Democrats Routed: No Indication They Understand Why

The extent of last night's rout of the foundering Democratic Party is captured in the fact that the race for the U.S. Senate seat in Virginia has yet to be called. That a threadbare corporate mannequin GOP apparatchik like Ed Gillespie is neck and neck with incumbent Mark Warner is a huge statement. This is a Republican midterm tsunami. As Jonathan Weisman and Ashley Parker report in "Riding Wave of Discontent, G.O.P. Takes Senate":

Democratic midterm losses during the Obama presidency now rival those of both Richard M. Nixon in 1974 and Bill Clinton in 1994 as the most destructive to his party’s political standing in Congress in the post-World War II era. It was a stunning reversal for the president, who was the first Democrat since Franklin D. Roosevelt to twice win a majority of the national vote.

Democratic losses run the gamut. Kay Hagan, Democrat incumbent Senator from North Carolina, was predicted early in the evening to be the victor over Republican challenger Thom Tillis. She lost. Liberal stalwart Mark Udall lost in Colorado (Democratic Gov. Hickenlooper appears to be holding on ). Michelle Nunn was blown away in Georgia. Conservative Republican governors Scott Walker of Wisconsin and Rick Scott of Florida both won.

The loss has to be laid at the White House doorstep. According to a story by Peter Baker, "President Obama Left Fighting for His Own Relevance":

Just two years after Mr. Obama’s re-election, the midterm results underscored just how far he has fallen in the public mind. Nearly six out of 10 voters on Tuesday expressed negative feelings about his administration, according to exit polls. For every two voters who said they had cast ballots to support Mr. Obama, three said they were voting to express their opposition to him. 

The electorate was deeply pessimistic about the country, with seven out of 10 describing the economy as not so good or poor and eight out of 10 expressing worry about the direction of the economy in the next year.

The most interesting part of Baker article is the picture it paints of Obama. The president -- incredibly -- doesn't think he is to blame:

WASHINGTON — Two things were clear long before the votes were counted on Tuesday night: President Obama would face a Congress with more Republicans for his final two years in office, and the results would be seen as a repudiation of his leadership. 

But that was not the way Mr. Obama saw it. The electoral map was stacked against him, he argued, making Democrats underdogs from the start. And his own party kept him off the trail, meaning he never really got the chance to make his case. “You’re in the Final Four,” as one aide put it, “and you’re on the bench with a walking boot and you don’t get to play.” 

The Republican capture of the Senate culminated a season of discontent for the president — and may yet open a period of even deeper frustration. Sagging in the polls and unwelcome in most competitive races across the country, Mr. Obama bristled as the last campaign that would influence his presidency played out while he sat largely on the sidelines. He privately complained that it should not be a judgment on him. “He doesn’t feel repudiated,” the aide said Tuesday night.

But the Republican tide was stronger than projected, sweeping away Democrats even in some of those few blue states where the president did campaign. Mr. Obama now faces a daunting challenge in reasserting his relevance in a capital where he will be perceived as a lame duck. If the hope-and-change phase of his presidency is long over, he wants at least to produce a period of progress and consolidation to complete his time in the White House. 

After making congratulatory telephone calls from the White House on Tuesday night, Mr. Obama will kick off that final phase on Wednesday with a news conference seeking bipartisan accommodation on issues of mutual interest, and he invited Republican and Democratic leaders at the White House on Friday. At the same time, aides said, Mr. Obama is eager to throw off the constraints of a campaign that he did not direct and begin to defend his record in a more robust way again. 

“He’s going to be aggressive. He’s ready to go,” said another senior official, who like others did not want to be identified discussing plans before the election results were tabulated. “We’ve got a lot of important stuff to get done in the lame duck. He’ll talk about that tomorrow. We’ve got a lot of important stuff to get done in the last two years. He’s anxious to get going on that.”

This should concern Democrats. It is a portrait of leadership walled off from reality, ready to cut deals on corporate taxation and trade that will accelerate the pauperization of a working class already savaged by the Great Recession.

There is no indication that the Democrats accurately discern the dire straits of the party. They are banking on demographics, that as younger and more non-white voters take to the polls they will vote Democratic. Jonathan Martin, "Voters’ Second Thoughts on Hope and Change," quotes Obama campaign guru David Plouffe as saying:

“We’re on a demographic march that is going to put more states in play,” said David Plouffe, Mr. Obama’s former campaign manager, citing Arizona, Georgia and Texas. Such raw political projections are, of course, far removed from the hopeful rhetoric that vaulted Mr. Obama to stardom 10 years ago.

