RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.nbcnews.com/think/opinion/house-election-results-new-york-vote-show-ego-prevailed-party-rcna57328

It will go down as one of the bitter ironies of the 2022 midterm campaign: One of the few states that actually faced a “red wave” of Republican victories was deep-blue New York.

Democrats could have prevailed had their state party — which was busy deflecting progressive criticism of their conduct — marshaled better infrastructure and financial support for swing-district candidates.

To sour matters further, Democratic losses in the Empire State appear to be pivotal in the narrow majority in the House of Representatives that Republicans are likely to have starting next year. The icing on this rotten cake is that New York Democrats have no one to blame but themselves.

On a night of many disappointments, the party’s most egregious own goal was the one scored for Republicans by no one less than the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee Chairman himself, Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney. Maloney, whose DCCC role is to elect as many Democrats to the House as possible, not only presided over the loss of four previously Democratic New York districts, but failed to win his own race after putting his ego above the warnings of party officials and activists.

Maloney isn’t the only one to blame for Democrats’ Big Apple bludgeoning, however. The Democratic legislators who control the statehouse fumbled the ball when they were given the task of drawing up new congressional districts to reflect the results of the 2020 census. Their new congressional maps failed to satisfy the courts that they didn’t violate the state constitution’s bar on partisan gerrymandering, leading to the appointment of a nonpartisan election expert as a special master to draw new maps that cut deeply into Democrats’ previously safe districts. 

https://www.frontpagemag.com/how-could-john-fetterman-have-won/

It’s hardly even believable: the stuttering, sputtering John Fetterman, a stroke victim who only rarely manages to utter a complete sentence, coasted to victory in the Pennsylvania Senate race. Like Joe Biden, Fetterman is so clearly unfit for his new job that no sane person could possibly think otherwise; it boggles the mind to think that any Pennsylvania voter could have seen any of Fetterman’s incoherent ramblings over the last few weeks, both in his debate with Dr. Mehmet Oz and in his campaign rallies, and thought, “That’s the man I want representing Pennsylvania in the Senate.” But Fetterman will show up in the Senate in January — if someone can guide him to where it is — and all the explanations of why this ridiculous charade is set to happen are bad in different ways.

The immediate possibility, of course, is that Fetterman’s victory is due to chicanery at the ballot box. Over at Townhall, Mia Cathell reported Wednesday that “in an undercover video filmed by Project Veritas Action (PVA) journalists at a Philadelphia polling location, Project Veritas founder James O’Keefe alleges that the investigative group’s journalists were told whom to vote for mere feet outside of one of the city’s polling places. Two of the interactions were captured on camera.” The person telling voters how to vote was, of course, a Democrat Party operative. O’Keefe explains, “This is referred to as electioneering.” It’s also illegal.

This is striking, but it isn’t evidence of large-scale ballot box tampering. In a clear sign that they suspected they would have to cheat in order to win, the Fetterman camp filed suit the other day to have ballots counted even if they were marked with the wrong date. But as it turns out, they didn’t even need the tainted ballots to put their man over the top. So what does explain the victory of a candidate who is without any doubt the least competent and capable individual ever to stand as a candidate for the United States Senate?

https://www.foxnews.com/opinion/gen-z-stopped-republicans-expected-red-wave-how-gop-win-over-young-voters

One week after the 2022 midterm elections, Republicans want to know: what happened? Why were expectations about the midterms so completely wrong? How could a deeply dishonest and unpopular president score one of the best midterm outcomes in recent history?  

Like a great many Republicans, I am deeply disappointed, having hoped to see Americans deliver a well-deserved rebuke to a party in charge of all three branches of government – a party that set inflation soaring and sowed the seeds of recession.

There is much finger-pointing underway; many blame former President Trump for endorsing flawed candidates, prioritizing personal fealty over GOP victories. Some have dumped on Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell for failing to support Trump-endorsed candidates. There is lots of chatter on social media about the need to get out ahead of the ballot harvesting and mail-in voting which helps Democrats.

All those complaints are valid, but another reason that the polling was so inaccurate and that so many critical races swung to Democrats is the growing importance of Gen Z voters, which appears to have been completely ignored by the GOP.

An estimated 27% of eligible voters aged 18-29 turned out to vote, compared to roughly 20% of young voters who typically participated in elections in the 1990s.

Not only did Gen Z show up in force, they overwhelmingly picked Democrats, by a 28-point margin. That preference was close to their vote in 2020, which went 62% Democrat and only 32% GOP.

This is important, especially because this group, which now accounts for about 10% of eligible voters, will continue to grow. In 2020, their votes totaled almost three times the number cast just four years earlier, when they reached voting age.

https://spectatorworld.com/topic/midterm-results-good-republicans-not-great/

The dust is still settling around the congressional midterms, but it looks like Republicans will retake the House by a very slim margin and Democrats will have an ever-so-slight lead in the Senate.

