take a look at the CCDL meeting (Connecticut Citizens Defense League)
http://courantblogs.com/capitol-watch/foley-speaks-to-gun-owners/
Posted on 01/13/2014 7:02:51 PM PST by Kenny
Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.) is in a lot more trouble than it seems. Despite his ample war chest and approval ratings, only 50 percent of Virginians say Warner should get a second term. And independents, by a margin of 49 to 43 percent, say they would rather have someone new in Virginia’s Senate seat.
Moreover, Warner will have to defend his deciding vote for Obamacare during a midterm election that will likely be driven by voter anger over Obamacare. Virginians upset about President Obama’s false promise that “If you like your health plan, you can keep your health plan” will be surprised to discover that Warner made the same false pledge, declaring “I’m not going to support a health-care reform plan that’s going to take away the health care you’ve got right now or a health-care plan that you like.” He did. And if The Post is right that a second wave of Obamacare-driven cancellations is coming in October, just a few weeks before Election Day, that broken promise will be front and center in voters’ minds when Virginians go to the polls.
Still, in the absence of a skilled, well-funded opponent capable of exploiting these vulnerabilities, Warner might well coast to reelection. But Warner could soon have a credible challenger if Ed Gillespie enters the race — possibly as early as this week.
Like Obama, Warner will try to shift conversation from Obamacare to income inequality. Gillespie won’t let Warner off the hook on Obamacare, but he’s more than ready to engage Warner on the economic debate — and is uniquely positioned to do so. He grew up in a blue-collar family, the son of an immigrant who came here from Ireland when his father found work in America as a janitor.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
Ed Gillespie: Republican Voters Resigned To Immigration Reform
Thanks for the ping.
Just when I get finished mentioning I don’t use the Orwellian newspeak colors... how can we ever hope to win the ideological war when the right unapologetically accepts the willful mis-labeling given to them by the left. Red is a leftist color, not blue. When you say it’s going “blue”, it’s not going leftist. It’s ignorant and it’s offensive (I’m not strictly directing it at you... but at all Conservatives that blindly use the wrong colors to denote ideology).
I think you’re unnecessarily panicking based on recent elections and presuming things will continue to worsen and that it’s all over for the VA GOP. Zero barely carried the state in 2012 and again, the state moved more to the GOP side over 2008. We had a horrid candidate both years, neither of which motivated Conservative voters. With a better candidate, there’s no reason to believe the state would not vote Republican.
Add in there’s no way Terry McAwful would’ve won in November had McDonnell’s corruption and Bolling’s sabotage not helped to do in Cuccinelli (with more than a little help from a faux Libertarian). McAwful is the first candidate since Mills Godwin in 1965 to win the Governorship with a minority of the vote. McAwful’s “win” also wasn’t able to alter the dynamics of the legislature.
You also presume that for the foreseeable future that voting patterns will remain a certain way based on demographics. That’s foolish, because they can and do change. My state, TN, changed dramatically. So has West Virginia. It was pronounced at the end of the ‘90s that VA would be Republican without exception. NoVA was wealthy and suburban Republican for decades.
You give the example of VA going the way of NV and CO. Well, Nevada hasn’t elected a Democrat Governor since 1994, and keeps at least 1 GOP Senator (both Senators would be Republican if Reid hadn’t lucked out by getting a horrid opponent in 2010 — Reid is enormously unpopular in his state).
Colorado has had unfettered Democrat control for most of the past 8 years and it has blown up in their faces, and their elected officials are very unpopular (and aside from Governor & Lt Gov, the downballot offices are Republican). In many of these states, why the GOP doesn’t have a Senate seat or Governorship is because of damaged nominees or party infighting... the exact problem that has plagued Virginia.
That’s the problem with studying political science and trying to project into the future... it’s an inexact science. Dynamics change, how people vote doesn’t often make logical sense.
Lastly, I wouldn’t definitively claim Hillary is unbeatable in Virginia. She’s a toxic candidate with baggage back to Watergate. Would I then claim she is absolutely beatable ? No. Because we already know the RINO Establishment is utterly comfortable with Democrats ensconced in office (how many Bollingites and Hagerites cast their lot for McAwful in ‘13 and Mark Warner in ‘01). If they foist a 3rd consecutive ringer for ‘16 (Chris Christie), it would be Hillary’s to lose (and she merely need carry the same states as Zero in ‘12).
