I’ll lead with an analysis by Larry Sabato that a race Republicans should win handily is now a tossup.
Obviously, if the Democrats won this race it would be a pretty big deal as far as perception goes. On substance, it seems to me that in Steve Beshear the Democrats have had one of the best governors in the country, so that should help the party in Kentucky even though Kentucky is very anti-Obama. Plus as Sabato notes, Bevin has been an awful candidate.
Thoughts? Predictions? I’m not making a hard prediction here, but if I had to bet, I’d put my money on the Democrat, Conway.
Obama has ruined the face of the Democratic Party. He makes all Democrats look like out of touch, transgender (in reality, you either have a y chromosome or you don’t. the end) loving, Israel-hating, Islamism-apologizing idiots. That is why Democrats can’t win KY today.
In any case, this is almost certainly yet another case of the Democratic voters staying home. Whereas the Republicans have a solid base of voters who would climb uphill (both ways!) to vote in all elections, the voting demographics the Democrats rely on are remarkably less enthusiastic about non-presidential elections.
There is a mentality amongst much of the Democratic voting core that the presidency is of paramount importance, while “lesser” positions, ie Congressional offices hold little import. The Presidency matters little when both houses of Congress are under firm Republican control. Something really needs to be done, or the so-called Blue Wall many Democrats triumph will mean nothing.
As an Ohioan who has finally reached the age of majority and participated in my first ballot, I was not very shocked to learn that none of my friends voted today. They all lean strongly Democratic.
As someone who lives in Louisville, but not a native, I am starting to understand why this city wants to think of itself as its own little state, rather than part of the Bluegrass.
What a stunner. Republicans win an election in an odd year race in a red state. Color me stunned. Now 400,000 Kentuckians may lose their health insurance in a protest vote against there being a black guy in the White House. They will have the government they deserve.
I agree with Bob though that it’s not TOO surprising for a red state to elect a Republican governor, even if they haven’t in the past. What is shocking is that the polls were so wrong, presumably due to turnout problems for Democrats.
But DerekMichaels is right about Obama to a large extent. Don’t know about the transgender thing, but the RGA ran ads tying Conway to Obama and Conway was repeating the 2014 failed strategy of distancing himself from Obama. Don’t know why Democrats continue to do this. It doesn’t work. If you are a Democrat, you own the President’s record. Be proud of it. Aren’t almost all Democrats(a few like DerekMichael excepted) proud of the President’s record? Am I to seriously believe that Democratic politicians are far less likely to approve of him than the party’s voters? Everyone knows it’s a lie, so why bother pushing it?
I’m proud of the President’s economic and social policy record (saving the banks, ACA, taxes, SCOTUS) but his foreign policy and the way he leads and image he projects just sucks and doesn’t do justice to traditional Americanism. Image is part of leadership when you’re president, and that matters.
This discussion should probably go to another thread, but this Democratic voter thinks you’re way, way off about the way he leads, the “image he projects”, and “traditional Americanism”.
Pointing out that America is exceptional, not “like Greek exceptionalism” as he said in 2009. Traditional Americanism negates his apology speeches to the Muslim world, or publicly treating the leader of the Jewish State worse than communists like Chavez and Castro. One thing Trump is right about is that America does need a cheerleader.
“Traditional Americanism” means the Melting Pot, open arms, and that poem on the Statue of Liberty. We’ve had all of that for far longer than we’ve had any of the militaristic jingoism stuff (which we also imported).