The most interesting coverage I can find is on DailyKos. NYT offers a view through its filter here. Fox offers its version of coverage here, which requires an adjective stronger than “filter,” but I’ll leave it to you to fill in.
The best the Globe can muster at the moment is an AP story that maintains Democrats in South Carolina vote by alphabet, with a preference for names that begin with letters close to “A,” and a passel of other wire stories. Ah, how have the mighty fallen (P.S.: the Celtics lost).
What do these results tell you, if anything, about the likely results in our upcoming Massachusetts elections? Let me guess: they improve the case for your favored candidates. Have at it.
ryepower12 says
When you reduce the region that represents 3% of Halter’s total vote in the first go-around from 40+ polling locations to two, so there would be an estimated 500 people per poll per hour, with some driving twenty miles or more to even get to the polls, combined with other pro-Halter regions losing 50% or more of their polling locations… all due to local county officials who have backed Lincoln… this is the result you get. It was totally predictable — I didn’t even watch the news tonight to see the results, because I knew it was going to happen.
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p>Make no mistake: Tonight’s election was stolen by folks who are very, very good at it… even if they aren’t all that subtle. How this was legal is beyond me. Methinks the establishment that allowed this travesty to occur will regret it when Lincoln gets her butt stomped a few months from now. Sadly, though, part of me thinks they won’t even care. There is an element that exists for some in politics in which that element only cares about who they know and personal relationships, not what’s good or right, fair or democratic and certainly not what’s smart in the medium or long picture. People like Lincoln and her pals represent the epitome of that. Make no mistake: they are rotten from the inside.
liveandletlive says
about the polling locations being closed. That sure sounds like an inside fix. Not to mention it took forever for the results to come in.
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p>The media is saying that Lincoln won because Bill Clinton came in and saved her day. Well let’s all remember that Bill Clinton came in and saved Martha Coakley’s day too.
ryepower12 says
This honestly should be the #1 national story right now, even over the oil spill. Democracy was just stabbed with a shiv in Arkansas and something at the very least has to be done about it so it doesn’t happen again. This is not a free country when 3% of a candidate’s entire statewide base is reduced from 40 polling locations to 2, where there would have to be 500 people per poll per hour to meet the (otherwise) expected voter turnout (and that was just the most blatant county — there were others where this stuff happened that was almost as bad). This was absurd, ridiculous and I’d have to hope criminal.
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p>At the very, very least, there needs to be instant runoff in Arkansas, if insiders have the ability to pull these kinds of shenanigans between elections. There should have been riots.
liveandletlive says
I believe that Halter could have won the general election(plus be an excellent Senator). Our smart Democratic leadership is holding fast to keeping incumbents in the race, ignoring the seriously anti-incumbent mood in the electorate. They are so smart I can’t stand it.
hoyapaul says
Again, the results help to show that the Republicans nationwide are doing their best to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory this November (sound familiar, Charlie Baker?). Harry Reid now has a very legitimate chance of retaining his seat due to the Nevada Republicans’ inexplicable nomination of Sharron Angle. However, it’s also true that Democratic primary voters chose a couple weaker candidates in Senate primaries as well. South Carolina Democrats decided to run a nobody against one of the most odious members of the Senate, and, of course, Bill Halter came up short against the severely damaged Lincoln.
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p>The difference, however, is that the Republicans were almost certainly going to win both races anyway. Despite all the disappointment about Halter, the fact is that he would have been a major underdog to retain the seat — likely better than Lincoln, but losing by 15 points instead of 20 isn’t really meaningful.
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p>By the way, it was surely idiotic for that “unnamed senior White House staffer” to say that unions just flushed $10 million down the toilet in support of Halter. Why piss off unions unnecessarily? Aside from the political foolishness of the statement, however, the unnamed official is correct — it was a waste of money. Despite how much unions hated Lincoln, and understandably so, why spend $10 million against her? That’s a lot of money to “send a message” that, even if successful, would have served as a moral victory at best.
jconway says
This was a overall a good night for the Democratic Party. I was always suspect of the Halter race since it seemed like such a waste of time and energy for national progressives to pour resources there. Are we really making a statement that moderate Dems are endangered by ensuring the leftist candidate will lose in the general election? No matter which way Lincoln voted on health care, the bailout, or a host of issues she would have lost. AR is probably the last major hold out in the South that had a strong and viable Democratic machine, and that machine which elected everyone from Fulbright to Clinton has now finally cracked. Huckabee’s victories for the governorship show that the Southern realignment has finally hit AR, which next to GA was the last state to really see it happen as conservative Dems finally died and were replaced by conservative Republicans. I don’t think anyone can really stop that trend.
