2022 Midterm Election thread

[Lord Ash]

Blind squirrel nuts and such.

Two kids, you say? So more like a broken clock…

[acdevil]

Two kids, you say? So more like a broken clock…

Or a spry mailman.

[rasputin]

Or a spry mailman.

Sounds to me more like the Farkel family on Laugh-In.
I'm old.

[CameronBornAndBred]

I'm guessing that Florida incumbent politicians are mindful that their response to Ian will be heavy on voters' minds come November.
If they aren't, then George Bush is sending a gentle reminder.

[bundabergdevil]

I'm guessing that Florida incumbent politicians are mindful that their response to Ian will be heavy on voters' minds come November.
If they aren't, then George Bush is sending a gentle reminder.

I dunno...a sharpie says what?

[Mtn.Devil.91.92.01.10.15]

I'm guessing that Florida incumbent politicians are mindful that their response to Ian will be heavy on voters' minds come November.
If they aren't, then George Bush is sending a gentle reminder.

George Bush doesn't care about black people. Oh wait, what genius thinker said that?

Sheesh.

Yes, as divided as our country is, I would hope our people would come together to support and care for one another in the face of a natural disaster. Whatever your feelings about FL politics and politicians, I hope this is navigated efficiently and thoughtfully.

[JasonEvans]

Oh, I don't know. How hard is it to find multiple "scheduling conflicts"?

Been away a few days so only seeing this now...

I think "scheduling conflict" ain't gonna fly with Trump. It means you had someone or something on your schedule that was seen as more important than appearing with him. That's not the message you want to send to him.

If you are a Republican running for office this fall and Donald Trump wants you to show up at his rally, you better show up at his rally or you run a real risk that he will talk negatively about you and scuttle your chances in a big way.

[bundabergdevil]

Consensus is building that we are headed into a recession*. My firm is openly talking and planning for it internally now. I get the impression the narrative is taking shape that this is what is likely happening across channels, not just in conservative media. How fast that develops and how much purchase it gets in the average person minds is going to be, ahem, important in a little over a month...


Edit: Looking over recent polling suggests ~60% of people already think we are in a recession and an equal amount could not correctly define what constituted a recession. Perception and such.

[ClemmonsDevil]

https://fivethirtyeight.com/features...obbs-decision/

Article looking at how Dobbs has increased the likelihood of women turning out in the midterms and has pushed them towards the Democratic party. I don't think Dems win the House and they may lose the Senate. But Dobbs is looking more and more like the reason we are even having this conversation.

[Bluedog]

https://fivethirtyeight.com/features...obbs-decision/

Article looking at how Dobbs has increased the likelihood of women turning out in the midterms and has pushed them towards the Democratic party. I don't think Dems win the House and they may lose the Senate. But Dobbs is looking more and more like the reason we are even having this conversation.

There's a lot of dumb luck/timing with getting Supreme Court justices appointed. So I understand how this issue could increase passion/turnout, but getting your desired representative isn't going to change things, right? Unless Congress gets enough votes to make it a constitutional right, but that's not even close to happening...I suppose people vote on issues though even if their representative isn't able to enact the vision. So, it would appear on the surface to me to be more impactful for a presidential election because there at least there's a chance for new supreme court appointments. Still, the fact the supreme court overrode it so close to an election can only hurt Republican chances overall.

Also, for all the talk of Democrats winning the popular vote in Presidential elections four times in a row and 7 out of the last 8 (or something like that), it's interesting that the graphic shows republicans winning the popular vote in midterms four out of the last six elections (admittedly, with dems winning all three before that).

[ClemmonsDevil]

There's a lot of dumb luck/timing with getting Supreme Court justices appointed. So I understand how this issue could increase passion/turnout, but getting your desired representative isn't going to change things, right? Unless Congress gets enough votes to make it a constitutional right, but that's not even close to happening...I suppose people vote on issues though even if their representative isn't able to enact the vision. So, it would appear on the surface to me to be more impactful for a presidential election because there at least there's a chance for new supreme court appointments. Still, the fact the supreme court overrode it so close to an election can only hurt Republican chances overall.

Also, for all the talk of Democrats winning the popular vote in Presidential elections four times in a row and 7 out of the last 8 (or something like that), it's interesting that the graphic shows republicans winning the popular vote in midterms four out of the last six elections (admittedly, with dems winning all three before that).

https://www.forbes.com/sites/alisondurkee/2021/06/14/mcconnell-biden-wont-get-supreme-court-pick-in-2024-if-gop-wins-back-senate/

Although Republicans have also said they won't confirm a Biden SCOTUS pick if they take the Senate. So that makes it spectacularly important.

