Extremely different. The Democrats didn't have anything remotely close to 100% opposition to everything Bush did. If they had, we might not be stuck with Alito and Roberts, Medicare Part D, Iraq, etc.
the homo, not the Cuomo predicts a republican landslide... -- I predict a Republican victory of tsunami proportions on November 2nd. For the last six months in various public forums, I have said that Republicans will take both the House and Senate. Most political observers, citing statistics from various states, continue to say that, while it appears certain that the House will go Republican, there are too few Senate seats in play for a Republican takeover. Further, many pundits state that Democrats will preserve their control of the Senate because the Republican Party has undermined itself by fielding whacko and semi-whacko candidates from the "Tea Party" wing or otherwise offering inferior candidates, e.g., Christine O'Donnell in Delaware, Rand Paul in Kentucky, Sharron Angle in Nevada, Linda McMahon in Connecticut and Carly Fiorina in California. Without being able to cite statistics that support my view, I nevertheless predict the Republicans will also take the Senate. .... Why would intelligent voters leave the Democratic Party that they endorsed so heavily two years ago in the 2008 presidential election? The reason is obvious – deep, deep disappointment in the record of President Obama. ...The American public is enraged and wants to punish those who have been in charge of the country.
I'm honestly shocked that you have time to post on other public forums with all the trolling you do here.
that's really sad and depressing. And truly shows that Republican leaders right now are just a traitor to this nation.
My hope is that progressives learn from this and craft a better message, but that will take less smugness, less smirking, and less mud slinging, and more listening, so I'm not overly optimistic.
There wasn't much of anything the Dems could do to avoid getting killed in the mid-terms unless there was a magic bullet they didn't fire that would have fixed the economy. I guess it's to be expected, but I am amazed that so many liberals believe their current problems are due to bad messaging and tactics. Political Math 101: A new president + same party controlling both houses of congress + major recession (inherited or not) = Mid-term bloodshed.
That's about it. Even if the economy was stronger, I think Republicans would have won the house. It's just typical election cycles. Unless there was a war going on. I really think Obama will be better off with a Republican House and a Split 50-50 Senate. It will force Republicans to lead, something they haven't done in quite some time. I don't think they have a plan...Obama took all their ideas in an attempt to pull a Bill Clinton and then Repubs had to attack those ideas in order to play politics. But one thing is for sure. Americans are not going to be happy if the Republicans just use their power to continue to attack Obama just to win the presidency in 2012. They need to come up with something and now they have to fix the mess we are in as well. Of course, there's very little Obama or Repubs can do now. The Stimulus was passed and had it's impact. It's out of the federal gov't hands. Let's hope that the new congress will not try to extend tax cuts and instead focus on reducing the deficit.
I said a couple of months ago that GOP success in the mid-terms would help Obama's re-election chances.
I certainly agree with the gist of your post, A_3PO, but disagree regarding your amazement at the criticism some of us have directed towards the Democratic leadership and the President for our current predicament. Hope springs eternal in the breast of an ardent Democrat, which would describe me, but I've been upset for a long time at the lack of a coherent message during this election season from my party and I think at least some finger pointing is justified. OK, probably a lot of finger pointing, at least in my opinion, but maybe not a middle finger.
There's a huge difference between 20 seats, 40 seats, 60 seats, and 80 seats. There are certainly things that Dems could have done to improve the situation. You see it where individual Dems are doing those things and closing the gap or turning races in their favor. Good campaigns always can counteract national trends.
Dem leadership certainly hasn't had much of a message and are definitely off their game. I don't question the criticism. I disagree with the notion better messaging would prevent the Dems from getting stomped in two weeks. Better messaging doesn't change major political tides, especially mid-term elections. You also have to admit it's hard to craft messages that resonate when everything is going wrong (with the economy) and you can't do much more to change that near-term. The stimulus certainly helped but explaining to the general public hitting the wall at 50 mph is better than 80 mph is hard. TARP has been a success too. But you know what? The economy still stinks and high unemployment remains. Major, in select individuals races, you can buck national trends. It happens somewhere every election. But that isn't something national Dem leaders can do much about. In fact, guys like Manchin in WV are running away from their own party as fast as they can.
Absolutely - but more traditional Dems are asking voters to vote for them for NO REASON. That's not a winning strategy at all. I agree this is a wave election - but if the GOP wins by 6 pts vs 8 pts, that's probably a 20 seat difference. And having a unified message - or some kind of message at all - can easily swing an election by 2 points. For example, 9 out of 10 Americans thing Dems raised taxes over the last two years. If Dems had been running ads for the past 2 months trumpeting that every American got a tax reduction, that wouldn't have an effect? Of course it would - how much? Who knows. But wave elections are made far worse when the party facing the wave runs away from whatever little it has going for it.
I think the Dems and Obama thought the economy would turn sooner than it had. That or they figured the public would have been more patient. Either way they grossly miscalculated. The Stimulus package was the right thing to do. The issue wasn't that. It was that he went after health care instead of focusing on the economy and the deficit. I understand the argument made that he had to do it when he had a chance with a dem congress....but it's clear that it was health care that sunk the Obama Express. I don't think this health care bill will really make a difference. It's too small of a step and comes at too high a political cost. Better would have been to focus on the economy with jobs programs and figuring out how to make entitlement programs solvent. I think he followed his idealism and did not act as a pragmatist. And now the Dems will rightfully pay a steeper price. However; I do not think this is a referendum on the President and if the Republicans use their new found power to simply try to be a thorn in Obama's side, they will end up helping him get re-elected. Americans aren't putting Republicans back in power in Congress to see them be obstructionists. It's to move the country towards austerity and reduce the deficit. They will need to work with Obama on that. Let's see if they can.
Oops. I didn't notice the dashed line to indicate you were quoting text from your link. I should have known that you would never actually write that much on your own.