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p>The WH official was uncouth but also right, there are plenty of races where they could have sent the same message and won. I for one wish some of that $10 million went right here to the 9th district, or to Lipinski’s district in IL. I have said it before and will say it again, it makes sense to challenge bad Democrats in places that could easily elect good Democrats like CT, MA, or IL. It does not make sense to replace bad Democrats with good Democrats in places that will not elect Democrats anymore like the South or some of the plains states. The other irony is that Halter was also just as conservative as Lincoln as a Times article showed, he just did not articulate it during this campaign and likely would have tacked against Obama and towards the middle had he won the nomination.
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p>I would say the more interesting races were in areas where Republicans had a good chance of winning and then shot themselves in the vote. The Tea Party did not elect Scott Brown, moderate Dems and independents tired of the Beacon Hill establishment did. The same coalition that elected Weld, Cellucci, and Romney elected Brown. It was an old school return of the moderate Republican, not a new school endorsement of radical right wing politics in the land of Kennedy. Remember Scott Brown defended Romneycare and argued that it would be better than Obamacare, whereas the tea party opposes ANY government sponsored health care reform.
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p>In CA the otherwise moderate Meg Whitman had to tack to the far right on immigration and has no destroyed any chance the GOP has of picking up Latino votes, and it needs at least 20% of those votes to win the general election. Say hi to Governor Brown. The moderate Tom Campbell got trounced by Carly Fiorina, an otherwise moderate Republican who had to tack to the far right to beat out the tea party candidate as well. Say hi to Senator Boxer. And in NV and earlier in KY the GOP put easy races at risk by adhering to the far right. It will be interesting to see how this all plays out.
hoyapaul says
Yes, I agree. And there’s also the Connecticut race, where Connecticut Republicans decided to nominate the clearly weaker candidate (McMahon) instead of Simmons. That race had less to do with ideology, but it fits the pattern of the GOP primary voters doing everything they can to boost Senate Democrats’ chances in November.
jconway says
Not only is Simmons your typical socially moderate, fiscally conservative Republican that can actually win in CT, and a proven political brand who delivered for his state as a Congressmen unlike the fire throwing newbie in McMahon, he was also an actually distinguished Vietnam vet and really could have thrown that in Blumenthal’s face. Instead Blumenthal’s weak service record still outshines a lifetime devoted to promoting a fake sport that is riddle with steroid abuse and really chews and spits out its personalities. That makes a whole lot more sense than a respected and sensible politician with a distinguished service record to boot. My only hope is that Blumenthal can contain the damage and still beat McMahon, and so far it looks like he has.
ryepower12 says
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p>It’s Lincoln who was endangering the seat by staying in the race; Halter was the only chance to save it. Lincoln has an infinitesimal chance of winning that seat — somewhere above zero and below one IMO. The only way she wins is if the Republican candidate pulls a Larry Craig or something of that nature, and even then it wouldn’t be a sure thing. Lincoln is toxic.
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p>(Furthermore — it’s not a waste of “progressive” resources to oust a hack corporatist. Lincoln is one of the worst people in the Senate, not just one of the worst Democrats.)
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p>You’re right, the “machine” has seen better days, but I’m not so sure it ‘cracked’ as much as you think. There was just no holding Lincoln’s water. She pierced that hull a long time ago. Halter was outside of that machine and had already won statewide office; if his election wasn’t stolen (and it was), he’d have had a real shot of winning in November.
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p>He may well have been as conservative as Lincoln, but you mistake the progressive movement. We’ve elected plenty of conservative democrats in conservative areas of the country. We just don’t elect corporate hacks in those conservative areas. If you think Halter would have been a corporatist like Lincoln, clearly you weren’t paying attention to where the money in Lincoln’s campaign was coming from. The corporations behind Lincoln’s campaign don’t give a crap if she wins the race, but they do care if Halter won it. Halter, simply put, is not them and not of them and they don’t like him one bit.
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p>This is a self-defeating strategy. When we don’t compete in an area, of course we lose — and we expand where the GOP can go on the offensive (with the result that we end up giving up more and more territory to them, becoming a smaller and smaller geographic party).
