That said, the
person who will decide tonight's race is really Republican turned
independent Chris Daggett, who has steadily chipped away at Christie's
numbers. Watch for Democrats to marginalize his impact on the race—they
won't want to admit that Corzine may have been trampled if Daggett
hadn't taken some of the vote. Speaking of third-party candidates . . .
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David A. Graham
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Oct 20, 2009 04:30 PM
Republicans are rubbing their hands in glee—and Democrats wringing theirs—at the struggles of Democratic gubernatorial candidates in New Jersey and Virginia. Both of these governor's seats carry great power and would be impressive coups for the GOP, but from a national level, they're really most important for citizens of New Jersey and Virginia. The race the nation should be watching is a special election in upstate New York.
On the gubernatorial level, Republican Bob McDonnell looks to have the upper hand in Virginia, while incumbent Democrat Jon Corzine may eke out a win in New Jersey but will only do so after embarrassing 11th-hour revelations about opponent Chris Christie, attacks on Christie's weight, and help from an independent, third-party challenger. But regardless of who wins, these races aren't really referendums on Barack Obama—they're referendums on the corruption-racked Garden State and the economic future of the Old Dominion. The New York race, however, will provide some hints as to whether Democrats can hold on to voters who went for Obama in 2008 and show what path the right wing might choose to regain relevance.
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Katie Connolly
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Sep 2, 2009 12:19 PM
Yesterday, Politico's Josh Kraushaar compiled a list of the casualties of what's been a particularly brutal August recess. Kraushaar is right—bodies are piling up on both sides of the aisle as the health-care debate becomes increasingly volatile. With even the White House looking seriously bruised, it's hard to think of any politician who has fared well over the last month. But there are a few winners amid the casualties. Here is our take on who they are:
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