The Best Of Both Worlds?
Posted on November 3rd, 2009
by Daniel Larison |
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Clearly, I overestimated Democratic power in New Jersey, which I assumed was more or less unbeatable despite Corzine’s low approval ratings and weak polling. The pick-ups in both gubernatorial races were impressive, and it seems to me that the scale of the win in Virginia was significant and not easily dismissed in a state that had been trending Democratic for the last several cycles. Even taking into account that Corzine had once trailed Christie by double digits, a statewide Republican win in New Jersey certainly signals dissatisfaction with the status quo at the state level. Certainly lower turnout favors the more mobilized party, and Republicans made the most of this today. Exit polling indicates that protest votes against Obama were more or less offset by support for him, but there appears to be much less enthusiasm on the Democratic side. Oddly enough, the one race in which there seems to have been overperformance in the Democratic effort was in the House special election that doesn’t have much significance.
What is more encouraging to me is that the wins by Christie and McDonnell show that competent center-right candidates interested in governance and all those “parochial” local issues can tap into voter discontent and win electoral victories. Hoffman’s possible defeat suggests that campaigns dominated by the presence of national activists, empty sloganeering and indifference to local interests may not gain traction even in those districts that are traditionally inclined to favor the politics of someone like Hoffman. Those of us who would like to see Democratic domestic agendas thwarted without empowering the Palins of the world may have managed to get exactly the results we would wish to have.
Filed under: politics
Throw the rascals out! Elect new rascals.
I’d say you’re about exactly right on this. And, of course, the usual suspects are drawing the exact opposite lesson. Amazing but not surprising.
Keep in mind that in both governer’s races. the democratic candidates were exceptionally bad candidates and ran bad races.
The simple fact is, McDonnell was just a better man and a better candidate than Deeds, who not only appeared incompetent, but actually ran away from the Democratic base, who consequently did not turn out for him. The vote was not ideological, but driven by the simple issue of who was the better candidate. Democrats can’t use their advantages to sweep in poor candidates.
In New Jersey, Corzine was just a bad governer who shouldn’t even have been in power – he came out of retirement to step into the vacuum created by McGreevy’s hilariously scandalous exit a few years ago. He was corrupt, stupid, and governed badly. Again, Democrats can’t be expected to win with guys like that.
To extrapolate from those two cases the notion that Democratic candidates nationally are in trouble is misleading. Bad Democratic candidates are in trouble, but that’s true for Republicans as well. I see no reason to believe that good Democratic candidates are in trouble.
You are quite right of course that this does show that good, center right Republicans can win statewide races against bad Democratic candidates. That’s always been the case, and always will be the case. It also shows that the better strategy for Republicans would be to showcase competent, non-ideological center-right candidates who show a real capability to govern well.
However, on the national level, as in NY-23, GOP politics remains driven by ideological issues and social identity. These governers races don’t reflect well on next year’s midterm federal elections because they are not federal races. There are certainly reason to think that if the GOP were to nominate competent center-right candidates for the house and senate in 2010, that they could pick up some serious ground. But there’s no reason to think that will be the case. To the contrary, it appears that the GOP is dedicated at the federal level to nominating the most extreme and hard line ideological candidates they can find, and to ignore and dump competent center-right candidates like Scozzafova. That does not bode well for them. Nor are they likely to encounter many more races at the state level where bad Dem candidates are faced by good center-right candidates.
Of course, the state of the economy will drive a lot of the action over the next year. If the economy continues its recovery, the Dems will do fine. If the GOP-predicted double dip occurs, then the Dems will be swept from power in the house, and weakened in the senate. But that’s a pretty risky bet to make, and choosing candidates who are ideologically pure, who opposed everything Obama has done, when it turns out that what Obama did helped bring us out of the recession/depression, could be utterly disastrous by then. It’s hard to imagine the Dems picking up seats for a third consecutive election, but it could actually happen if the GOP goes down the road it’s on. At the state level, there will always be competent GOP candidates who can win office over bad Dems, but at the federal level they are betting the farm on a second economic collapse that does not seem in the cards, in the vain hope that it will lead to an ideological reversal.
