It would be an error to evaluate the trajectory of the midterms by looking for or chronicling only data fragments that point in the direction of the dominant reality – that a Red tsunami is on the way.
To be clear, the likely prospect of such a ruby swell is currently a reality, not a narrative, per both Republican and Democratic sources working on actual campaigns in 2022.
But while there remain some bright spots and glimmers for Team Blue right now, remember one fundamental truth about political waves: In the end, they almost always flow in one direction and they usually flow hard.
Even in a midterm cycle characterized by an unusual number of powerful crosscurrents, when the votes are cast and counted, we are likely to be looking at unidirectional crimson.
Which means that Republican candidates who might have lost close races are now likely to win close races; that Republican candidates who were on track to win narrowly will now likely win big (allowing Red money to be redirected elsewhere in the closing days); and that Democratic candidates who were on track to win narrowly will now more likely than not lose – and some by shockingly/surprisingly big margins.
Here are today’s strands that, pieced together, suggest why we are all saying now that a tsunami is more likely than a trickle:
1. I keep hearing it from all quarters, that crime is driving some voters to the right as much or more than inflation, including some upper income elites who see the failure of local Democrats to competently address basic issues of public safety as part of a larger emotional fear about bedlam.
Daniel Henninger captures this point of view well:
Progressive criminal-justice theories are running side by side with a crime surge in cities and suburbs. Virtually no new-generation prosecutor has been willing to make a midcourse correction. Democrats own it….
Most voters, especially the independents trending rightward, don’t like chaos. To ride it out, voters can choose between a red wave or a blue wave. The blue wave crested two years ago. It’s not going to return for Democrats in three weeks.
2. The New York Times story about President Biden’s eschewing of the kind of homestretch rallies on offer from his predecessors is one of the most important essential reads of this cycle. The Democrats’ leader has not held a midterms campaign rally since Labor Day; he will make two stops in Pennsylvania’s two biggest cities today without such an event. The Times explains this phenomenon by citing the incumbent’s low job approval rating – and quotes the White House’s spin on the matter. But everyone knows the real, additional reasons for this absence, as well as the political implications for 2022, 2023, and 2024, and it is just such an amazing state of affairs.
3. The Wall Street Journal finally gets around to doing its news section version of “we all expect a big Red wave now,” with these items of wisdom from ace Democratic pollster Celinda Lake standing out as true truths:
“A quarter to a third of independents are still undecided, and they moved slightly from leaning slightly Democratic to slightly Republican,” said Ms. Lake. These voters, she said, tend to have lower incomes than core members of either party and are more concerned about the economy and inflation.
Ms. Lake said the Democratic Party’s challenge is to show voters that it has a better economic plan than the GOP, possibly by focusing on the party’s efforts to cut medical costs and protect Social Security and Medicare.
4. Two things are happening in the City of Angels that speak to why the Democrats’ travails might be running even deeper than the current CW. Tom Edsall writes in the New York Times about how the city council’s racial divisions are both a cause and effect of a potential wider donkey crackup – and what if the much more moderate candidate wins the mayoral contest?
5. The Democrats’ Ohio Senate candidate, Tim Ryan, goes to the Washington Post to beg for more of the kind of national Blue money he has been denied and needs in order to have a chance to win, even though such pleading is off message for the Buckeye hopeful. The larger meaning of which is, if we do continue to head towards (and then see) a full-blown Red tsunami, Democrats are going to go through the following steps:
A. Concern (over the next 10 days).
B. Panic, carping, and finger pointing (over the final week before Election Day).
C. A circular firing squad (from November 9th through Thanksgiving).
D. Faux soul searching (until Joe Biden announces a decision about whether he will run for reelection or not).
E. Twin existential and identity crises (for as far as the eye can see).
More tomorrow….
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