But with stubbornly moderate Democrats such as Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema, Republicans can be fairly confident the upper chamber will not try to advance the most extreme parts of President Biden’s agenda, even if they do increase their majority by one seat in the December runoff in Georgia. And of course, because of the flip in the House, those uber-progressive proposals will never make it up to the Senate. The governor’s houses in Maryland and Massachusetts may have flipped blue, but Republicans knew they were lucky to be holding them in the first place.

Even so, at the topline level it is understandable Republicans are disappointed. With a struggling economy and a sitting Democratic president with approval ratings stuck in the forties, conventional wisdom says they should have picked up thirty to forty seats in the House and easily taken the upper chamber. There was also a hope, realistic at the time even if fantastical now, of taking control of some blue-state governor’s mansions like Oregon that didn’t materialize. Yes, the GOP flipped Nevada, but that was canceled out by Katie Hobbs’s victory over Kari Lake in neighboring Arizona.

But if conservatives can look past the disappointment they feel from overblown expectations, they will see there is plenty of good news. They have control in the House of Representatives and hold the majority of gubernatorial seats. In North Carolina and Ohio, Republicans won all of the Supreme Court races on the ballot, winning and preserving Republican majorities, respectively. Democratic Kansas governor Laura Kelly hung on to her job, but Republicans gained a super-majority in the House to match their existing advantage in the Senate. While Republicans lost chambers in Minnesota, Michigan and Pennsylvania, they gained a super-majority in Iowa and West Virginia and took away one held by the Democrats in Oregon. Overall a good result, if falling short of great.

A look at 2018 and 2022’s exit polls also quantify the narratives about Democrats losing ground with minority voters. Compared to the 2018 midterms, Republicans grew support among all minority groups: +4 among Black voters, +10 among Hispanics and an impressive +17 among Asians. If Republicans can continue to improve on these trends, even at the marginal level, it puts a significant number House districts previously out of reach on the table and solidifies their positing in current swing districts. For example, Florida’s 25th and 26th congressional districts flipped in 2020 as Republicans increased their margins among Hispanics and Democrats were unable to regain power during the midterms.

https://amgreatness.com/2022/11/14/maricopa-countys-top-election-official-runs-pro-democracy-pac-that-opposes-election-deniers/

Maricopa County Recorder Stephen Richer started a “pro Democracy” political action committee (PAC) in 2021 to stop GOP candidates who believe the 2020 election was stolen, it has been revealed.

Richer, like Maricopa County Supervisor Chairman Bill Gates, is a Republican, and has been vocal in defending the legitimacy of the 2020 presidential election.

The PAC, Pro Democracy Republicans of Arizona, declares on its website that Republican candidates should “accept and acknowledge” that former president Donald Trump lost the election.

The Arizona election wasn’t stolen. We Republicans simply had a presidential candidate who lost, while we had many other candidates who won. It’s time we Republicans accept and acknowledge that fact.

Candidates come and go. But our democratic institutions are long-lasting, and peaceful transitions of power are a hallmark of the United States. We should not abandon this history in favor of conspiracy theorists and demagoguery.

To that end, we are launching this PAC to support pro-democracy Arizona Republicans.

We hope you will join us. We will win some races. We will lose some races. But either way, we will be strengthening the processes that have long undergirded Arizona and the United States.

In November of 2021, Richer told the Arizona Mirror that the PAC’s “primarily focus” would be “on legislative and county races,” but that assertion does not track with the PAC’s financial activity.

According to Transparency USA, Pro Democracy Republicans of Arizona raised $88,443 in total contributions, and spent $69,761—most of it in the third quarter of 2022.

https://www.realclearflorida.com/articles/2022/11/14/florida_counts_its_ballots_in_hours_so_why_does_arizona_take_days_864565.html

As the saying goes, the definition of insanity is doing the same thing again and again and expecting a different result. If that’s true, then it is insane to expect Arizona to produce election results in a timely manner and free of controversy. Three months ago, Arizona’s administration of voting in the state primary election created chaos. Arizona let America down then, but many hoped that the state’s leaders would learn from that mistake and produce better results in November. No such luck: Arizona’s administration of the general election shows that its failed leadership has not learned anything.

Maricopa County, Arizona’s largest county, finds itself at the center of the voting controversy. Its voting administration is divided up between the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors, the county recorder, and the secretary of state. The board handles the actual voting and counting of ballots, while the recorder’s office manages the registration and verification of voters. The secretary of state oversees voting in all Arizona counties.

On election day, 60 of Maricopa’s 223 voting locations faced problems with their voting machines. The machines would not accept votes, which may have caused some people to miss their chance to cast a ballot. Many felt that these problems disproportionately harmed Republicans because Republicans vote heavily in person on Election Day, while Democrats predominate in the use of mail-in voting.

In early returns on Election Night, the whole GOP statewide ticket started from a massive deficit, creating the illusion that these races were over. Days later, the vote counting continues, while Florida, a state with roughly three times as many people as Arizona, counted nearly all its ballots on Election Night. No matter who wins in Arizona, the losing side will likely feel cheated.

