As you are almost certainly aware, there was an election yesterday. As of this writing we still don't really know who is going to control the house and the senate, with the house looking to be a GOP win while the senate is such a mess we might not know who controls it until the likely Georgia runoff election. There are quite a few important races that have yet to have been called.
Before I get into the politics of it, I have to say that this was yet another unacceptable election. There is absolutely no reason why a 1st world country can't have their votes counted within a few hours. Brazil, famous for being a corrupt country, had their election a few weeks ago and had the results in three hours. If Brazil could do it why couldn't we?
It's pretty clear why. There are a lot of completely incompetent people running our elections. Though some states seemed to have improved a bit in how long it takes to count, others seem to have gotten even worse. Arizona was an absolute mess and it's no surprise that their races have not been called yet.
And here in Wisconsin, I had an election experience that was just embarrassing. First, as I was getting ready to enter the polling place, I found the door locked. Thankfully there were people in front of me that were able to open the door, but still. After that there was a big commotion by the ballot scanner and there was a big announcement that a ballot had gotten stuck. I saw a few people leave after hearing that and I wasn't able to have my ballot scanned. It was only the presence of an election observer that made me comfortable enough to hand my ballot in to be scanned in when the machine was fixed.
As for the election results, I have mixed feelings. I'm obviously furious that Tony Evers was reelected and somewhat baffled as to how. Evers is the most do-nothing governor that we have ever had (so I am not too worried about what he's going to do) but I am puzzled why Wisconsin voters gave him a second chance. The other governor races weren't much better with several unpopular governors getting re-elected inexplicably.
But the news isn't all bad. It does appear that the Republicans will probably win the house and may even take the Senate. That's a major victory even if it wasn't the red wave that we were all expecting. It should blunt some of the worst excesses of the Biden administration. It will be even better if they manage to take the senate, which looks at least possible at this point.
Some of my most hated political enemies have lost as well. Stacy Abrams, the go to person for claiming election fraud, was beaten in a landslide. Most notably, Robert Francis "Beto" O'Rourke has now lost as a Senate, Governor and Presidential candidate and I couldn't be happier.
And both Florida and Texas are pretty clearly red states now, with Georgia looking like it might be one as well. Florida is so deeply red now that I can't see the Democrats winning there in 2024 or beyond without major changes. That's a good advantage for Republicans in 2024 and it's clear that Governor DeSantis is a major rising star.
As for why the so called "red wave" didn't happen I have a few ideas. The first is obviously candidate quality. There is one reason and one reason only that John Fetterman managed to win in Pennsylvania and it's because the other candidate was Dr. Oz. Why the Republicans of Pennsylvania put up a Oprah castoff as it's candidate is beyond me. It was to the point that even a stroked out Fetterman, who could barely talk during his debate, was able to beat him. Joe O'Dea in Colorado was another weak candidate that tried to stay in the center and wasn't able to appeal to anyone in the end.
I think voter fraud was possible a factor in this election as well. Mail in ballots have still not been dealt with and with that being the case there is a real chance that some election fraud happened. I am not as sure about that as I was about the 2020 elections, as congressional races are harder to steal than presidential races, but are a factor in senate and governor's races. But there was at least something done in some states to prevent fraud.
A lot of people are blaming the repeal of Roe v Wade, and I don't really think that had too much to do with it. As I have said for a long time, most of the people that even cared about it a little were already going to turn out for the Democrats. And I do think that it being repealed did actually drive Republican turnout as well.
But I think it was an enthusiasm problem for the Republicans responsible for what happened. Though I didn't see many Democratic signs here in Wisconsin, I didn't see anywhere near the number of signs for Republicans compared to previous elections. I think 2020 was extremely demoralizing for a lot of people and many of those people didn't show up. I think there was little faith that the election would be fair and even if it was, the GOP has not delivered that much since 2020. They had a chance to fight in 2020 and they didn't take it and it disappointed a lot of people.
The other major problem is that the Republicans seemed to have abandoned the strategy that served them so well in the 2021 election in Virginia. That election was about education and the gross excesses of the LGBT community. People have a visceral disgust of what the transgender community wants to do with children but it didn't come up.
Indeed, for almost all of the issues the Republicans abandoned winning issues and instead focused on the economy. Indeed, that could have worked if the Republicans actually had a plan for what to do about runaway inflation and other economic problems. Same with crime, foreign policy and all the other issues. Those were Republican strengths, but I never got the impression that they pushed on it hard.
Regardless, this was not a victory for the Democrats and not a defeat for the Republicans. They did not do as well as we all hoped but they did deal a major blow to Democrats and will almost certainly control the house, and perhaps the senate as well. That's a win, even if it wasn't as convincing as it should have been. Now, unfortunately, we move on to the 2024 Presidential election and the possible Donald Trump/Ron DeSantis war (which sucks because I like both of them).
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