I’ll add in, too, that we don’t even know the future of our current party system. How long can the Republican Party remain in its current state with the vast disconnect from its leaders on every front from its base ? They are as hostile to us as the Democrats. Although the Democrat base grumbles about their officials, they still vote the way they want them to. Getting rid of the corrupt, statist, crony capitalist, big government cabal in the GOP, the rich Willard stereotype, and forging ahead with a new coalition pledged to smaller government, reformist government and economic opportunity and personal empowerment offered by Ted Cruz and Sarah Palin and their supporters, and we’ll create a new dynamic for the future.
The GOP Establishment and Democrats are terrified at such a vision and movement, because it destroys the control of the former and creates fissures in the racial/gender holds of the latter. Each has to maintain the status quo to keep power, why they’re so often in bed together. It’s this kind of revolutionary change that MUST happen if we are to keep this country for the future.
>> I think it’s a major overreaction <<
Welcome to FR!
after living Georgetown in 1984 ... the only thing I know about Virginia is:
Q. What do the Key Bridge and Jimmy Carter have in common?
A. They both go in and out of Rosslyn.
Fortunately, that’s one “Rosslyn” (sic) I’ve never had the pleasure of (and I don’t mean Virginia).
Living in nearby Maryland’s Howard county I can appreciate what kabar observes in VA.
I have seen exactly the same thing happen in this county, endless development and lots of immigration lured by high paying jobs.
I barely recognize this place from my memories
This county was conservative in 1994 when Dems got beat(I recall that election a black Republican was in line ahead of me ), by 2004 it voted Dem now it is solid DEM, and they keep on building and coming,
Obama being a educated smart sounding brown definitely resonated with our newer members, especially compared to McCain and Romney. .
Howard County went to the dark side well before that. It hasn’t voted Republican for President since 1988. Given that it’s wedged between the Baltimore/DC morass, it’s amazing it lasted that long. I’d probably say the most horrific example of decline is Prince Georges County. It went from 41% Republican in 1984 to 9% (!) in 2012. Even more Democrat than the city of Baltimore.
Maryland has always been a difficult state for the GOP. Some statewide offices have been continuously Democrat since the 19th century. Since after 1958, it has only elected a Republican twice (1966 with Agnew, and that was because the Democrats split the vote in a 3-way race and Agnew ran to the left of the Dem nominee, George Mahoney; and 2002 with Bob Ehrlich) — or three times if you count Glendening’s pretty glaring theft in 1994 of Ellen Sauerbrey’s victory.
It also hasn’t voted for a centrist Republican for Senator since 1970 (Glenn Beall, Jr.) or for a bonafide Conservative since John Marshall Butler in 1956 (note I don’t count the execrable leftist Chuck Mathias, who was all but planning to switch parties if he ran again in 1986). My former Senator from TN, Bill Brock, even ran in 1994 against Sarbanes, and fared about as well as could be expected.
Add to that the very weak presence of the GOP in the legislature, even in decades past when the party was carrying the Presidency. It just simply has never been a competitive two-party state below the federal level, and even that is gone. It’s also curious that Black Democrats in MD have gone along with Whites in keeping them from winning more offices (with more racially-drawn lines, the GOP would up the number of wins, especially in Congressional seats). It will be curious to see if MD Dems give the Gubernatorial nod to Anthony Brown, seeing how hesitant they’ve been towards Black candidates statewide.
You are right. I didn't remember it that way because GOP won midterms later than that, and it was pretty white in the 1990s and I saw the real changes in that in the 2000s.
I still remember in early 1990s when Howard county passed a law making illegal rental discrimination against those with section 8. The apartments filled up with welfare basket cases in the 1990s.
Speaking if Maryland, that establishment RINO Bob Erhlich really got me with his lame challenge to O Malley in 2010 as governor. It was pathetic. It was like he was paid to take a dive.
A long story about those two, Michael Steele was Erhlich’s Lt Governor, then ran for Senate and lost, then Hannity pushed him as RNC chairman I assume because he was black.
Erhlich was on CNN Crossfire today, just annoying. It makes me skeptical of Maryland Republicans.
That Michael Steele couldn't have done a worse job.
Ken Blackwell was the superior Black choice in that race. With Katon Dawson the White option, did a good job in SC.
