Posted on 06/11/2014 7:25:13 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
It was exactly the opposite.
Hanover County is about as conservative of a county as there is in the USA. Brat creamed Canto in Hanover. When I saw the Chesterfield and Hanover results, I knew it was over for Cantor.
Yes it is.
Before everyone declares this to be a victory for “the tea party” (yes, I know it was a victory for the IDEA behind the TP), explain how and what kind of help the TP gave to Brat. And, tell us how many democrats crossed over and voted against Cantor in this low-turnout election. To me, Cantor is such a creep that I can see liberals wanting to humiliate him personally.
I want conservatism to win. That won’t happen if everyone gets all giddy over one victory and doesn’t fight the same fight over and over in every state, every race. If we use the Brat win to recharge and go forth with new vigor - great!
Roskam is from Illinois, not Kansas.
None. It is pure BS to suggest that the Dems were the reason why Cantor lost. He was beaten by Reps who were unhappy with him.
As someone who was somewhat involved with the Brat race including placing robocalls against Cantor, the real reason Cantor lost was due to the grassroots organization that supported Brat. There were some local Tea Party folks, but there was no national help except primarily from Laura Ingraham. The battle was won in Hanover County by some very real patriots who were unhappy with Cantor for a number of reasons, including immigration and Cantor's support of the ENLIST Act and his promised "Kid's Act," which was his version of Obama's backdoor Dreamer amnesty.
Cantor did not have townhall meetings. A few years ago when we had a statewide Tea Party convention in Richmond, Cantor was one of the few politicians who did not show up. He is arrogant and aloof. No doubt, he screwed up tactically because he underestimated the challenge and had no inkling that there was growing discontent among his constituents. Cantor was overconfident and very vulnerable. Dave Brat was the first credible candidate to challenge him.
Cantor's tone deaf statement a few days before the election on the massive surge of "children" coming across the border put the nail in his coffin. His reaction that the GOP could work together with Obama on specific immigration issues was the last straw.
Cantor is an example of a politician who had become so disconnected with his constituents that he thought he could do anything he wanted without political consequence. And to make matters worse, he was challenged by a bright, articulate candidate who despite being outspent 22 to 1 was able thru grassroots volunteers to mobilize the votes to win.
On the issue of immigration, Dave Brat has provided the GOP with the template on how to make immigration a winning issue. Brat is the first one to link immigration, legal and illegal, with unemployment and declining wages. He just used commonsense that if you have a surplus of labor, it makes no sense to continue to bring in more labor, which increases unemployment and depresses wages. As an economics professor, he could easily make the case.
Brat went after the Chamber of Commerce and the corporate lobby. He was putting into practice what Jeff Sessions has been advocating, i.e., Becoming the party of work
When Americans went to the polls in 2012, the following was true: Work-force participation had sunk to its lowest level in 35 years, wages had fallen below 1999 levels, and 47 million Americans were on food stamps. Yet Mitt Romney, the challenger to the incumbent president, lost lower- and middle-income voters by an astonishing margin. Among voters earning $30,000 to $50,000, he trailed by 15 points, and among voters earning under $30,000 he trailed by 28 points.
And what did the GOP’s brilliant consultant class conclude from this resounding defeat? They declared that the GOP must embrace amnesty. The Republican National Committee dutifully issued a report calling for a “comprehensive immigration reform” that would inevitably increase the flow of low-skilled immigration, reducing the wages and living standards of the very voters whose trust the GOP had lost.
Over the past four decades, as factories were shuttered and blue-collar jobs were outsourced or automated, net immigration quadrupled. Yet the corporate-consultant class has pronounced that an insufficient level of immigration is the problem. A more colossal misreading of the political moment has rarely occurred.
Doesn't matter.
The important thing is that a liberal republican Majority Leader of the House was fired.
Brat isn't likely to lose the general election, and even if he does, it won't change control of the House.
The Dems are much more worried about losing Senate seats.
/johnny
At the end of the day, the Tea Party needs mainstream Republicans to accomplish things legislatively; but, the mainstream GOP will need the Tea Party as well. People like Boehner should recognize that, and extend an olive branch.
Graham should be on that
Over 370,000 votes were cast in that district two years ago. Fewer than 70,000 were cast yesterday.
The claim was constantly made that the benefit to having 6 opponents was to force a run-off where Graham would face a single strong challenger. The fact wound up being that there were no potential strong challengers in the group that ran against him.
How could any one opponent gain traction in such a crowded field? I suspect a lot of people looked at the long list of names and voted for the one they recognized.
I think the 'anyone but Graham' sentiment in South Carolina was badly overestimated.
I hear one big problem with Cantor, not often mentioned in the post-mortems, was that he was terrible at constituent services. Is Graham good at this?
Graham may be a bit of a weenie and a total RINO but I've also heard that he spends every spare moment back in South Carolina doing all the town halls and the meet-n-greets and barbecues with people. There may be a few people left in the state who haven't personally met Graham at one time or another but not many. And his office is also supposedly very good at taking care of constituent requests. So if you go with the theory that all politics is local, then Graham has local politics down to a tee.
When I lived in Wisconsin I must have run into William Proxmire out shaking hands a half dozen times. Once it was the Friday after he was re-elected! He never stopped campaigning. Also, I hear Ted Kennedy was a master at constituent services, often answering constituent phone calls personally. People will forgive a lot ideologically if someone has helped you or a relative out of a jam.
Few may have heard of him but our local US House Representative, Howard Coble, was famous for personally assisting constituents as well. One thing was certain, he absolutely knew his constituency and was as conservative as he was able to be. When he was unable to support a particular vote he had very logical reasons to do so. He represented the will of the people who elected him. Very reliable, likable old fellow.
http://go.bloomberg.com/political-capital/2014-06-11/eric-cantors-historic-loss-numbers/
Scroll down for numbers in the CD7 race 2012 v 2014. This data disagrees
with your 370,000+ votes in 2012.
Those are numbers for the primary. My figures were from the general election,
Okay. I was mixed up and thought the comparison was primary to primary votes.
Two words for him.. "LIBERIAN GOLD"...
My vote for biggest loser: Jenny Beth Martin and her Tea Party Patriots group
She REFUSED to support Dave Brat. Jenny Beth Martin REFUSED to endorse Dave Brat in any way, even though she was specifically invited to do so.
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