[spidermonkey09]

It was clear from ages ago they were going to lose the House. Its also pretty common for the incumbent to lose one or the other. Entirely possible they keep the Senate which would be a fairly decent outcome for the incumbent in midterms. No wonder you're pessimistic if you were hoping for the democrats to hold both.

[teestub]

Looks like there’s potential Boebert will lose her seat, which brings joy to my heart 😄

[TobyD]

Please no MAGAA.

Surely there is someone else the Republicans would rather have lead them?

Not if millions of people would vote for him, which they will. Much like Boris Johnson, I'm not sure many Republicans actually like him very much, but they'll put up with him if he can win them an election.

[SA Chris]

I'm aware of the situation, it was more a comment of exasperation rather than an actual question.

[TobyD]

I'm aware of the situation, it was more a comment of exasperation rather than an actual question.

Apologies then, I'm sure you knew what I said anyway. Despite the UK media reports of DeSantis' success and Trump's rage, I find it unlikely that Trump can turn down the amount of attention he'd get from a presidential bid. His dominant quality is pathological narcissism, I'm not sure if he cares about popularity, he just wants to get his way and for everyone to talk about him. 

[SA Chris]

Indeed. There are few people on this planet I detest more.

[TobyD]

The BBC are now reporting that the Democrats have held onto the Senate: BBC News - US midterms: Democrats retain control of Senate after key Nevada victory
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-63612410

Should Biden take the unexpected success as a victory lap, and bow out to let someone less ancient run in 2024?

[andy popp]

I remain in the situation I was last night. However well the Democrats have defied expectations it's not good enough if they lose the House majority. The Republicans just need 5 extra wins. State adjustment of house seat boundaries have gifted Republicans additional victories, especially in Florida. The Republicans could go slightly backwards in votes for house seats compared to 2018 and still win a house majority.

These elections have been pretty disastrous for the Republicans. Facing an incumbent with poor personal approval ratings and obvious flaws (Biden simply is too old) who has had to deal with very rough economic conditions and an even rougher foreign policy context, Republicans should have swept the board. Instead the Dems have pulled off the best result of an incumbent administration in decades. They've retained the Senate (possibly with an increased majority, depending on how the run-off in Georgia goes) and the House is still in play. If the GOP does win the House their majority will probably be tiny and the party fractious and hard to govern. Plus there are GOP reps Biden can work with - and did work with effectively over the last two years. Yes, plenty of MAGA loons won but some of the most high profile Trumpers - Doug Mastriano, Blake Masters, Kari Lake (hopefully) - lost. As important is what happened at the State level, where Dems took complete control of the government in Michigan and Minnesota - these are very important swing states that won't now be further gerrymandered or have the '24 elections run by some "Big Lie" believer (see loss by Finchem in AZ). Most of all this was a pretty thorough repudiation of MAGA/Trumpism. The best outcome would be for the GOP and Trump himself to entirely fail to learn the obvious lesson. I'm looking forward to an imminent announcement from him, triggering intraparty warfare with De Santis.

[mrjonathanr]

The best outcome would be for the GOP and Trump himself to entirely fail to learn the obvious lesson. I'm looking forward to an imminent announcement from him, triggering intraparty warfare with De Santis.

I think you can be confident about that!

[teestub]

These elections have been pretty disastrous for the Republicans.

Yeah this is definitely a good news politics story which have been in short supply recently!

[TobyD]

I remain in the situation I was last night. However well the Democrats have defied expectations it's not good enough if they lose the House majority. The Republicans just need 5 extra wins. State adjustment of house seat boundaries have gifted Republicans additional victories, especially in Florida. The Republicans could go slightly backwards in votes for house seats compared to 2018 and still win a house majority.

These elections have been pretty disastrous for the Republicans. Facing an incumbent with poor personal approval ratings and obvious flaws (Biden simply is too old) who has had to deal with very rough economic conditions and an even rougher foreign policy context, Republicans should have swept the board. Instead the Dems have pulled off the best result of an incumbent administration in decades. They've retained the Senate (possibly with an increased majority, depending on how the run-off in Georgia goes) and the House is still in play. If the GOP does win the House their majority will probably be tiny and the party fractious and hard to govern. Plus there are GOP reps Biden can work with - and did work with effectively over the last two years. Yes, plenty of MAGA loons won but some of the most high profile Trumpers - Doug Mastriano, Blake Masters, Kari Lake (hopefully) - lost. As important is what happened at the State level, where Dems took complete control of the government in Michigan and Minnesota - these are very important swing states that won't now be further gerrymandered or have the '24 elections run by some "Big Lie" believer (see loss by Finchem in AZ). Most of all this was a pretty thorough repudiation of MAGA/Trumpism. The best outcome would be for the GOP and Trump himself to entirely fail to learn the obvious lesson. I'm looking forward to an imminent announcement from him, triggering intraparty warfare with De Santis.