“These governers races don’t reflect well on next year’s midterm federal elections because they are not federal races.”
I don’t disagree with this, and I wouldn’t claim that they mean anything for the ‘10 elections. The next post touches on this. You’re right that Deeds and Corzine were terrible candidates. The turnout-depressing tactics of Deeds were very foolish.
We should remember that VA and NJ results were produced by strong anti-incumbency sentiment fueled by economic woes. This works in the GOP’s favor at the state level right now because they were routed from so many governor’s mansions and legislatures over the last few years, but it could just as easily turn against them in states they currently govern. Whoever emerges from the Perry-Hutchison smackdown in Texas will face the same problems. Add to this that there are governor’s races next year in states that Republicans have no shot of winning. New Mexico is foremost in my mind because I’m here and I know how hopeless the state party is, but this is likely true in other states as well.
One lesson from last night seems to be that the GOP thrives on poor overall turnout, and turnout is likely going to be higher in the midterms.
I’m not really disagreeing with you either, just adding to your thoughts. Anti-incumbency is certainly a factor, especially in the midst of economic uncertainty. But that 3.5% GDP 3Q growth should give the GOP pause on the idea of running against Obama’s economic record. If that continues over the next year, Obama and the Dems won’t be facing economic or anti-incumbency problems. In fact, incumbents who supported Obama’s economic plan will be very strong. Remember how Rush Limbaugh said that if the economy recovered under Obama’s plan that it would mean the end of the GOP? He could be prophetic at least on that count. It was one thing for the GOP to be rooting for a long recession.depression to run against the Dems on. It’s another to be expecting the recovery to peter out and double-dip. They have no plan B for this, other than more economic turmoil, rather than a continuing recovery. And remember that Obama’s stimulus plan is weighted towards 2010, and will thus be a strong bulwark against any double dip, and will pretty much ensure ongoing economic growth through the fall elections. Enthusiasm for the GOP at that point will be reduced to tea-baggers, Palinite social conservatives, and anti-deficit fanatics who both forget the GOP’s role in creating these deficits, and think that deficit spending to stimulate the economy out of a recession/depression is unjustified. That’s not exactly a winning coalition.
” … the wins by Christie and McDonnell show that competent center-right candidates can tap into voter discontent and win electoral victories.”
I never thought I would say this, Dan, but you’re too optimistic. I would remind you that the same could also have been said of Rudy Giuliani circa 1993 or Mitt Romney circa 2002 or even George W. Bush circa 1994.
Sadly, recent history makes it abundantly clear that “competent” or “centrist” Republican governors or mayors have a mysterious tendency to turn Full Neocon or Full Wingnut or a combination of the two when they step out on to the national stage. (Granted, Bush’s conversion took time. His foreign policy rhetoric in 2000 was shockingly sober in retrospect, but that was also pre-9/11.)
Even Sarah Palin’s alleged “independence” and “reforms” were touted in the mainstream media at first. But as you and many others here complained at the time, whatever “paleocon” or libertarian tendencies she had went out the window.as soon as McCain put her on the national ticket.
As to why this happens, I’m not entirely sure. Is it cynicism? Is it conviction? I suspect that Republican governors and mayors are putty in the hands of the neocons because non-neocon foreign policy experts have been purged from the party. Republican politicians who are not well-versed in foreign policy have no one else to go to.
Tim Pawlenty is already wandering down this road, and McDonnell will follow a similar trajectory in a few years if he has serious national ambitions. You can almost set your watch by it.
We should remember that VA and NJ results were produced by strong anti-incumbency sentiment fueled by economic woes. This works in the GOP’s favor at the state level right now because they were routed from so many governor’s mansions and legislatures over the last few years, but it could just as easily turn against them in states they currently govern.
That may be too strong an interpretation. Perhaps it’s just that in the present environment of high anxiety there simply is little or none of the default benefit of the doubt incumbents get in better times.