[bundabergdevil]

There's a lot of dumb luck/timing with getting Supreme Court justices appointed. So I understand how this issue could increase passion/turnout, but getting your desired representative isn't going to change things, right? Unless Congress gets enough votes to make it a constitutional right, but that's not even close to happening...I suppose people vote on issues though even if their representative isn't able to enact the vision. So, it would appear on the surface to me to be more impactful for a presidential election because there at least there's a chance for new supreme court appointments. Still, the fact the supreme court overrode it so close to an election can only hurt Republican chances overall.

Also, for all the talk of Democrats winning the popular vote in Presidential elections four times in a row and 7 out of the last 8 (or something like that), it's interesting that the graphic shows republicans winning the popular vote in midterms four out of the last six elections (admittedly, with dems winning all three before that).

Yeah, a single representative can do virtually nothing on most issues*...it's just that for the most part, representation.

*Single representatives can certainly exert leverage if they're a key vote or with seniority and in a position of committee/purse string power. Still, they're not going to do anything about, let's say, inflation or war because the most prominent institutions influencing those things are out of their control.

[Skydog]

There's a lot of dumb luck/timing with getting Supreme Court justices appointed. So I understand how this issue could increase passion/turnout, but getting your desired representative isn't going to change things, right? Unless Congress gets enough votes to make it a constitutional right, but that's not even close to happening...I suppose people vote on issues though even if their representative isn't able to enact the vision. So, it would appear on the surface to me to be more impactful for a presidential election because there at least there's a chance for new supreme court appointments. Still, the fact the supreme court overrode it so close to an election can only hurt Republican chances overall.

Also, for all the talk of Democrats winning the popular vote in Presidential elections four times in a row and 7 out of the last 8 (or something like that), it's interesting that the graphic shows republicans winning the popular vote in midterms four out of the last six elections (admittedly, with dems winning all three before that).

Keeping the Senate is vital for Dems - they will get to appoint a lot more federal judges if they do, including a tiny possibility of a SC judge.

[PackMan97]

Consensus is building that we are headed into a recession*. My firm is openly talking and planning for it internally now. I get the impression the narrative is taking shape that this is what is likely happening across channels, not just in conservative media. How fast that develops and how much purchase it gets in the average person minds is going to be, ahem, important in a little over a month...


Edit: Looking over recent polling suggests ~60% of people already think we are in a recession and an equal amount could not correctly define what constituted a recession. Perception and such.

Traditionally a recession is two quarters of negative economic growth, so we are already there. However, CNN had this article to try and put lipstick on that pig.

https://www.cnn.com/2022/09/26/inves...ing/index.html

The new aim appears to be for a so-called growth recession: A prolonged period of meager growth and rising unemployment. The pain is sharper and lasts longer than that of a soft landing, but a “growth” recession doesn’t pull the entire economy into contraction the way a proper recession would. It looks like a recession, and feels like a recession, but it isn’t a recession — at least not officially.

I will say COVID, China's continuing lockdowns, the spike in mortgage rates, a housing shortage in most places, and many other things have got things out there confused as all get out. For example, domestic manufacturing is experience a significant resugance right now and is showing it's strongest growth in decades and is likely not to slow down very much at all. Housing is in trouble with the rise in prices and rates, but with a housing shortage something will have to give as people need to live somewhere. The mortgage industry is hemoraging and it really doesn't matter what real estate does because lots of folks have refinanced and aren't going anywhere. (i know my wife and I have probably refinanced 10 different times as rates have fallen over the past 20 years. Now we are at sub 3% and are done until we pay off the house and have to go chasing out kids to wherever they end up in 15 years). I don't disagree with the CNN article in that the next few years are going to be hard to label...but at the end of the day if your family is experience job/income loss it may not matter if you are the 4% that is unemployeed, your personal unemployment rate is 100%

How this all affects the mid term will likely depend on a voters industry. I imagine those in housing and mortgage industries would break R because of their economic recession. Manufacturing and unions will likely break D because of their economic boom. At the end, everyone will yell at each other for not understanding their reality and call each other fake news watchers.