It is essentially good news, I'd agree. But it may have given Biden the confidence to run again, which I think would be a mistake but I don't live there, or know much other than digesting a lot of media. My real concern is that a much more canny and clever candidate will adopt the Trump MO of ignoring any norms of behaviour and cause some real damage or conflict. Trump seems to be blinded by his own narcissism and hubris in office, and became a fool. Someone else could be more dangerous, equally, Trump may have learnt from his previous experience, although the that seems unlikely at the moment. In any case I think the Democrats would be better off with a much younger leader (like Obama, he's about two decades younger than Biden!). Obviously someone else really though.

[Offwidth]

These elections have been pretty disastrous for the Republicans. Facing an incumbent with poor personal approval ratings and obvious flaws (Biden simply is too old) who has had to deal with very rough economic conditions and an even rougher foreign policy context, Republicans should have swept the board. Instead the Dems have pulled off the best result of an incumbent administration in decades. They've retained the Senate (possibly with an increased majority, depending on how the run-off in Georgia goes) and the House is still in play. If the GOP does win the House their majority will probably be tiny and the party fractious and hard to govern. Plus there are GOP reps Biden can work with - and did work with effectively over the last two years.

The key par result for GOP was taking the House. I keep looking at the voting detail on the remaining results and can see no way through for the Democrats. Maybe I'm being dim and am missing something. To describe the outcome as pretty disastrous seems to me to be beyond clutching at straws. I don't need to give egg sucking lessons on what they can do with house control. The elections have only been a disaster for the Republican election deniers.

The context arguments in my view are simply wrong ... those past elections were not a face off with a completely unhinged Republican threat, visibly slathering for blood in the news. That the US is still near enough split down the middle with risks of lunacy, like massive support for counterfactual positions on elections (often run by state Republicans) and theocratic tendandancies (that regard the rights of a foetus produced from rape or incest as more important than the mother) just seems terrifying to me.

Yes, plenty of MAGA loons won but some of the most high profile Trumpers - Doug Mastriano, Blake Masters, Kari Lake (hopefully) - lost. As important is what happened at the State level, where Dems took complete control of the government in Michigan and Minnesota - these are very important swing states that won't now be further gerrymandered or have the '24 elections run by some "Big Lie" believer (see loss by Finchem in AZ). Most of all this was a pretty thorough repudiation of MAGA/Trumpism. The best outcome would be for the GOP and Trump himself to entirely fail to learn the obvious lesson. I'm looking forward to an imminent announcement from him, triggering intraparty warfare with De Santis.

These are important results but it's not everywhere and much damage is already done. Look at Florida and see how redrawn constituency boundaries have helped turn the biggest traditional swing state so red. There is a glimmer of hope in internal warfare but just as GOP deliberately rode Trump's surge to a win they could well just dump him now.

[spidermonkey09]

The issue is that looking at what you term a disaster, a disaster was always overwhelmingly likely given historical precedent. You can't seriously have been expecting an incumbent govt to hold onto the House and the Senate, but if you did than I think that's where the problem in your analysis is. It simply was never going to happen. You might as well just say US politics is a disaster in general, but that's a different point.

Disaster is all relative, sure any kind of Republican advance I also see as a disaster but this is, in the context, a very good result for the Democrats on its own terms.

[Offwidth]

I can hardlly be accused of not paying attention, having spent a lot of time in the US, knowing many people there and watching the media on the country pretty often. Maybe I'm just an optimist at heart about the good in people.

More than half of white college educated men and not far below half of white college educated women voted for Trump and most of that will have been tribal GOP voting or self interest (tax, religious  conservativism etc). All their media back then will have been saying the Democratic message was woke exaggeration of his risks. Then we had covid, the terrible economic fallout of his disastrous handling of the pandemic, the needless annoying of allies well beyond issues of arguments on fair expenditure, the endless lies, the praising of dictators, election denial in the face of incredibly strong push back from Republican election officials, the invasion of Congress, post presidential breaches of state security that make Hillary's email foolishness look trivial and much more besides. Then the Roe vs Wade repeal and the auto triggered bans on pretty much any abortion in some states. This is all plain unamerican.

https://www.pewresearch.org/2021/01/29/how-america-changed-during-donald-trumps-presidency/

I just can't see the vast majority of well educated Republicans as bad people and the ones I've met should have seen the light and helped 'clean house' on the key issues in these mid terms. That is not what has happened, although some Republican voters have helped keep some of the worst of the wolves at bay. I felt the same about brexit... people who live in bubbles will more easily get duped but a sizable proportion would see the error of Boris's brexit in time and will help 'clean house'.