What I’ve seen of Democratic insider analysis of New Jersey is that the election was all about who would better crush the corrupt nominal Democratic holds on power (’bosses’ and ‘machines’) in county and local governments in northern New Jersey. Christie had no coattails in the state legislature for a Republican agenda; there was little in Republican gains to executive or legislative power at lower levels. The situation is reminiscent of Romney’s win in Massachusetts in 2002.
Virginia is more persuasive as a Republican win. But it should be pointed out what was staked on Creigh Deeds on the Democratic side: the “electability” claim of the center-Right faction inside the Virginia Democratic Party. This election result did some hard and possibly quite permanent damage to the electoral credibility of conservative Democrats in the state. The next statewide Democratic nominees are very likely going to be, and run, center Left.
One could argue that it was all a matter of McDonnell’s appeal over Deeds’s. That may well be. But to look nationally over the last decade plus, conservative Democratic candidates and election doctrine have been most successful when a state is safely Republican but its Republican candidates threaten to run off to the right. Conservative Democratic candidates in the norm fail as abjectly as Deeds did in either extremely conservative states or in states that on trend could tip Democratic within an election cycle or so.
I live in Virginia where McDonnell won so I hope I can give an insider view of the election. The election was basically about the economy. With Virginian unemployment hovering around 6%, McDonnell was better able to tap into the discontent brewing in the State. He advertised himself as a jobs governor, advertised his transportation plans and campaigned very well. He did a lot of outreach to Northern Virginians and the immigrant communities that live there, especially Asian Americans and he was rewarded with 58% of Asian American votes in Virginia. Deeds ran against a thesis. WaPo’s endorsement also did not help one bit and might have hurt Deeds in SouthWest Virginia. Also, Virginia has a pattern of electing the member of the other party for governor compared to the party in power in DC.
It will be disingenious to say that Obama played no part at all in the Republican sweep. All three positions, Governor, Attorney General and Lieteunant General were Republicans and elected with around 60% of the votes. When McDonnell ran against Deeds for Attorney General just a few years ago, they were neck and neck (McDonnell barely won). McDonnell beat Deeds this time around by 15 or so percent of the votes. Independents swung wildly to the Republicans. You have to keep in mind that Virginia is NOT a blue state. It is at best a purple state and it swung wildly red this election.
Virginia is a common sense state and is most importantly, a fiscally conservative state. A lot of Democrats and Republicans alike seem to forget that. The attack ad that depicted Deeds as increasing taxes and pork killed him. But it is not fair to say that fault lies only with the candidate. Obama’s prolifigate spending and the ballooning deficit (as well as the unemployment rate) are responsible for the desire of Virginians to put a Republican in charge (balance of power and all) of their state. And McDonnell is a conservative, no doubt about that. People care more about jobs than what he said in a college thesis ten years ago.
Virginia 2008 Obama votes: 1,959,532
Virginia 2009 Deeds votes: 818,894
dropoff: 1,140,638 (-58%)
Virginia 2008 McCain votes: 1,725,005
Virginia 2009 McDonnell votes: 1,163,529
dropoff: 561,476 (-33%)
Looking at the numbers, the 30-35% dropoff shows that the McDonnell vote came from a fairly typical off-year Republican base turnout cohort, even if it was very motivated. Just as is implicit in your explanation of its voting rationale, nyx.
I’ll concede that Obama overperformed the likely baseline partisan split in the Virginia electorate (imho around 48-49%D/51-52%R) by perhaps 300,000 votes. Typical dropoff from Presidential to well contested midterm elections is 30-35%, accounting for another 500-600,000 votes Obama got and Deeds didn’t. I believe it’s fair to account Deeds responsible for the remaining, 200-300,000ish, vote dropoff among Democrats and Democratic leaners.
My sense of the fair summary of the 2009 Virginia election is this: McDonnell earned himself a victory- he consolidated his partisan base vote quite perfectly and that likely would have been enough to prevail with 51% or 52%. The many Democratic leaners who stayed home on Election Day made for his much larger margin of victory, however, including a lot of Republican success downticket.