Associated Press
With 12 weeks remaining before Election Day, it's still far too soon to say with any confidence how many key contests will turn out, but a pattern is nevertheless clear: the Republican base is helping set up the Senate matchups Democrats want.
In Indiana, Dems far preferred to run against Richard Mourdock than Dick Lugar, and GOP voters obliged. In Missouri, Dems hoped Republicans would nominate Todd Akin, and they did. Even Nebraska's race is probably more competitive after Deb Fischer won her GOP primary.
And in Connecticut, Democrats preferred not to face Chris Shays, and as of last night, they won't.
Linda McMahon, the former CEO of wrestling juggernaut WWE, once again won the Republican nomination for U.S. Senate on Tuesday, crushing former Congressman Christopher Shays by a 3-to-1 ratio. [...]
McMahon praised Shays but said her victory proves voters want a business leader over a career politician. It's an argument she already has been making against Rep. Chris Murphy, the Democratic nominee, who has spent his career in government, first in Hartford and now in Washington.
Shays was the moderate former congressman running against McMahon, the conservative wrestling executive, who ran for the Senate two years ago and lost by 12 points in a cycle that heavily favored Republicans. Thanks to her vast fortune and the GOP base's distaste for moderation, the results weren't close.
This is, of course, exactly what Democrats hoped would happen. Indeed, we've seen this dynamic before -- in 2010, Dems were able to maintain their majority in the Senate thanks in large part to Republican primary voters rejecting more electable candidates in Nevada, Delaware, and Colorado. In 2012, it's quite possible Democrats will hold onto their majority once more because the GOP base didn't learn any lessons from the last cycle.
There were plenty of other interesting results last night -- Tricia mentioned several of them earlier -- but there was one other primary that stood out for me. Did you hear about Rep. Cliff Stearns (R-Fla.)?
Stearns is generally considered one of the nuttier members of the House Republican caucus, questioning the legitimacy of President Obama's birth certificate, endorsing presidential impeachment for no particular reason, and leading strange witch hunts against Planned Parenthood and Solyndra.
And as of last night, Stearns apparently won't be back next year.
The big story from Tuesday's House primaries is the apparent defeat of GOP Rep. Cliff Stearns, who trailed veterinarian Ted Yoho by 829 votes with 100 percent of precincts reporting.
Stearns refused to concede late Tuesday night, saying he was awaiting the certified results and the Associated Press had not called the race as of early Wednesday morning.
So who is Ted Yoho, the man who pulled off one of the most unexpected upsets of the primary season? A 57-year-old veterinarian, a National Rifle Association member and a political newcomer with tea party support.
Yoho is also the candidate who ran this rather colorful ad during the primaries.
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A birther primaried by a tea partier? What happened? Did the birther refuse to endorse euthanasia for gay pets?
It's the GOP death spiral.
Yes...we are watching Republigeddon play out right in front of us during this election. I have no idea which of the 3 factions (Tea, neoCons or libertarian) will win the war and kick the other 2 out of the Republican tent. My guess is that together - with their differences papered over and willing to work together - they STILL might not have been strong enough to defeat Obama/Biden. But as it is; with at least a third of their prospective support already written off and the bedrock shifting and faulting in upheaval - I'd say that homeless Republicans will be looking for any shelter they can find in September.
All are, of course, welcome in the Democratic tent - where no litmus tests or loyalty oaths are ever required. We are internally contentious but we DO support our candidates...eventually. We also support the deepest American values of social justice, equality before the law and non-discrimination because of gender, race, religion, sexual orientation, place of origin or state of physical ability. Everyone deserves to live decently in a decent society.
Amen.
Thank you for saying that. If Obama does win and we somehow manage to gain seats in Congress, it would be in the spirit of Democracy if an olive branch was extended across the aisle. The branch may not be accepted, but it would uphold the left's continued support of diversity and forward momentum for the nation as a whole, not just for ourselves. I like that about Dems.