[spidermonkey09]

I can hardlly be accused of not paying attention, having spent a lot of time in the US, knowing many people there and watching the media on the country pretty often. Maybe I'm just an optimist at heart about the good in people.

I'm not (and haven't been!) accusing you of that, or anything; I just don't agree with your analysis!

I'm well aware of the depths the Trump administration plumbed, its partly because of that I'm surprised you were daring to hope for things to 'snap back' to (relative) normality. I see the GOP as fairly fundamentally broken; now they've let the populist genie out of the bottle its very hard to return to politics as normal. The 'guardrails of democracy' are well and truly down in the US at the moment and in that context every election is an absolute dogfight (been reading How Democracies Die which has influenced my thinking on this!). I think, unfortunately, for the forseeable future every election will be characterised as a winner takes all game and 'a fight for the soul of America' etc etc.

[Offwidth]

Well my prior early autumn mid term optimism on a 'snap back', due to enough well educated Republican voters pushing against the worst and most rabid idiocy, only just turned out to be not enough this time. As such your claim that the house win was clear from ages ago pretty obviously wasn't true. My real disappointment in the 'near miss' in house results leading to a very likely tiny Republican majority will almost certainly be justified.. as will my relief about the Senate. The overall result is no cause for celebration, even if nothing like as bad as it could have been, and even if it does for Trump there are other lesser monsters ready to step in and continue the damage.

If we believed comparisons with previous midterms were going to be especially indicative of the results this time, given the US economic problems and low presidential ratings, Republican wins would have been even greater than the Republicans incorrectly expected.

I also doubt we have many significant difference in views on the venal nature of too much in US politics, so I can only  guess I was unclear in, or you misread, what I was saying.

[TobyD]

I can hardlly be accused of not paying attention, having spent a lot of time in the US, knowing many people there and watching the media on the country pretty often. Maybe I'm just an optimist at heart about the good in people.

I'm not (and haven't been!) accusing you of that, or anything; I just don't agree with your analysis!

I'm well aware of the depths the Trump administration plumbed, its partly because of that I'm surprised you were daring to hope for things to 'snap back' to (relative) normality. I see the GOP as fairly fundamentally broken; now they've let the populist genie out of the bottle its very hard to return to politics as normal. The 'guardrails of democracy' are well and truly down in the US at the moment and in that context every election is an absolute dogfight (been reading How Democracies Die which has influenced my thinking on this!). I think, unfortunately, for the forseeable future every election will be characterised as a winner takes all game and 'a fight for the soul of America' etc etc.

I pretty much agree with all of that. Some of the Republican party and their core voters have totally bought into the populist Trump playbook, and that's not changing for a while. All future US elections carry a significant risk of violence, in my opinion. See the 'Doomsday Watch' podcast for a lot on this.

[TobyD]

Great news that the Trump organisation has been convicted of tax fraud,  and that the Democrats won Georgia.  Nice change from the unmitigated bad news about everything else. 
BBC News - Georgia Senate runoff result: Democrats solidify Senate control after Warnock victory
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-63877555

[SA Chris]

Was about to post the same, watch the slime try and wriggle off the hook now, or make some feeble spin on it. Hopefully another reason for him to not try and run again.

[petejh]

This is the former president of the United States. Truth beating fiction yet again.

https://mobile.twitter.com/AutismCapital/status/1603428488194555907/mediaviewer

[teestub]

Grifters gonna grift.  I bet he was thrilled with the idea of NFTs - money for something with no tangible value at all, surely the holy grail of grifts!

[Johnny Brown]

I reckon Pete’s gonna invest.

[Ged]

Surely that's a deep fake and this is a big piss take?

[Snoops]

Appears fully genuine.
All over the news

[slab_happy]

Even the MAGA faithful appear to be underwhelmed:

https://twitter.com/willsommer/status/1603433447489413131

https://twitter.com/MollyJongFast/status/1603507158246629382