I’m off cable news for the next 4+ years, only getting little glimpses here and there of what’s going on in print. But the takes I’ve been reading from the so-called pundit class have been really bad.
I’m not sure the presidential election was ever winnable. Kamala Harris performed fantastically well. Much better that I expected. The campaign was also very good. It’s painful because the polling, which was also pretty good, showed a coin toss race. Unfortunately the polling error was not in our favor.
Inflation is a nearly impossible force to counter. I remember Americans going nuts over small blips in gas prices in 2012. Food and shelter price increases feel ten times worse. Here’s a look at how governments in the G7 have fared (or are projected to fare*) since 2022
| Country | Party in Power | Previous election | Recent election | change |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| UK | Conservative | 43.6% | 23.7% | -19.9% |
| France | Ensemble | 38.5% | 24.5% | -14% |
| Japan | LDP | 48.1% | 38.5% | -9.6% |
| Italy | The League | 7.8% | 37% | -29.2% |
| Canada* | Liberal | 32.6% | 23.3%(polling) | -9.3% |
| Germany* | SPD | 25.7% | 15.5%(polling) | -10.2% |
| US(Pres) | Democratic | 51.3% | 48.3%(projected) | -3% |
Add to this the fact that the war in Gaza put Democrats in an impossible position. Polls went from Biden +4% to Biden -4% in fall of 2023 and never really bounced back. I still believe that if the war had ended, Harris might well have won.
There are lessons to be learned from every election, but the Democrats ran a very good campaign. Kamala Harris’s favorability increased 13%. She dramatically closed the gap on the economy and immigration. On exit polling, “defence of democracy” was cited as the most important issue, followed by the economy and then abortion (so much for Republicans owning the top two issues).
Kamala Harris herself performed better than I could have ever imagined. She was disciplined, focused and charismatic. She’s a brilliant orator and debater.
The ground game also worked just like it was supposed to. Harris ran 2-3 points better than her average in the 5 battleground states that are far away from Mexico.
Pundits are gonna pundit and there will be lots of over-interpretation to be had, but the bottom line is this: sometimes life deals your side a bad hand, and there’s not much you can do about it.
But, but, what if she picked Josh Shapiro???? VP candidates hardly ever make a difference. Even if she won PA, she still loses MI and WI. There was potential for some unwanted palace intrigue here too as Shapiro didn’t really want to be chosen. This might have saved Bob Casey though.
But, but, what about The View Interview, Biden’s Garbage comment, Joe Rogan???? No campaign is perfect. It’s like asking a pitcher who threw a 2-hitter, “why didn’t you pitch a perfect game?” Even when Democrats don’t make mistakes, Republicans make them up anyways (“You didn’t build that”, “Lipstick on a pig”). If the debate, which was watched by 67 million people only created a temporary 2 point bump, no singular event was going to make much of a difference.
But, but, if they only tried this message with the working class…. Give me a break. They had all the best coms people working on this and focus-tested the campaign messaging to death. Whatever message you think they should have used, they checked and it wouldn’t have worked any better.
But, but, Biden should have dropped out sooner……. Okay, yes, probably. But this would not have made a difference either. Let’s game this out. Harris would have had a huge advantage in the primary as a sitting vice president. She would have inherited a lot of Biden’s team and a ton of institutional support.
Democrats had no appetite for a protracted primary process facing an existential threat. With her orating and debating abilities and competent campaign management, she would have very likely won any regular primary in a walk. During the primary, she would have taken damage and possibly have had to take more positions to the left of where she ran in the general election. Trump’s campaign would also be much better prepared for her. She had a phenomenal first month. You weren’t going to beat Brat Summer as an introduction.
This wasn’t a football game. The score still matters. The senate could be 57-43 right now and out of reach until 2030. We could be staring at a strong 25 seat Republican majority in the house. Not to mention a possible wipeout in state and local races that were mostly a wash.
Now for the bright side:
The House
Democrats are nearly guaranteed to regain the majority in 2026. Aside from 2002 when Bush’s approval was 70% and 1998 during the Clinton impeachment overreach, you have to go back to 1934 to find an election where the party out of power didn’t gain 4 seats.
The Senate
This will be a bit harder. Democrats have a good shot at North Carolina and Maine. Iowa looks possible as well as Joni super-pro-life Ernst won in 2020 with only 51.7% support in a state with a draconian, unpopular abortion ban. People write off Florida, but remember that Nelson lost by 0.1% in 2018. With Trump choosing the candidates, we can probably count on at least one Roy Moore, Richard Mourdock, Todd Akin situation. Admittedly, this would have been much easier if Bob Casey had pulled out a win. (edit: he still might have an outside shot now down only 19K votes)
The Presidency
Democrats have a deep bench for 2028. Donald Trump has remade the Republican Party to serve only himself. He’s destroyed its institutions and driven out a lot of the smart people. Nobody else can pull off what he did politically. Look at how his chosen candidates have fared when he’s not on the ballot. The low propensity voters that he got off the couch aren’t coming out to vote for anyone else and the suburban voters he lost aren’t coming back to a party enthralled to crazy.
Right now
I know it looks bad, but the defining feature of Donald’s Trump’s tenure is utter and complete incompetence. Harris was right when she said that Trump would have no guardrails, but he also has nobody around him who knows how to get anything done. He’s chosen the dumbest of the dumb to work for him.
Look at what happened last time he was in office. He passed one stupid tax bill. The bill is now expiring and also very unpopular. All of his executive orders can be undone with a pen in 2028. A great many of them will be held up in court since he doesn’t have anyone competent writing them. The non-partisan public service is still there, and Biden’s administration has spent the past two years putting up roadblocks to safeguard it. When Trump tries to purge it, there will be many lawsuits grinding the process to a halt. He won’t get to remake the courts since Republicans didn’t hold up 2 years of Obama’s nominees this time, and there is no more Mitch McConnell.
Trump is also declining fairly rapidly. It becomes harder and harder to bully people when you can’t finish a sentence. And if you think that JD Vance and others will step in to fill the void, there is one constant about Donald Trump: his ego will never allow it. He will cling to every tendril of power until the last bit of orange fades from his face.
In two years, Trump will be a lame duck with a hostile congress and taking the blame for a bad mid-term. In four years, he will be gone forever. The Republicans may be craven, but their corporate masters will never support a full-on coup d’etat for a lunatic.
No comments:
Post a Comment