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Midterm Elections

Captain Obvious

Americans go to the polls today to vote on a number of issues but primarily the US Senate and Congress. The Democrats are expected to take control of Congress and the Republicans are expected to retain their slim minority in the Senate but there could be a few surprises. Record numbers of early voters and massive voter suppression mean that polls may not be too reliable and Democrats only need to flip two seats to take control.

Here's a quick rundown from CNN

https://edition.cnn.com/2018/10/27/politics/us-midterm-election-explainer-intl-trnd/index.html

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Cato the Elder

lawred2 wrote: »

why should that extend to voting for a Republican senators or congress people?

This is the point many are making. For Republicans, this isn't about Trump. It's about state-level politics.

Furthermore, I consider that Carthage must be destroyed.

RobertKK

lawred2 wrote: »

why should that extend to voting for a Republican senators or congress people?

Because obstruction in the House and/or can stop Trump implementing policy. For some that is a reason to vote Democrat, for others it is a reason to vote Republican.

8-10

Anyone here voted by mail from Ireland? We received our sample ballot after requesting a vote-by-mail ballot a few weeks ago and thought it was the real one at the time without opening. Only realised last week when trying to fill it out that it was a sample. Real ballot never arrived. Status "in the mail" but it's clear it was never sent.

Captain Obvious

RobertKK wrote: »

Are you generalising?

Not all Republicans are the 'lock her up' kind, just like all Democrats aren't like Hillary Clinton who jokes all black people look alike.

They are as long as they support Trump

RobertKK

8-10 wrote: »

What State/District out of interest?

He is from Las Vegas, but not sure if he is registered there or where he is now living. I don't feel I have the right to give out a lot of detail about the person as it is not my info to share.

RobertKK

Captain Obvious wrote: »

They are as long as they support Trump

Trump was democratically elected.
By your reasoning, all Republicans should have resigned from the party because of the fleeting visit of Trump to the party in what will be the history of time.

Hurrache

prawnsambo wrote: »

That is true unfortunately. Even if he doesn't keep them to the letter or at all, he throws enough crap around and raises enough smoke that it's hard for people to really see whether or not he's kept such promises. People believe that he's built the wall, that he's repealed the ACA etc.

Oh I believe there's people out there that will vote just because they think he keeps promises, that's not the think I don't believe.

Dog Man Star

Please read some of RobertKK's posts in the Trump thread before replying to him here.

You will save yourself a lot of potentially wasted time.

Here's a typical post:

https://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=106842710&postcount=4492

Captain Obvious

RobertKK wrote: »

Trump was democratically elected.
By your reasoning, all Republicans should have resigned from the party because of the fleeting visit of Trump to the party in what will be the history of time.

The Senate and Congress have a duty to keep the president in line. The Republicans used this to block any decisions Obama made and have supported Trump in almost every way. They did not have to resign, they simply had to do their duty. They have not done so bar one or two stray votes and a bit of tutting. So it can be assumed that they are fully in line with Trumps policies.

8-10

RobertKK wrote: »

He is from Las Vegas, but not sure if he is registered there or where he is now living. I don't feel I have the right to give out a lot of detail about the person as it is not my info to share.

From Vegas and a man, sure I know who he is alright! Won't mention the name don't worry.

The Heller - Rosen race is one of the more interesting ones for sure.

Dog Man Star

Don't waste your time

https://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=106842710&postcount=4492

Captain Obvious

North Dakota effectively excluding Native Americans from voting. A good boost for the Republicans there although Heitkamp was in trouble anyway.

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2018/11/federal-judge-lets-north-dakota-republicans-block-native-americans-from-voting.html?fbclid=IwAR1T8Ejw706MBGxKC63s_X1jqjsI7SyPI8RNcqB9b6TunCwWOyoCa5R8ul8

RobertKK

Dog Man Star wrote: »

Please read some of RobertKK's posts in the Trump thread before replying to him here.

You will save yourself a lot of potentially wasted time.

Here's a typical post:

https://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=106842710&postcount=4492

You added nothing constructive.

I have spoken against some of Trump's policies, I am not some idiot who sees everything as being black and white, which is what idiots do.