Everyone with a role in managing voting in Maricopa County contributed to this failure. Arizona’s secretary of state is Democrat Katie Hobbs, who is running for governor. Her office is overseeing the election that will determine whether she becomes the next governor. In 2018, Democrats wanted then Georgia secretary of state Brian Kemp to resign during his run for governor, and he ultimately did so as counting continued after the election. Hobbs refused to resign, yet she showed up to work for only 19 days in the six months leading up to the election. Hobbs should have been more dedicated to the office she held or else resigned it, especially considering the state’s disastrous primary.

https://www.frontpagemag.com/who-lost-the-senate-everyone/

The circular firing squad is in session and a red wave, which had a thousand aspiring proud papas, is instead an orphan.Everyone is blaming everyone else. As they should.

The midterms showed that we learned little from 2020. Few Republicans, outside Florida and Georgia, were ready for the systematic corruption of elections by the tide of Democrat ballots backed by massive voter registration machines and the new pandemic rules.

Republicans were played even worse this time around.

Then there was everything else. Republicans went into this as a divided party torn apart by infighting, internal politics, ego, personal agendas, greed and dysfunction and emerged the same way. Maybe even worse.

Consultants, celebrities and private agendas, as well as post-2020 infighting, kept good candidates from being nominated.

And while there were good candidates who lost, but there were also horrendously bad ones beginning with Mehmet Oz in Pennsylvania whom no functional party in touch with its principles or even basic sanity would have ever put its best for on the Senate.

Who’s to blame for that? Everyone.

There is no single scapegoat for this. Everyone who shaped the election gets a share of this disaster. And arguing otherwise is dishonest.

https://amgreatness.com/2022/11/12/nevertrump-fraternity-parties-on/

Is Peggy Noonan back in the driver’s seat? The title and argument of her Wall Street Journal column Thursday made me wonder. “Maybe Republicans Will Finally Learn,” she intoned, explaining in a subhead, “If they aren’t serious about policy, they’ll nominate Trump in 2024 and lose a fourth straight election.” 

By “Peggy Noonan,” I do not just mean that particular columnist. I mean the generators of The Narrative tout court. As a paid-up member of the establishment, Noonan has long been a Trump opponent. If you have your finger in the air, you know that that’s the way the wind is blowing. It happened in a nonce. 

Of course, the NeverTrump speakers have been blaring that message since 2016. But someone flipped a switch, and the other bank of stereo speakers suddenly came to life, spouting the same message: The horrible ogre Donald Trump lost the midterm elections for the GOP. Not only that, he said disobliging things about two of his possible GOP rivals, Ron DeSantis and Glenn Youngkin of Virginia. Be done with him!

I happen to be a fan of DeSantis and Youngkin. Both are talented politicians and credible future GOP presidential candidates. But having witnessed Donald Trump’s inventory of epithets for his Republican rivals in 2016 (“Little Marco,” “Low Energy Jeb,” “Lyin’ Ted”), I am not really surprised that he is honing that rhetorical sword. Some people think it happened all of a sudden a week or two back. In fact, it has been developing for some time. Do I like it? Not really. But no one who has watched Trump over the last six years should be surprised. We don’t yet know whether he is running in 2024. Probably, we will on Tuesday when he makes his advertised big reveal. My bet? He will run. 

The establishment thinks so, too, which is why you cannot turn on the news or open a newspaper without encountering warnings that there is serious “GOP pushback” to the idea. 

The “Dump Trump” meme, active since he won the 2016 election, has acquired new energy following the midterms. We were promised a red wave. It didn’t materialize. It must be Trump’s fault. 

Was it? Ninety-three percent of the hundreds of candidates Trump endorsed won their primary contest in the 2022 election. Eighty percent won in the general. That is a far higher percentage of wins for Trump-endorsed candidates than ever before. In 2018, for example, only 59 percent of the candidates he endorsed won in the general. 

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2022/11/gop_must_insist_on_a_return_to_pre2020_election_system_in_competitive_states_or_die.html

It’s entirely possible that the Republicans will not win the House. If they do, it will be by a razor thin margin under circumstances that should have produced a blowout.

The main reason for this second in a row reversal of all historic electoral precedent is plain to anyone who wants to look and be honest:

Florida has an electoral law that most closely recreates the US election DAY mechanics of all time prior to 2020: No mass mailing of unrequested absentee ballots to all registered voters – only those registered voters requesting an absent ballot no later than 10 days before the election get one; and their ballot is counted only if received by a specific date.  In Florida there was strict enforcement of date deadlines, and larger percentages of voters than elsewhere voted at the polls.

Ergo: in Florida there was fast counting and quick results; and much less time for shenanigans.

And a Republican blowout.

In Florida there was no collecting/harvesting of ballots. And – even more important – no voting by that substantial segment of the Democrat party base that’s too disorganized and generally out of it to either remember to go to the polls or to request an absentee ballot.

The mass mailing of millions of absentee ballots, coupled with lengthy return periods and allowed methods of return (e.g., unsupervised drop boxes) has, in a multitude of ways, expanded the Dem vote.

It may save them both the House and Senate this time.