Larry Hogan Jr. enters the 2014 GOP primary for MD Governor. Surprisingly crowded GOP field.
Just out of curiosity, I looked up Howard County in other races. It hasn’t voted GOP for Senator since Mathias in 1980 (Mathias carried every county in the state, even the city of Baltimore with 57% !). Gubernatorially, it has only voted GOP twice in a half-century, in 1994 for Sauerbrey (54%) (though she lost it in ‘98 with 47%) and 2002 for Ehrlich (where he got 55%). Ehrlich lost the county by 677 votes in ‘06 and a wider margin in ‘10, just 44%. Curiously, before 1994, you’d have to go all the way back to 1962 to the last time a GOP candidate won there (by a one-time Congressman named Frank Smalls). Even Spiro Agnew didn’t carry it in ‘66 (his main county was a huge landslide in Montgomery, he failed to even carry Balto County where he was County Executive).
Ehrlich wasn’t a bad sort, more liberal than I would’ve liked. He was the only gubernatorial casualty in 2006, attributable to the terrible climate for the GOP (Pawlenty in MN came within a hair’s width of falling, too... winning only because the Dem Lt Gov candidate committed a public faux pas that brought down her running mate). Still, I was surprised O’Malley won, he was such an awful Mayor of Baltimore. The rematch in ‘10 turned out to be ill-advised (on par with Sauerbrey’s rematch in ‘98) and I didn’t much follow it, given the other races across the country that appeared more winnable. If you believe he took a dive in ‘10, that would be a serious disappointment to hear.
Steele I had high hopes for, but he ended up a disaster. At best, he might’ve been a mediocre Senator (which is about as best as one can hope for in MD), though he had the bad luck of having to run in ‘06. Who knows, had the seat been open instead in ‘02, he might’ve pulled it off. Where I had an inkling of Steele’s being on the wrong side was the infamous 2008 1st district primary where he backed the RINO Gilchrest over Andy Harris (Ehrlich conversely backed Harris). As we know now, Gilchrest went full-Democrat for Kratovil and sabotaged Harris after his victory, and we needlessly lost the seat for 2 years as a result.
I need not run down his track record as National Chairman, but I did not endorse him for the post (in fact, he was next to last in being qualified of all the candidates - with SC’s Katon Dawson and OH’s Ken Blackwell being the top two choices at the time). He was thoroughly AWOL during 2009 when we could’ve hit the Dems hard in the special elections (ask FReeper Chicago Lady, who was the GOP nominee for Rahm Emanuel’s House seat, he didn’t give her the time of day). He then acted like he alone was responsible for the 2010 wins rather than the Tea Party grassroots movement. I publicly called for him here to step down or be removed as chairman very early on. It’s amazing how truly lousy the GOP Chairs have been in the past decade. The last “great” chairman was, of course, Lee Atwater. The only person who exhibits that sort of fearlessness today is Ted Cruz. Of course, an Atwater couldn’t get elected chairman today... he actually wants to win, not to run ringers and collaborate with the bipartisan big gubmint cabal.
The “other” Michael Steele. :-P Susanna Hoffs is (and still remains) the hottest member of “The Bangles.” She turns 55(!) on Friday and looks 20 years younger.
Presuming he gets the nomination, I think Foley will be successful in the rematch race (of course, it was blatantly stolen in 2010). Hopefully, Esty will be a victim this year along with Malloy.
very good analysis and as you say...demographics is destiny for nations
I do not know how Foley escapes the RINO tag.
Go Boughton.
In 2006 O Malley beat Ehrich using deceit. A electric deregulation law that passed before Ehrich took office (Dem Glen Denning deal) ended price controls that year 2006 and O Malley, whose goal was to make them go much higher by passing green energy and conservation laws, blamed the large price increase on Ehrich’s being too nice to electric companies, and the fool voters here really believed O Malley would protect them and voted for him (I talked to a few).
2010 was a slaughter when Ehrich tried a rematch, the grand tax-master O Malley saturated the air waves (like every 15 minutes) labeling Ehrich as dishonest for promising to not raise taxes.
Ehrich really had no campaign in 2010. I cant even remember what he ran on. He sure didn't go after O Malley. It was worse than Romney in 2012. I have no respect for him after that, or the Maryland GOP.
Warner will do what ever Virginia DEM does, cheat.
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