I agree about the olive branch but how about the next time around lets only have 1 olive branch instead of trying it again on every issue despite all the other times its done NO good
Republican'ts would react to an olive branch by accusing Dems of trying to turn the country into Greece! Lets extend something else....
You forgot the christian right , which includes glen beck now , oy vay
Kevin, my gut agrees with you, but I think NeedMoreCoffee is right. If we win, we need to show the country that we're better than those @!$%#s. The Dems, the indies, and the undecideds will need to know that we're thinking of the welfare of the country, rather than just how to keep ourselves in power.
Obviously the economy trumps everything, and the uncertainty in Europe will hold incredible sway over how this election turns out. But the path is set for a Democratic takeover because John Boehner and House Republicans have been such miserable failures in their nearly two years at the helm of Congress. The approval rating for Congress has never been lower, and voters are simply fed up with the reckless intransigence and partisanship displayed on anon-stop basis by the GOP. What have they done to create jobs or strengthen our economy? Nothing. - principled progressive
I sort of feel like the Europeans are so terrified of a Romney Presidency, they they will suck it in with whatever crap is going to fly with their own economy until the election has passed.
Paul Ryan is a huge mistake because it puts the spotlight directly on the failures of the house republicans to do anything of meaning. No wonder Romney is starting to sound desperate, he could lose by a landslide at the rate at which he is turning off voters. He had already lost women and Latino, losing the elderly would be the official death blow.
The GOP needs to take their party back from the tea party, the tea party fanatics are in fact destroying them. I can't conceive that they have any long term future with the majority of the country thinking they are looney. There are sane republicans who could make a difference (Huntsman, McCain, and various others who have been ousted by the stupid.)
So at least you admit the European economy is in shambles. Now please explain why Obama should mimic their collapsing model as he is trying. Also, come to think of it, can you explain the word "intransigence" because from your use you really do not understand it; you seem to think it belongs only to the Republicans. Obviously you have not been paying attention.
CTM, Obama has not been mimicking Europe, he has been if anything a moderate conservative in his tenure. Since you don't seem to understand why Europe is having the problem....
I don't think the polls are quite showing that, Activist. They're looking a bit better, but it's still going to be close either way.
Be careful what you wish for- remember Joe Lieberman? ( Independent, CT)
Linda McMahon said:
" voters want a business leader over a career politician. "
The fact is, voters do NOT KNOW what they want. And are easily swayed by someone telling them just about any eyewash that wins votes.
Jack Nicholson gave us a couple of core truths about this subject:
"You want me on that wall! You need me on that wall!"
And, of course, "You can't handle the truth!"
Truth hurts once, lies hurt forever.
The problem is that the tea party has bought into a notion that ideological purity is necessary to win, when in fact the majority of the country is somewhere in the middle. If you asked even most tea party members whether they feel that violating constitutional rights is something they favor, they would say no. If you asked the majority of them whether they think religion should be the basis of law they would say no.
Your right they don't know what they want, and they are being led by the Koch brothers whose father was a well known fascist in Europe to believe otherwise. The answers don't lie in extremes, they lie in balance between the needs of corporate and populace.
Activist:The problem is, so many people in their district's do'nt believe it's their congressman or senator causing the problem.They believe it's the other guy.A while back I saw a poll about this and if I remember right it was 38% do'nt believe it's their representative.The idiot's just do'nt pay attention or just do'nt care that they're getting or going to get screwed.
The devil you know vs the devil you don't.
He may be an SOB, but he's my SOB.
As Joe Biden said the other day, "All politics is personal."
While it sounds nice that democrats are running against "the rabidly nuttier" wing of their party, the sad truth is that there were sheeple voting for the most ignorant candidates to begin with. While I fervently hope that there are enough moderates and independents left that still have common sense, decency, intelligence and morality to vote against the "rabidly nuttiest" candidates, I still say whoa (not in a good way).