The shrewd Thomas Edsall notes, "‘Making the President Small’," problems with the "demographic wave" line of thinking prevalent in Dem circles, at least in terms of the 2016 presidential election:

Democrats counting on favorable demographic trends to carry their party to victory in 2016 should consider three significant developments reflected in the outcome of Tuesday’s elections. 

The first is that the Republican establishment, at least for the moment, has wrested control back from the Tea Party wing. This will make it more difficult for Democrats to portray their opponents as dangerous extremists. 

The second, and more important, development was the success of Republican candidates in defusing accusations that their party is conducting a “war on women.” The effectiveness of Republican tactics on this front is sure to influence strategy in two years, threatening to undermine a line of attack that has generated a gender gap and has been crucial to past Democratic victories.

The third was the powerful showing of Republican gubernatorial candidates in two Midwestern states important to Democrats in presidential elections: Wisconsin and Michigan.

All indications are that Democrats are clueless as to their lack of popular support. It as if they don't understand that their maintenance of a neoliberal Deep State of permanent warfare and endemic joblessness is not something to which voters will actively rush out to the polls register their approval.

Obama occupying the White House for the next two years means that the Democrats will continue to be yoked to a failed, brutal, unpopular Deep State. The GOP was able to remake itself in a jiffy after the 2008 Obama landslide because it was out of power; the Dems controlled both houses of Congress and the presidency. There will be no clean break for the Democratic Party.

Hillary's run in 2016 will begin in earnest in a few months. There is no pot of gold at the end of that rainbow. Dems will continue to hemorrhage despite all their demographic advantages because it remains a corporate party. Absent some form of makeover to convince voters in the rising demographic -- young people of color -- that the Democratic Party isn't primarily a vehicle for Deep State prerogatives -- war and the concentration of wealth -- losses will continue to mount.

U.S. Election Day: Democrats Headed for Defeat, Hopefully Some GOP Governors Too

Election Day dawns in the United States. "Beacon of democracy" according to the press release but "Great Satan" to parts of the planet, there are some interesting trends of which to take note today in the land of Lucifer.

The conventional wisdom as blared by loudspeaker in the media monopoly is that today the GOP will roll. I think the conventional wisdom is on the money this time around. The death knell for the Democrats began sounding last year. At first, at the end of the summer 2013, Obama dodged a bullet when he aborted his bombing run on Damascus by clutching at the Russian-sponsored proposal to have Syria get rid of its chemical weapons. Peace Prize winner Obama's move to initiate a war seriously undermined his credibility among the progressive, anti-war wing of his party, which is the informed, activist wing you need come election time.

Then there was the golden opportunity of tarring Republicans for their government shutdown in October 2013 squandered by the disastrous premiere of Obamacare. It has basically been all downhill since last fall --  from ISIS to Ebola to anemic job growth.

For a rundown on the election check out "What to Watch For as G.O.P. Expects Big Night at Polls" by Jonathan Martin and Nate Cohn.

Colorado is a designated bellwether:

Republicans are closely watching Colorado, where Senator Mark Udall and Gov. John W. Hickenlooper, both Democrats, are in danger of losing. Mr. Obama won the state twice, and with a younger, increasingly progressive population, Colorado has been trending Democratic. If Representative Cory Gardner can defeat Mr. Udall, who made his campaign almost exclusively about abortion rights and contraception, it will demonstrate that Republicans still have strength in a state that could be essential to regaining the presidency.

Colorado passed gun control legislation post-Sandy Hook and legalized cannabis in a 2012 vote, both under Gov. Hickenlooper. For the Republicans to take him out, as well as a Udall, a name synonymous with liberal Democratic politics in the U.S., would be a significant victory.

On the other hand, The GOP is walking the wire with its union-busting governors in the industrial heartland:

The polls also show up-in-the-air races in Michigan and Wisconsin, where the Republican incumbents, Rick Snyder and Scott Walker, appear to hold nominal leads. 

If the Republicans lose one or two of these races, it will complicate what might otherwise be an impressive performance for them in governors’ contests nationwide. Republican governors in competitive states have no business losing in what should be a good year for the party.

The wounded Dems are relying, once again, on the Obama coalition -- blacks, women, Latinos, students -- to hold on:

Every vote counts, of course, but some constituencies — especially those that made up Mr. Obama’s victories — will play a crucial role in shaping the outcomes on Tuesday. 

