False Victory

 From Unherd:

With no sign of a Republican resurgence, the Democrats will likely be lulled into thinking that Biden’s polarising agenda is a vote-winner, in the same way the conspiracy-minded MAGA wing of the GOP refuses to move on from 2020. Until it’s resoundingly disproved in the ballot box, stridency tends to whip up your base: Trump’s supporters have become, as the President suggested, “semi-fascist”, while his political mentor, South Carolina’s James Clyburn, goes further, decrying the GOP as the architects of a Nazi state.

When Democrats performed poorly in the past, they were forced to rethink their politics. After Walter Mondale suffered a landslide defeat to Reagan in 1984, the Democratic Leadership Council was set up to steer the ship towards the centre — and ultimately supported both a young Bill Clinton and, to an extent, Biden himself. In turn, the DLC was inspired by the moderate Coalition for a Democratic Majority, founded after Nixon’s trouncing of McGovern in 1972. Today, however, it’s hard to say that now is the time for a new political vision when virtually all the high-profile blue state Democrats won, sometimes by wider than expected margins.

So, rather than using the next two years to regroup and craft a political programme that could win the next election, the Democrats now appear stuck with a weak leader who appears unfit to deal with the global challenges that will define America in the coming decade. Internally, too, the Democrats look increasingly unstable. A stronger-than-expected Midterms performance doesn’t mask the fact that the progressives remain a dominant faction in the party — with an associated agenda that, outside of deep blue-college towns and core cities, commands remarkably low levels of support, as Barack Obama and others have warned.

Sticking to such a programme threatens the party’s already weakening hold on working-class voters, in particular those threatened by climate policies. Over time, the economic implications of Biden’s green agenda may be obvious, but for now they are hidden amid massive deficits and increased transfer payments. However, as Democratic strategist Ruy Teixeira has noted, in the longer run, the party’s emphasis on “de-growth” and austerity is unlikely to attract middle and particularly working-class voters. Already, the political implications of climate policy have ruined the Democrats’ best chance to take the GOP seat in Ohio. Their candidate Tim Ryan may have claimed to support fracking, but his backing of the Pelosi Congressional agenda proved disastrous in a state whose economy is fuelled by natural gas production and hopes to attract new investment, including a possible $20 billion new Intel chip plant in the Columbus suburbs. In Florida, meanwhile, Ron DeSantis won heavily in Latino, historically Democratic regions.

To lure back those alienated by the Left’s climate and cultural agenda, socialists such as Bernie Sanders propose a more economically redistributive policy. This has clearly worked in California where last year’s surplus was channelled into subsidies for working-class voters who are stuck paying the high rents and energy prices caused by policies dreamt up in Sacramento. To win, Sanders has noted, the Democrats need to focus more on basic economic concerns, such as pensions, healthcare, job creation and higher wages. What’s needed is a giant US welfare state, a supercharged Sweden on steroids.

The big problem for the Democrats, now that this seems an acceptable policy, lies in who will pay for it. Biden’s 2020 electoral win was largely financed and marketed by the corporate and tech elite. Today, however, many of these moguls are moving to the Right as their mega fortunes, particularly in Silicon Valley, become less mega. Most remain supportive of the Democrats, although arguably the biggest player, Elon Musk, has shifted his support to the GOP. Meanwhile, once-reliable backers, such as JP Morgan’s Jamie Dimon and Steve Rattner, have been harshly critical of Biden’s economic policies and worry about the expansion of anti-trust regulations. And as the Democrats push their draconian climate policy, the ranks of its wealthy critics are likely to swell. Nationalising the energy industry would, for instance, rob them of the windfall from an energy “transition” to solar and wind power. Wall Street and the Valley may yet find that their alliance with the climate activists will end in tears. (Read more.)

 

From Red State:

Yes, there are still serious problems that need to be addressed and resolved about our elections, and the wins thus far are by no means a Red Wave. However, we need to acknowledge and celebrate these factors:

• Republicans still dominate in the executive houses of the nation and this is where national policy has been successfully challenged. If you need proof of that, look at the career of Missouri Attorney General—and now Senator-elect Eric Schmitt. The states of Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Iowa, Idaho, Ohio, Oklahoma, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Vermont, and Wyoming all have sitting Republican governors.
• Outlier candidates are making a difference in control of the House, and may win Republicans the Senate (see, Laxalt, Adam).

Who are these outlier candidates? The ones that people have paid little attention to, or they’ve given them attention for all the wrong reasons. As usual, the legacy media, GOP-e, and the garden-variety strategists are missing the real point.

But then, what else is new?

Consider Monica De La Cruz, who just became the Congresswoman-elect for Texas District 15. De La Cruz campaigned on border security, support of small businesses, and fiscal responsibility. All CNN and Fox News could focus on is that she was a “Latina” candidate while breathlessly reporting how Hispanics were moving away from Democrats toward Republicans.

As with Hispanics (and other values voters), it is less about party, and more about deliverables. De La Cruz’s South Texas district has many multi-generational small business owners who have been adversely affected not only by the Biden administration’s ignoring the border crisis, but federal regulations that have hamstrung them and prevented their businesses from growing and thriving. (Read more.)

 

From NTD:

Authorities in Maricopa County, Arizona, have addressed a widespread problem that occurred with tabulation equipment on Election Day at dozens of polling sites across the county.

On Tuesday, election officials in the county said that tabulators in roughly 20 percent of polling sites were malfunctioning. Later in the day, the Maricopa County Elections Command Center said in a statement that “printer settings” were the cause.

In a joint statement on Wednesday, Maricopa County Board of Supervisors Chairman Bill Gates and Vice Chairman Clint Hickman released more details on the issue, saying the ballot-on-demand printers were used previously and had correctly operated during the 2022 primaries in August.

“The printer settings for the Ballot-On-Demand printers at Vote Centers were the same ones we used in the August Primary,” the chair’s statement reads. “The paper was the same thickness. Prior to the General Election, the Elections Department test-printed and test-tabulated hundreds of ballots without issue.”

The issue impacted “less than 7 percent of Election Day voters”—or “about 17,000 ballots”—that were dropped into secure slots at the tabulators, the statement noted.

It also added that officials are committed to fully investigating the incident and digging into “the root cause of what happened” so similar problems can be avoided in the future.

Despite a widespread issue with tabulation equipment in Arizona’s most populous county, voters were still able to vote at locations with defective machines, although the ballots would be placed in a separate box.

“The good news is election administration has built-in redundancies—backup plans when things don’t go as planned. This enables all valid votes to count even if technology, on occasion, fails,” according to the chair’s latest update.

“Voters impacted by the printer issue had several ways to cast their ballot yesterday, including dropping their completed ballot into a secure box (door 3) on-site. Those ballots will be verified as legitimate and then tabulated at MCTEC. That process is already underway,” they added. (Read more.)

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