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p>When we compete, we build an infrastructure in the area and have a shot of winning, and of growing in the future. All through the 90s and most of the 2000s we used the ‘why bother?’ tactic with the South and got creamed, risking turning the plains states into the next South.
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p>Now, the pendulum has turned. Howard Dean’s 50-state strategy was a godsend to the Democratic Party, already paying off and promising to pay off huge dividends in the medium and long term. I don’t understand why so many feel so quick to go right back to where we were when it was a proven Epic Fail. Yeah, maybe you could say we spent too much, but because of that effort, ro they had to fix the entire election, robbing Halter of his most important polling locations representing upwards of 5% or more of his votes in the first round, to ensure Lincoln’s victory.
jconway says
538 shows that Halter polled the same or worse than Lincoln on the aggregate. There was no way we were keeping that seat. And that $10 million would have been better spent getting rid of Lynch here in MA, Lipinski in Chicago, and other anti-HCR votes in safe blue seats. It might have helped unseat Jane Harman but Halter took up all the grassroots energy, money, and excitement on Kos and other left leaning sites. Whats the point of replacing a corporate (corporatist for the last time is the ideology of fascist Italy and it REALLY does not apply here to a Wal-Mart backing Dem) Dem with a corporate Republican? I say replace corporate Dems with progressive Dems which can be accomplished in several districts across the country. Sestak is a great example of this strategy on the Senate level.
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p>Halter a former Clinton administration official, social security privatization advocate, and McKinsey consultant would not have been better than Lincoln in the long run. He was a crass opportunist who sucked in all the lefties and unions money for his own purposes. The Times and the Nation exposed his fraud already.
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p>I completely agree with the 50 state strategy which is why it makes sense to support conservative Democrats in conservative districts, people like Stephanie Hereseth or Senators like Ben Nelson and Mary Landrieu. Now if you want to oust a conservative Democrat in a liberal district, Lynch comes to mind, or Wynn in 06′, or Lipinski out here in IL, thats all well and good. Stop wasting money on lost causes, and if labor as badly damaged right now its a real shame this money did not go towards realistic races or organizing more workers.
ryepower12 says
it’s not just where he was at, it was his fav/unfav. Lincoln has no where to go, people’s opinions were all formed. Halter did as well or better in most polls, despite the fact that he had plenty of room to grow, because fewer people knew him and his favs/unfavs were much better already. Furthermore, he would have been running against a Washington insider in an anti-insider year, so he would have been in a stronger position to mount that kind of a campaign.
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p>No. The “lefties” knew where he stood. The unions were behind him because he’d sign EFCA, one of two or three votes they’d need to get that through. The netroots were behind him because he would have been better than Lincoln on corporate issues and would have played ball with the netroots community.
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p>Unfortunately, your writing speaks to the contrary.
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p>You just said Halter was conservative, doesn’t that mean you should have supported him?
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p>I don’t know much about Hereseth, but if Nelson and Landrieu are the kinds of people you support, then you don’t just support ‘conservative’ democrats, you support the corporatist hacks. They don’t win us any points in the electorate — which is evidenced by the fact that both of them are almost certainly going down next time they’re up for reelection. By the way, both of them have also proven to be out of the mainstreams in their own states because of their corporatist behaivor.
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p>Meanwhile, you act like the progressive movement has been pushing all these unelectable lefties in conservative districts. That couldn’t be further from the truth. It was the progressive movement that got (much better) Senators in like Webb and Tester — both conservatives, but both also populists who stand up for the people of their states far more often than they do the corporations. They have proven that there’s a difference between conservative democrats and the far more odious corporatist democrats, like Lincoln, Nelson and Landrieu. The progressives and netroots have proven they know what it takes to find winners in conservative districts because, unlike the DC establishment, the candidates that the netroots and progressive movements field in conservative districts are almost always coming from people who are inside those districts and know what’s really going on outside the DC bubble.
jconway says
I first would like to thank you for a respectful debate and again we support the same ends but are arguing over the means to that end.
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p>You first contention that labor and the netroots knew Halter was a conservative does not seem true. In fact many were excited about his candidacy, a lot of out of state progressives and labor activists came in to support him, and he clearly flip flopped on social security and trade to get those votes, which makes me partly doubt his commitment to voting for EFCA. Don’t get me wrong Lincoln needed to be challenged, and I likely would have voted for Halter, but I think the big difference is you and Mr. Lynne conceded this was an uphill race when that money could have been spent on winnable races where corporate Dems were running against labor in states where they were beatable.
