Re: America's Affordable Health Choices Act of 2009 - Part 2 - Deathers vs. Commies
No, the independents stayed home or voted GOP, especially in Virginia. And if you don't think the Blue Dogs, and other Dems in conservative areas, aren't even more wary of Obama's policies now you need to spend some time in flyover country where his policies may be made or broken.
Scott - From Larry Sabato re: Virginia...
Turnout played a huge role in the outcomes in both NJ and VA, with Republicans showing up in droves and Democrats going fishing, at least to some degree. In Virginia, one result of absentee Democrats was the lowest voter turnout for a gubernatorial election in the state's modern two-party history (1969 to 2009). The 2009 turnout of 39.8 percent of the registered voters was the lowest in forty years. Even with all the population growth since 2005, the absolute voter turnout in 2009 (1.97 million) fell below that of four years ago (2.0 million). And the electorate was barely more than half that of 2008 (3.7 million). Astounding.
Does anybody doubt African-Americans weren't engaged in this week's elections? Here's some proof for remaining doubters, in a sampling of heavily black precincts around Virginia. Even though Creigh Deeds received a larger percentage of the black vote (93 percent) than the previous Democratic gubernatorial nominee, Tim Kaine, in 2005 (90 percent), the turnout was miserable for Deeds--more than 10 full percentage points lower. He received many fewer African-American votes than Kaine, despite near-unanimous backing from blacks who cast a ballot.
Also, regarding Dems vs GOP in Congress 2010 from McClatchy:
"Yet despite the criticism toward the White House and Congress, a plurality of Americans (48%) plan to vote Democratic in the 2010 midterm elections, while 41% say that they would vote for the Republican candidate. Just 2% would cast their vote for a third party candidate and 6% are unsure. Three percent do not plan to vote next November."
Will politicians get jittery? Of course, that's what politicians do. However, the amount of Democrats in "flyover country" isn't that great (are there even 10 Dem reps in total in Utah, Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, North and South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma), as the Dems gains over the last two cycles have come at the expense of Republicans in New York, Pennsylvania, Connecticut, and the like - states unlikely to want to return to a GOP led Congress. I'll say again, if anti-health care reform was an electoral winner, the candidate who strenuously ran on it (Hoffman) would have won in a GOP district.