Democrats will need to counter a strong Republican advantage with men by winning women by nearly as much. That might require an even larger gender gap in some states than the 18-point one in the 2012 presidential election. Democrats will also need a much stronger turnout among nonwhite voters than they received in 2010. Black turnout in Georgia and North Carolina will be especially important: Follow whether the black share of the electorate approaches or exceeds 2012, when blacks represented 23 percent of North Carolina voters and 30 percent in Georgia.

I don't see students, women and Latinos strongly motivated to turnout this polling season; blacks on the other hand might very well show up in numbers greatly exceeding the last midterm. The reason? All the Republican-sponsored restrictive voting laws requiring photo identification and doing away with same-day registration are clearly aimed at diminishing the black vote.

Read Erik Eckholm's excellent synopsis of the GOP's voter suppression efforts, "Election Tests New Rules on Voting":

New rules to limit same-day registration or require photo identification will be in effect in some states, even as their constitutionality is argued in the courts. Most of the changes were adopted by Republican legislatures in the name of electoral integrity, even though evidence of voter fraud was negligible. They are opposed by Democrats who say tighter rules are aimed at discouraging minorities, poor people and college students from voting. All those groups tend to prefer Democrats.

“A significant number of changes are going into effect that will make it harder for millions of Americans to participate,” said Wendy R. Weiser, director of the democracy program at the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law. “In close races, the impact might be larger than the margin of victory.” 

But Republicans say such concerns are overblown. 

“We believe these claims are made for partisan purposes to rile up the Democrat Party base,” said Michael B. Thielen, executive director of the Republican National Lawyers Association in Washington. 

Numerous reports of voters facing obstacles have emerged from early voting in Texas and Georgia, among other states. But quantifying the impact of the altered rules is challenging, especially in a midterm election expected to have low turnout. In states like North Carolina, liberal groups hope that public anger over curbed voting opportunities will provoke a backlash that motivates Democratic voters, offsetting possible losses.

Another tactic Dems use to juice turnout is by placing minimum-wage increases on the ballot. Labor reporter Steven Greenhouse weighs in this morning with the informative "Little Opposition Seen in Some Votes to Raise State Minimum Wages":

In Alaska, Arkansas, Nebraska and South Dakota, binding referendums would raise the state minimum wage above the $7.25 an hour mandated by the federal government. 

These measures are so overwhelmingly popular in some states, notably Alaska and Arkansas, that the opposition has hardly put up a fight.

“These groups have noticed that minimum-wage increases can easily pass — they have seen this in the past few years,” said John G. Matsusaka, executive director of the Initiative and Referendum Institute at the University of Southern California. “They can’t get it through the legislatures in these red states, so they do it this way.”

Some Republicans say that the main reason for these initiatives is to mobilize low-income voters to help re-elect embattled Democrats, like Senators Mark Pryor of Arkansas and Mark Begich of Alaska. But supporters deny this, saying they are pushing to raise the minimum because so many workers are struggling and because the minimum wage has trailed inflation. 

The measures in Alaska, Arkansas, Nebraska and South Dakota would set the minimum wage lower than the $10.10 an hour that President Obama has asked Congress to pass, to no avail. The ballot initiatives in Arkansas and South Dakota call for a minimum of $8.50 an hour, while Nebraska’s would go to $9 and Alaska’s to $9.75.

***

Seattle has adopted a measure that will raise its minimum wage to $15 in several stages, while San Franciscans will vote on Tuesday whether to approve a $15 minimum wage. Residents in nearby Oakland will vote on a $12.25 wage.

In a surprising twist, hardly any business groups in San Francisco are opposing the $15 proposal, which is expected to pass easily.

Seattle, where I reside, has one interesting race. Jess Spear, a young climate scientist running as a socialist who was Kshama Sawant's campaign manager (Sawant's victory in 2013 paved the way for increased minimum-wage measures nationally), is taking on Speaker of the House Frank Chopp, an entrenched corporate-friendly Democrat, in the 43rd Legislative District. Spear won't win. But she has run a good campaign, and she has hit Chopp hard and repeatedly, forcing the moribund machine pol to actually defend himself and campaign this time, touting his accomplishments for the district. It is what democracy is supposed to look like and sound like and be like. Going forward, we need more vibrant, youth-oriented third party campaigns.