Tuesday’s election results offer something for everyone. Democrats can look at Virginia and conclude that Republican “extremism” on social issues like abortion, contraception and guns, combined with the deep divisions that appeared in the Alabama 1st District GOP primary results, continue to offer them opportunities for 2014 and virtually guarantee […] Read more »
The GOP Still Hasn’t Figured Out How to Get On With the Tea Party
Postmortems of odd-year and special elections often suffer from overly broad generalizations that push a particular narrative while overlooking any arguments that get in the way. The instant analyses also tend to suffer from the impulse to extrapolate results and divine great meaning, as if they foreshadow the future. I’ll […] Read more »
What Democrats have going for them? Republicans
… Conservatives are already explaining away the Cuccinelli defeat. He was vastly outspent by McAuliffe. He was tarnished the incumbent Republican governor’s ethics scandal. He was hurt by the government shutdown — which was, of course, engineered by Tea Party Republicans. One in three Virginia voters said someone in their household […] Read more »
G.O.P. Weighs Limiting Clout of Right Wing
Leaders of the Republican establishment, alarmed by the emergence of far-right and often unpredictable Tea Party candidates, are pushing their party to rethink how it chooses nominees and advocating changes they say would result in the selection of less extreme contenders. The push comes as the national Republican Party is […] Read more »
Virginia, New Jersey results highlight Republican Party’s divisions, problems
Tuesday’s elections, which produced a resounding Republican victory in New Jersey and a dispiriting loss for the GOP in Virginia, highlighted the challenges ahead for a badly divided party — and will probably intensify an internal debate about how to win back the White House in 2016. … The outcomes […] Read more »
Exit Poll Results Tell a Tale of Two Republicans
Broad personal and professional appeal lifted Chris Christie to easy re-election in New Jersey, yet without the clear home state endorsement for the presidency he might have wanted. His fellow Republican, Ken Cuccinelli, lost a far closer contest in Virginia, done in by a mismatch on ideology in general and […] Read more »