The David Brat “earthquake”
The David Brat victory has been widely described as an earthquake. In the political world of DC, I suppose it is. To the rest of us it’s a surprise—pleasant or unpleasant, depending on your politics—but buildings are still standing and nothing has fallen off the shelves yet.
Funny thing how everyone’s ignoring Lindsay Graham’s victory, which appears to give the opposite message of Brat’s. Each race had special circumstances that make it difficult to generalize, but I think we can safely say that Brat’s does indicate a certain anti-DC, anti-incumbent fever that we already knew has been brewing for a long, long time. However, I don’t think it would have made as much difference had Brat himself not been a personable, smart, articulate guy, or if there hadn’t been a lot of anti-illegal-immigration news in the headlines right before the primary. It also helped that the vote was in a single district with a small turnout. In South Carolina, in his statewide contest, Graham faced a slew of opponents all of whom split the opposition vote among them, and that mattered in his victory.
I dismiss the idea that Democratic crossover votes had much effect at all in the Brat race, by the way. The argument offered by DrewM at Ace’s makes tremendous sense to me:
If you think 10,000 Democrats came out to vote for Brat (that’s about 1 in 6 votes cast), you’d think there’d be some sort of evidence of an organized effort. The notion that Democrats “smelled blood in the water” is ridiculous. No one saw this coming. Why would so many Democrats on their own suddenly think they could sway a race that everyone thought would be a Cantor blowout?
I think what will be especially interesting is how the so-called “establishment” Republicans react to this over time. Will Cantor be asked to resign from his post, and who would replace him? Will other Republicans change their amnesty-deal-friendly rhetoric? Or will they look at Graham’s win instead and decide that Brat’s victory was a one-off rather than a trend? I think it more likely that they’re pretty scared right now.
One thing I would hate to see is a civil war in the Republican Party that hurts their chances in 2014. First things first, and first is stopping or at least slowing down this president in the damage he can do before January of 2017. I happen to think that we need more fighters and fewer accommodators, and so far Brat fits the mold of the former rather than the latter, so I’m happy about his victory—just as long as he wins against his opponent in November.
[ADDENDUM: Interesting story about one of Brat’s winning moves.]
Cantor is supposedly stepping down as majority leader at the end of July.
A house divided against itself cannot stand–much less fight.
One lesson for sure: Articulate, coherent and principled candidates are a must. And principled usually means non-incumbant.
waitforit:
But do they have to be ethics professors 🙂 ?
It is an error to extrapolate VA-7 onto the nation. Cantor’s defeat means what, outside the Beltway? Not much.
McConnell won handily in KY against a conservative, also a neophyte, and he’s facing a three-named Dem female whose middle name is always given, Lundegren, just like Rodham. He may lose…to a rotten Dem. What’s that tell ya? That we are still deep in the weeds, and one swallow does not make a spring.
Graham was running against a incoherent herd of cats.
Brat is able to put into terms even the lo-fo voters can understand why importing as many Mexican peasants as possible is bad for the US.
I think we’re going to have to wait and see concerning the message of Cantor’s defeat. I believe it is very possible it was a singularity because of the disingenuous campaign against Brat. The voters observed it and responded.
But there’s a larger context exampled in UK and India. I’ve heard some compare the current wide revolt against elitism to 1848, the point being that various undercurrents can unite and cause change in one place but not another.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revolutions_of_1848
From Neo’s addendum link on one of Brat’s “winning moves”:
“But the key event of the election, which occurred during the Cantor crash week, was this: on May 28, Rep. Luis Gutierrez came all the way to Richmond to appear at the Virginia Capitol building for the purpose of declaring Eric Cantor to be ‘the one man standing in the way of immigration reform’.” . . .
“So Brat showed up an hour ahead of the Gutierrez event – knowing the cameras would already be there – and got out the message that Cantor’s mailers were dishonest, and that Cantor was in fact the friend of amnesty in this race.
This appearance by Brat, and the amateur-hour kabuki orchestrated by Cantor and Gutierrez, was the day the MSM first paid attention to Brat. This was the turning point.”
Along the same lines, Jennifer Rubin at the Wash. Post provides this tidbit:
“… a Virginia Republican veteran of many campaigns observed that while Cantor’s opponent was still an unknown, Cantor launched a huge, over-the-top ad campaign. He thereby ‘kicked the hornet’s nest’ and elevated his opponent.”
It really does pay to know how to play the game.
Here in Nebraska we have an interesting race. Incumbent Lee Terry had a tough primary race. Tea Party conservative Chip Maxwell is now running as an Independent. But this House District went for Obama in 2008.
I know Chip and like him, but will have to see how this develops. I also know the Dem candidate and do not want to see him win.
Mark Levin is making the point tonight that Tim Scott, strongly anti-“amnesty,” won His S.C. primary by 90%, and more tellingly, polled 100,000 more votes than his fellow S.C. senator, Lindsay Graham, who only got 57% of his voters, when facing 6 opponents who split nearly half the remainder.
That is a very weak showing for a heavily favored incumbent. And a very strong showing for Scott, who, by the way, is a black gentleman (man, those bigoted Southerners! — er, Never mind.) http://www.scott.senate.gov/
Levin also reported tonight (see his website for transcript) on the money-raising meeting for Thad Cochran held in DC, with the Usual Republican Suspects.
I wish, too, that the Republicans would unite against the Enemy, but the establishment Republicans will not fight them — in fact, they endorse the Democrats when a conservative wins.
So the real problem is with the soi-disant Repubs who act more like Lefty water-carriers.
The Republican party has been corrupted. There’s no other reasoning for it. Blackmail, bribes, something’s got em.
Love those points, Beverly. You always come up with good stuff!
On myth and Progressive failure to establish:
The Progs are Skelator who seems invincible; but with an over-reaching skeleton hand, their triumph is chopped off by He-Man. Who He-Man is in this metaphor is, I do not know. Frodo is fading, and the Elves have not revealed their power. The Silmaril is lost. But all is not lost.
He-Man was one of the greatest comic successes of all time. You wouldn’t know it because the Progs detest providing kids with simple good v evil entertainment, but the kids love it, and it’s hard for even Hollywood to resist the huge bucks therein.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8lk4Dm0qOX4
It probably shouldn’t be this way, but much more many (love that phrase) persons have watched and absorbed He-Man than all the Hollywood ever produced. Comic books reign. They produce our greatest movies. They provide our most recognizable archetypes. And they refudiate the “complexity myth” of Common Core and Prog propaganda.
I have a dream, he said,
And the crowds went agog.
The dream expressed was dead,
Felled by evil Magog.
That all should love, all us
Give without thought to home;
But, it is, home, whom calls
and requires our thought-less.
“…. at least slowing down this president in the damage he can do before January of 2017.”
The only way to do that is to raise Joe Biden to the office of president.
Vander, you’re assuming DC won’t be submerged under water by then or eaten by a volcano. A mushroom volcano.