ELECTION DAY

By the end of the day, we could have our first Real Worlder in the U.S. Congress, representing Wisconsin's 7th District.

 

Not a chance in hell.

 

Scariest part of your post is the word "first," implying more reality show candidates in our future. Please shoot me when we get a Jersey Shore candidate.

 

O'Donnell had too much video footage and was too high profile in the 90s for her not to catch some major attention.

She was a regular feature on the talking head shows and the footage is still out there.

The other reason for her high visibility is she's a genuine Tea Party candidate who knocked out the likely winner in the primary. A person considered so likely Biden's son didn't run for the seat.
The guy in South Carolina is just a nut job.

In my traditionally Democratic state, it could get flipped today going from one Republican in Congress to just one Democrat. Two seats have never been held by Republicans and, yet, both have Repubs favored and big.

My Republican operatives say it is all because of Obama, with his race being one big factor.

 

Why would you think race is a factor? Not arguing, just asking...

 

As I said on the Beck thread, I see this as 1994 all over again. Lots of noise from the Republicans who end up accomplishing little or nothing when it comes to the next Presenditial election. Ironically, Clinton's failing in his first two years was not passing health care reform and according to some, Obama's failing is passing health care reform.

All the Tea Party rantings are the equivalent of Newt and his Contract with America in '94 but in many cases the Tea Party folks will cause an even deeper split in the Republican party.
The Republicans didn't have anyone to beat Clinton in '96 and right now they don't have anyone who can beat Obama in '12.

And anyone -- are you listening Mizzou -- who thinks Hillary or any other Democrat is going to challenge a sitting President in the primaries in 2012 just doesn't have a clue.

 

Good morning ... polls have been open for a half-hour in north Idaho, and the sun came out for the first time in (seemingly) weeks.

That should mean a slight boost in already-high voter turnout (and I can get a bike ride in going to the polling place later this morning).

Why should you all care? Well, I see Nate Silver's control-of-the-House map (thanks for the link, Yankee Fan) has my congressman's seat as one of the 42 "toss up" seats.

Walt Minnick is a very conservative Democrat -- the only way a Democrat can be if he/she wants to be elected in the Gem State. He caught a break in the Republican primary when the Tea Partier candidate (backed by Sarah Palin) lost to a more "establishment" Republican, Raul Labrador. A state legislator whose day job is working as an immigration lawyer, no less!

Unfortunately, that has meant a raft of negative ads as each side tries to prove who is softer on illegal immigration. Such a vital issue here ... those illegals are just flooding across the Canadian border every day.

Anyway, thanks to the SportsJournalists.com crew for opening this election day thread. Despite all the hate and ignorance spewed during election season, this is how we choose our leaders and the issues we want them to focus on, so it's an important day.

 

Even before that meltdown, Louisiana's election system would have made it hard for Jindal to run in '12. Louisiana has off-year gubernatorial elections, so Jindal will be running for re-election next year. It'd be hard to win that election if he's also making the national rounds trying to prep for a presidential run, and it'd be even harder to win the primaries if he doesn't get in the race until January 2012. Of course, he could always skip the 2011 election and run for president, but it'd be hard to do that too. Ask Mitt Romney.

As for the elections today, I think there will be quite a few surprises, especially on the House side. With pollsters trying to ID Likely Voters and assuming a big Republican enthusiasm gap, there's going to be some big discrepancies if that gap isn't there -- and it won't be in a lot of districts.

I still think the GOP will ultimately take the House, but I wouldn't be surprised if they barely get across the 39-seat line to do so. Of course, I could be wrong and they could grab 60-65 seats.

 

I voted.
And I voted against Young Boozer.
Other than that and two or three others, I truly hated casting my ballot. The choices sucked.

 

I feel cheated.

All those exciting controversial races in all those other states.

Mine is boring candidates with the usual confusing state ballot questions.

I wish that there were some candidates on the ballot I could really hate.

And, why the heck do I need to vote on a water district commissioner? No one told me I'd have to decide that!

 

(Full disclosure: I'm a Democrat)

Regardless of today's outcome, the GOP will have some major problems looking forward to 2012. The party establishment has done a pretty good job capitalizing on Tea Party momentum and mixing it in with more traditional GOP candidates like Mark Kirk (IL) and Roy Blunt (MO), but what the Tea Party folks don't understand is that they're still going to be a substantial minority in that party, no matter what happens today. Look at the leadership: neither Mitch McConnell nor John Boehner are Tea Partiers. The House committee Tea Partiers hate the most, Appropriations, is likely going to be led by Hal Rogers, one of the longest-serving GOP members of Congress who is known for bringing pork projects home to Western Kentucky.

The GOP leadership is going to have a battle on its hands trying to please Tea Partiers, establishment GOP voters and independents. If it doesn't do it, this pendulum is going to swing back hard toward Democrats in 2012. That pendulum will already swing back toward Dems a little anyway, as young voters, blacks and Latinos all turn out more in presidential years, and all three are trending more and more toward Democrats. The next two years are going to be VERY tough for Boehner if he's going to maintain his majority for more than two years.

And with that said, I don't see Obama losing in '12 at this point. If the Tea Party is still strong in '12, the GOP's best chance at knocking off Obama (Mitt Romney) won't get through the primaries.

 

If Hillary thinks she can beat him, she'll run. The problem is, she can't beat him, at least not right now. What would be interesting is if Obama dumps Biden and puts Hillary on the ticket, which I think would be unbeatable and would put her in a decent position to run in 2016.