After cataloguing how the polls have shifted in favor of Republicans over the last month, in his most recent New York Times column David Brooks summarizes his take:
To understand how the parties think the campaign is going, look at where they are spending their money. As Henry Olsen noted in The Washington Post last week, Democrats are pouring money into House districts that should be safe — places that Joe Biden won by double digits in 2020. Politico’s election forecast, for example, now rates the races in California’s 13th District and Oregon’s Sixth District as tossups. Two years ago, according to Politico, he won those areas by 11 and 14 points.
If Republicans are competitive in places like that, we’re probably looking at a red wave election that will enable them to easily take back the House and maybe the Senate.
So how should Democrats interpret these trends? There’s a minimalist interpretation: Midterms are usually hard for the president’s party, and this one was bound to be doubly hard because of global inflation.
I take a more medium to maximalist view. I’d say recent events have exposed some serious weaknesses in the party’s political approach…l
Here are the bullet points he goes on to point out:
- It’s hard to win consistently if voters don’t trust you on the top issue.
- Democrats have a crime problem.
- Democrats have not won back Hispanics.
- The Jan. 6 committee and the warnings about MAGA fascism didn’t change minds.
- The Republicans may just have a clearer narrative.
Some of the poll results I’ve seen lately have been startling. More than 30% of Hispanic voters favoring Republicans. 15% of black voters favoring Republicans. It seems to me that’s a real problem for Democrats. For the last 20 years they’ve benefited from demographics; if that is reversing it’s not clear to me how they’ll reverse it. Appealing to young voters isn’t enough—there aren’t enough of them. And young voters don’t remain young voters forever. If Gen X is shifting towards Republicans, impelled by issues like the economy, crime, and the schools, it seems to me that the Democrats’ trouble is even greater.
In case anyone wonders I think the tail has been wagging the dog for a long time. Progressives aren’t even a majority of Democrats let alone of likely voters and yet the progressive ideology has become the guiding star of the party.
The progressives do have too much influence given that they are a fairly small percentage of Democrats. The Republicans are much more unified as their radicals comprise a majority of the party. Mostly I just think “its the economy,stupid!” Inflation worries will trump everything else.
Steve
I believe those percentages of Hispanic and Black turning Republican are low in the Brooks piece. Also, there has been a shift away from progressive affiliations among younger voters as well. Perhaps the Turning Point organization, headed by Charlie Kirk and Candace Owens, have had a conservative influence over the ideology being adopted by the youth of today. Or, maybe just the specter of a future filled with high debt, ebbing possibilities of home ownership or employment opportunities, high inflation, government controlled education, censorship of speech is less appealing to this group of budding adults. Whatever it is, the social progressive road map appears to limit and disadvantage people more than it benefits or mirrors their innate values.
As for a “red wave†materializing this November, if it were not for a cloud of elections being able to be successfully manipulated, I would confidently predict the republicans would have significant wins, even in areas of the country considered impervious to GOP messaging. However, with ballots already being misdirected or inappropriately managed during early voting, there are signs of those trying to obstruct election fair play. Ironically, citizen groups monitoring drop boxes, in hopes of discouraging illegal ballot harvesting or paid mules stuffing them with handfuls of ballots, are now being accused by Dems as “intimidating†voters. I’m sure having equal numbers of republican/democrat poll watchers, creating a shortage of questionable opportunities to stop, subvert, add illegal ballots, or maliciously adjudicate them, will also be subject to howls of objections by Dems who normally outnumber and manage most precincts – especially during the 2020 election where Zuckerberg’s monies hired said poll workers.
You’ve never seen an election in Chicago, have you? Each polling place is supposed to have an equal number of Democratic and Republican poll workers. Of course, most of the “Republican” poll workers are Republicans just for election day.
To have an equal number of Democratic and Republican poll watchers Republicans would need to ship watchers in by the busload.
Dave, that was quite a “Chicago revelation†to me, about Republican poll watchers being Republican for a day. I am kind of Pollyanna in my view of the world sometimes, in expecting honesty or fairness to be more of an innate quality in people. And, you’re right, I’ve never even been to Chicago, let alone witnessing an election there!
Hope so.
Pensions are dying.
The surest thing about the election is that we will get walls of text about Dems cheating without any evidence that any actually occurs.
Steve
I will repeat something I said before.
But could journalists quantify what they mean by “waveâ€.
Let me give an example.
A wave is republicans winning 250+ seats; more then they have achieved since 1928.
A “normal†result is republicans winning 230-250 seats; the range for the party gaining control of the House has won in the past 30 years (1994, 2006, 2010, 2018).
A pyrrhic victory for Republicans is winning between 218 and 230.
Anything below 218 is a disaster for Republicans and likely a signal of the demise of the party.
It seems most journalists are thinking a normal “result†when they use the word wave.
“The Republicans are much more unified as their radicals comprise a majority of the party. Mostly I just think “its the economy,stupid!†Inflation worries will trump everything else.”
In some ways that’s true, but in other ways not so much. The GoP broke apart thanks to Trump into the Maga and nevertrump factions.
Most regular people will vote with whoever is the Republican because the only alternative is voting for a Democrat or not voting at all. If you see the Maga candidates lose, I think the reason will be that a dispositive number of Republicans refused to vote for them.
We saw some of that in 2020 in several states where down-ballot Republican candidates got more votes than Trump. Some people will vote GoP reliably but still have limits.
Still, this is probably a relatively small group but could be decisive in a close race.
“The Republicans are much more unified as their radicals comprise a majority of the party.”
I sure hope the party leaders keep deluding themselves like that. Progressivism will be doomed.