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p>Lynch is a great case in point.Like Lincoln he depended on labor throughout his career, and like Lincoln threw them under the bus. The difference is unlike Lincoln there is no credible Republican that will win the seat, and unlike Halter there we got a great candidate in Mac. That 10 million could have been split three ways to oust Harman, Lynch, and Lipinski. And unlike focusing on that one Senate race you would have succeeded in replacing three DINOs with three progressives. I dont see what the message was when labor could not even punish Lincoln in a Democratic primary other than the fact that labor really does not have power, money, or influence in the South. If Halter had won we could argue this money was well spent, I’d argue he is a huckster that wasted union money for his own ambitions.
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p>I am as pro-labor as they come and my mom proudly pays her dues to the SEIU and I wish her money was spent on races where labor could have won. The way I see it we still have a net loss in AR for labor candidates and 3 house seats is worth the same as one senate seat and we could have had 3 progressives voting for HRC in the house instead of 3 DINOs that won’t. And the difference is those are liberal districts that are electing conservatives who get away with it because labor wastes its money on the Lincolns when it should be going after the Lynchs.
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p>As for the Nelson and Landreiu points, no I dont like them. I also like the tea party since it is marginalizing the Republicans into one region. How can you play in all 50 states when you ceded LA and NE? I dont see any way where Tester or Herseth are more progressive marginally than Nelson or Landrieu, or Webb for that matter who still supports DADT which Nelson at least had the sense to oppose. The big difference is those candidates have the ‘netroots’ blessing because they kissed Kos’s ass and more directly owe their elections to the netroots. But they sure as hell aren’t voting like it. At least Nelson does not owe the netroots anything. And yes you might be excited for him to go down next year, I am not since I think a Democratic Senate is better for progressives than a Republican one overall. You would not have gotten a more progressive Senate with Halter since either candidate was a sacrificial lamb. But you might have gotten a more progressive house in certain races including one right here in our own backyard.
stomv says
if you’re looking where I think you’re looking. Get yo’self to pollster and check out the two AR-Sen plots. Both Ds trail; but look at the trendlines — Halter was increasing his share over time, while Lincoln is falling further and further behind.
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p>Could that change? Of course. But the fact is that Lincoln’s fav/unfav is so bad that it seems incredibly unlikely she could hold on. A fresh face which could energize the left (instead of piss off both sides) and try to make hay out of the anti-Washington vibes had a better chance to win IMO, and had a better chance of voting in the interests of national Democrats once elected.
jconway says
In no way do I think Lincoln was more electable than Halter, I am arguing Halter was no more electable than Lincoln. Sestak has a 50/50 shot at winning, and is both more progressive and more electable than Specter, and younger too so he will hold onto the seat longer. Halter though had no realistic shot at beating the Republican and my point was not to defend Lincoln who deserved to lose, but to say that the victory of defeating her in the primary would have been a pyrrhic one rather than several real ones that $10 million could have bought.
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p>Again at this point its Monday morning quarterbacking, but I agree with the WH insider who leaked that quote in lamenting the progressive victories we could have gained with that money, and this really sets labor back.
mr-lynne says
The point here wasn’t just to try and elect Halter, and it wasn’t just about Lincoln.
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p>Ezra (emphasis mine):
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p>Did that message get across? You can’t just look at this election cycle to answer that.
tristan says
How Lincoln won shows off what would have been the best line of counterattack for Coakley against Brown: don’t let out-of-state influences choose our senator.
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p>True, this is a facile argument to make in a nationally visible senate race, and increasingly, these races are visible and thus nationalized in both media coverage and fundraising. But the anti-incumbent message is equally facile: most challengers are, by definition, outsiders rather than incumbents (the half-exception is when someone’s sliding laterally within the same level of government). So an incumbent or insider – and Coakley painted herself into this role by relying exclusively on her record and an air of inevitability, rather than tapping into populist frustration – might as well blast the challenger for being backed by out-of-staters (as they likely will, since challengers usually need the outside help to circumvent the state establishment). And Brown was absolutely reliant on outside help, just as Halter was. Never underestimate people’s potential indignation at outside meddling.
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p>One more way that Coakley blew it…