Quin_Dub

All,

This thread is specifically to discuss the mid term election - Results , exit polls , predictions etc.

If you want to discuss Trump and/or GOP Policies , the main Trump thread is the place to go..

Let's keep this one just for the specifics of the mid-terms.

Thank you.

Brian?

Captain Obvious wrote: »

North Dakota effectively excluding Native Americans from voting. A good boost for the Republicans there although Heitkamp was in trouble anyway.

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2018/11/federal-judge-lets-north-dakota-republicans-block-native-americans-from-voting.html?fbclid=IwAR1T8Ejw706MBGxKC63s_X1jqjsI7SyPI8RNcqB9b6TunCwWOyoCa5R8ul8

Typical voter ID shenanigans. The GOP should be ashamed of themselves. It's one thing to run attack ads on a black candidate with jungle sounds in the background (yep, this year in Georgia), but stripping people's right to cast a ballot is an absolute disgrace.

Captain Obvious

Brian? wrote: »

Typical voter ID shenanigans. The GOP should be ashamed of themselves. It's one thing to run attack ads on a black candidate with jungle sounds in the background (yep, this year in Georgia), but stripping people's right to cast a ballot is an absolute disgrace.

It was widely believed the natives were going to shun her anyway due to a broken promise.

WinnyThePoo

Kinda takes the mick out of the whole leader of the 'free' and worlds greatest country on earth.

oscarBravo

8-10 wrote: »

This is why the Republicans have been able to resonate so much easier with voters in recent elections. What's their stance on Healthcare...? It's pretty clear cut.

Is it? What's the GOP's actual policy on healthcare? Not the "destroy Obama's legacy" fetish, the actual policy?

hill16bhoy

Usually, in the senate, a high majority of toss-up or "in-play" seats break the same way.

Going back a full ten election cycles to 1998, the lowest percentage of toss up seats that have broken the same way is 66.6% for the Republicans in 2002.

https://politicalwire.com/2018/11/05/senate-toss-ups-usually-break-one-way/#disqus_thread

By my own calculations and based on the polls, there are 10 senate seats that are realistically in play to greater or lesser degrees tonight.

4 of those are being defended by the Republicans.

These are:
Arizona
Nevada
Texas
Tennessee

The Democrats are defending 6 "in play" seats:
Florida
Indiana
Missouri
North Dakota
Montana
West Virginia

If we take those "in play" seats away from the starting totals, we have Republican 47, Democrat 43.

That means the Democrats need 8 of the 10 "in play" seats to get to 51, whereas the Republicans just need 3 of those 10 to get to 50 and effective control.

North Dakota has to be presumed to be one that will get away from the Democrats, and I'm working on that basis.

Or to put it another way: The Democrats need to hold five of their six "in plays", and flip three of the four Republican-held "in plays".

Texas and Tennessee are the two seats that Republicans are banking on as their firewall.

However, it's entirely possible that Democrats could sweep the other seven races. Certainly my feeling is that there has been a slight movement back towards the Democrats nationally over the last week. Florida and Indiana are trending Democrat, while Missouri has swung back to being a genuine toss up after leaning slightly Republican for much of the campaign. However if the Democrats take Missouri, I think they'll take Nevada and Arizona too.

If they do sweep those seven seats, the Republicans are down to their firewall of Texas and Tennessee. These two are the hardest "in play" seats for Democrats to win.

But if they can take even one of the two, they would have a great chance to get to 51.

It's a tough ask for sure, but it's not out of the question.

However the two words that keep coming into my mind are "voter suppression", and sadly, I think there's a very good chance we could be hearing some more horrible stories about it tomorrow.

vetinari

Yep, the Republicans haven't been madly pursuing voter suppression for nothing.
Here's hoping it doesn't work out for them.
It's shameful that people can defend such blatant attempts at stopping people from voting.

Faugheen

Yeah I reckon if the Democrats are to have any chance of claiming the Senate then they have to win one of Texas and Tennessee.

I just can't see it, but if Beto wins Texas then he's going to be a big player in American politics until he runs for President (if he wins tonight, then it'll be a case of 'when'). The media love him and he's also popular among the likes of Ellen DeGeneres and that cohort.