[Mtn.Devil.91.92.01.10.15]

There's a lot of dumb luck/timing with getting Supreme Court justices appointed. So I understand how this issue could increase passion/turnout, but getting your desired representative isn't going to change things, right? Unless Congress gets enough votes to make it a constitutional right, but that's not even close to happening...I suppose people vote on issues though even if their representative isn't able to enact the vision. So, it would appear on the surface to me to be more impactful for a presidential election because there at least there's a chance for new supreme court appointments. Still, the fact the supreme court overrode it so close to an election can only hurt Republican chances overall.

Also, for all the talk of Democrats winning the popular vote in Presidential elections four times in a row and 7 out of the last 8 (or something like that), it's interesting that the graphic shows republicans winning the popular vote in midterms four out of the last six elections (admittedly, with dems winning all three before that).

Angry voters can be a powerful voting bloc, even if there's not a logical goal. I know a lot of ticked off people on both sides.

Again I struggle to find a reason to be optimistic about the near political future in this country. It smell rotten and it's going to take a lot to swing the ship into the right direction.

[tommy]

George Bush doesn't care about black people. Oh wait, what genius thinker said that?

Sheesh.

Yes, as divided as our country is, I would hope our people would come together to support and care for one another in the face of a natural disaster. Whatever your feelings about FL politics and politicians, I hope this is navigated efficiently and thoughtfully.

Not holding my breath on that. It'll get politicized. Everything else does . . .

[tommy]

There's a lot of dumb luck/timing with getting Supreme Court justices appointed. So I understand how this issue could increase passion/turnout, but getting your desired representative isn't going to change things, right? Unless Congress gets enough votes to make it a constitutional right, but that's not even close to happening...I suppose people vote on issues though even if their representative isn't able to enact the vision. So, it would appear on the surface to me to be more impactful for a presidential election because there at least there's a chance for new supreme court appointments. Still, the fact the supreme court overrode it so close to an election can only hurt Republican chances overall.

I think they overruled Roe at what, to those favoring the ruling, was at about as good a time as any. Of course it's partially dependent on when SCOTUS has a case in front of it upon which to make a ruling. But given that, they can release rulings at different times of the year. But they're not going to do something like overrule Roe in the first month of the presidency of someone from the other party. So doing it when they did, with at least a fair number of months before an off-Presidential election year, well, I don't think there was a much better time from their perspective.

[Bluedog]

Well I got a lot of replies to my prior note so rather than quoting everyone, just wanted to reply "good points!" 🙂

[bundabergdevil]

Traditionally a recession is two quarters of negative economic growth, so we are already there. However, CNN had this article to try and put lipstick on that pig.

https://www.cnn.com/2022/09/26/inves...ing/index.html



I will say COVID, China's continuing lockdowns, the spike in mortgage rates, a housing shortage in most places, and many other things have got things out there confused as all get out. For example, domestic manufacturing is experience a significant resugance right now and is showing it's strongest growth in decades and is likely not to slow down very much at all. Housing is in trouble with the rise in prices and rates, but with a housing shortage something will have to give as people need to live somewhere. The mortgage industry is hemoraging and it really doesn't matter what real estate does because lots of folks have refinanced and aren't going anywhere. (i know my wife and I have probably refinanced 10 different times as rates have fallen over the past 20 years. Now we are at sub 3% and are done until we pay off the house and have to go chasing out kids to wherever they end up in 15 years). I don't disagree with the CNN article in that the next few years are going to be hard to label...but at the end of the day if your family is experience job/income loss it may not matter if you are the 4% that is unemployeed, your personal unemployment rate is 100%

How this all affects the mid term will likely depend on a voters industry. I imagine those in housing and mortgage industries would break R because of their economic recession. Manufacturing and unions will likely break D because of their economic boom. At the end, everyone will yell at each other for not understanding their reality and call each other fake news watchers.

In fairness, it has not just been CNN saying we are not officially in a recession and these are strange economic conditions. It has been folks like Yellen and others saying we do not have broad-based economic weakness. Now though, More forecasters are predicting much tougher economic conditions ahead.

The waters are muddy here but I think we are moving toward a consensus narrative.

[PackMan97]

In fairness, it has not just been CNN saying we are not officially in a recession and these are strange economic conditions. It has been folks like Yellen and others saying we do not have broad-based economic weakness. Now though, More forecasters are predicting much tougher economic conditions ahead.

The waters are muddy here but I think we are moving toward a consensus narrative.

Yes, I'm aware that there is a panel of people that officially declare the beginning and end of things like recessions and we aren't officially in one until "they" say we are

For the next few years I think we see parts if the economy go in and out of growth periods all out of sync with each other. It's going to make for some nasty politics as both sides will laugh onto the narrative that best fits their needs at the time. Can't wait!