Kos posted this on Daily Kos:
There will be much number-crunching tomorrow, but preliminary numbers (at least in Virginia) show that GOP turnout remained the same as last year, but Democratic turnout collapsed. This is a base problem, and this is what Democrats better take from tonight:
1.If you abandon Democratic principles in a bid for unnecessary "bipartisanship", you will lose votes.
2.If you water down reform in favor of Blue Dogs and their corporate benefactors, you will lose votes.
3.If you forget why you were elected -- health care, financial services, energy policy and immigration reform -- you will lose votes.
Tonight proved conclusively that we're not going to turn out just because you have a (D) next to your name, or because Obama tells us to. We'll turn out if we feel it's worth our time and effort to vote, and we'll work hard to make sure others turn out if you inspire us with bold and decisive action.
The choice is yours. Give us a reason to vote for you, or we sit home. And you aren't going to make up the margins with conservative voters. They already know exactly who they're voting for, and it ain't you.
I actually think the problem isn't related to any of that. You can't look at local and state elections through a national prism. As a friend said about NY-23, everyone in the nation can talk about health care, but they are talking about jobs (up there).
You have to start with the candidates. Jon Corzine was weak. His popularity was not there and he was suffering similar to how Governor David Paterson is struggling. In these tough economic times, it is hard to be governor of a state. States and municipalities are feeling the heat of the economic recession. As a result, voters feel the need to change things.
Virginia was odd. It reminded me of NY-26 in a way. Here you have Creigh Deeds (Alice Kryzan in NY-26) winning the Democratic primary by surprise only to lose the general election. Deeds didn't poll particularly well at all throughout the race, so his loss was expected. When that is the case, who is going to get excited about that?
The three points Kos came up with are great for a House or Senate race, but not for a gubernatorial race or for other local and state races. We are talking about a whole other set of issues. Instead of health care, we are talking budget cuts. Instead of Blue Dogs, we are worried about the Hiram Monserrates and Pedro Espadas of the world who seek to throw a legislature into disarray.
It does not surprise me that a national blogger has such a take on a state-level race. While I think the issues listed are important, I think they aren't relevant to Corzine or Deeds. We lost New Jersey because of the economic state of the state. We lost Virginia because the candidate that won the Democratic primary was running second the whole race. States are facing tough times right now. We know that in New York and no other state is closer to New York in terms of issues like New Jersey is. We can relate. And we see New Jersey as a red flag for our own elections in 2010. |