Our democracy is being hi-jacked by a bunch religuluous, non-educated wing-nut group of people that have NO ideas, have never obviously read either the Constitution or Bill of Rights, many of whom are dependent on Social Security and Medicare! And yet these are the very sheeple so afraid of the black man in the White House, that they would rather see this nation destroyed by "rich white guys" that don't really give a dayum about them because - they don't have enough money to be in "their club" (namely: the 1%)!
VOTE OUT THE OBSTRUCTIONIST TRAITORS TO AMERICA IN 2012!
Zora , in the tex gop primary which featured the CRUZ t bagger guy , there was only about 3000 gop voters who decided that pick , the MINORITY wingers know where to strike , now any moderate gop in tex will just vote against the dem no matter what , the same went on in kansas , this is ONE way the really bat @!$%# crazy are getting into office
As a wrestling fan, I'm interested to see if the Democrats try and use the fact that a WWE talent (stage name "A.W.") was fired essentially for endorsing Linda McMahon's campaign on twitter. He also made a rather tasteless joke two weeks before, but was fired within days of mentioning the campaign, something that is apparently been forbidden to WWE staff. As her family is still in charge of the company, this could spin the "job creator" thing in interesting ways, without getting into the misinformation usually lobbed at the industry.
If he were to win, Ted Yoho would become just another House pig feeding at the trough of special interests and rolling in the sh*t of decades of Congressional malfeasance, Tea Party member or not.
I'm all for the Regressives blowing themselves up but I really like the idea, expressed earlier, of extending the olive leaf once the Dems win all the contests. Let's get out there and make those wins happen first.
the " regressives" lol
Sure am happy that the CT GOP voted for Linda again, Shays would have been a formidable candidate. However, I now have to endure recycling the daily mailings and screen the daily phone calls from her campaign as I have been doing prior to the primary. And I am a registered Dem! Another $50 million added to the $50 million she spent with her prior bid..$100 million! Imagine all the good she could have done with that money? For starters, she could give her wrestlers health insurance rather than hire them as independent contractors to avoid that....
Actually the "Independent Contractors" was her husband Vince's idea. But when you are Billionaires. Do you really care if the people who work for you get sick or not? Nope, just how much money they bring in.
I was raised in a Republican household. My mother even ran for local office as a Republican and maintained her seat until she chose to retire. My brother, my sister and I were raised to think for ourselves and look for common sense answers to problems in our personal lives as well as outside of that. We were also taught to look at both sides of an argument and take a grain of salt with arguments from both sides so that we can come to an informed decision. So, what happened?
The announcement of Romney was interesting enough. My mother flinched. The pick of Ryan as his running mate actually made her say, "I'm going to go out and campaign for Obama". When did so many people turn off their critical thinking?
I am basically a democrat though not officially registered as one, mainly because I still choose to see both sides of an argument. I could sit here today and tell you the good and bad points of both sides, whether I believe in them 100% or not. The extremism on both sides has gotten ridiculous. Whatever happened to caring about our fellow man? We can go to Iraq to bring democracy to the people but we can't let women decide which kind of birth control they can use? And, by the way, God gave Mankind free will so he can make a choice, what gives Man the right to choose for Woman?
As an interested observer from Scotland, this is an interesting comment to me. It's hard from the outside to see where the independants and moderates are right now.
Yet another example of why taxing these billionair crazies is a wise and healthy thing for america , McMahon has billions to run for office 10 times over, in an attempt to force her ideology down americas throat , we could be using some of that cash to build new schools instead
The best use of an olive branch is to leave it in the tree, to throw the nooses over for the Day of Justice for Traitors.
I sit and dream of what we could accomplish with a majority in both houses.........
Not much. Remember the Dems had that in 08 but Repubs did as much obstructionism as they could. That brought on the loss of the House because the Repubs blamed nothing getting done on the Dems. (they could get anything done. The Dems have control!) The ruels of congress need to be reformed. Reform works in both ways. The majority/minority will have to work with each other.