However I think the Democrats when eventually rue poor campaigning in North Dakota, as the other 7 are entirely up for grabs and we could easily end up with Mike Pence being the deciding Senate vote.

Nody

Faugheen wrote: »

Yeah I reckon if the Democrats are to have any chance of claiming the Senate then they have to win one of Texas and Tennessee.

I just can't see it, but if Beto wins Texas then he's going to be a big player in American politics until he runs for President (if he wins tonight, then it'll be a case of 'when'). The media love him and he's also popular among the likes of Ellen DeGeneres and that cohort.

However I think the Democrats when eventually rue poor campaigning in North Dakota, as the other 7 are entirely up for grabs and we could easily end up with Mike Pence being the deciding Senate vote.

I think the winning Democrat factor is simply Trump himself; even with a poor candidate (Hillary) Democrats won the popular vote on low turn out. This election looks likely to have noticeable higher than usual turnout which is likely to benefit the democrats and Trump's politics (and general behaviour) has been a driving factor in making that possible (compared to a generic R candidate such as a Bush etc.).

I was considering staying up to wait for the first results but I got a feeling it would be a waste of my time before there's enough results in to get an initial feel how things are leaning.

Water John

The CNN exit poll on voters doesn't look good for the GOP. Very large no think the country is going the wrong direction. 16% first time voters.

Itssoeasy

Water John wrote: »

The CNN exit poll on voters doesn't look good for the GOP. Very large no think the country is going the wrong direction. 16% first time voters.

One caveat though is that these numbers are preliminary and appear to be going on as people vote.

Also if you have the CNN app you can watch the live coverage. They have dropped the block they have normally. NBC haven't which is strange, and the abc news app also shows the election coverage.

Itssoeasy

Healthcare is the most important election issue which will be good for the democrats.

Itssoeasy

The Republican Party are not liked which is hardly surprising but Nancy pelosi is not liked. Let's say the dems do take back the House of Representatives tonight(well in January technically) how can she be a uniting speaker if in a CNN exit poll she's not liked by a good margain.

Itssoeasy

Water John wrote: »

The CNN exit poll on voters doesn't look good for the GOP. Very large no think the country is going the wrong direction. 16% first time voters.

But a large majority of voters in that exit poll feel the economy is doing well. It was a point made on CNN that how do you Square those two numbers.

spacecoyote

Faugheen wrote: »

Yeah I reckon if the Democrats are to have any chance of claiming the Senate then they have to win one of Texas and Tennessee.

I just can't see it, but if Beto wins Texas then he's going to be a big player in American politics until he runs for President (if he wins tonight, then it'll be a case of 'when'). The media love him and he's also popular among the likes of Ellen DeGeneres and that cohort.

However I think the Democrats when eventually rue poor campaigning in North Dakota, as the other 7 are entirely up for grabs and we could easily end up with Mike Pence being the deciding Senate vote.

Politico had an interesting piece where they were saying that whilst the Beto hype has worked really well to build his national profile that it could have worked against him in terms of the state election as he's slightly forgotten his focus on the local issues

Itssoeasy

The governors races in Florida and Georgia could really be historic. Stacy Abrams was actually invited to the governors mansion when she was in high school and was refused entry initially. How amazing would it be for her to become the inhabitant of that house in 2018.

hill16bhoy

Itssoeasy wrote: »

One caveat though is that these numbers are preliminary and appear to be going on as people vote.

Also if you have the CNN app you can watch the live coverage. They have dropped the block they have normally. NBC haven't which is strange, and the abc news app also shows the election coverage.

I would issue an even bigger caveat.

CNN's preliminary exit poll numbers say 54% view the Republican party unfavourably and 43% view them favourably.

The Democrats are viewed favourably by 50% and unfavourably by 46%.

For the Democrats that's slightly better than the corresponding (completed) exit poll in 2016 which gave them a 47% favourable/49% unfavourable rating.

But tonight's preliminary numbers are actually better than the full 2016 exit poll numbers for the Republicans, which gave them a 55% unfavourable/40% favourable rating.

2016 numbers for this criteria are towards the bottom this link.

https://edition.cnn.com/election/2016/results/exit-polls