Posts Tagged ‘Louisiana’

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Election Roundup Part 1: Just the Facts, Ma’am

Friday, November 11th, 2016

Time, finally, for something vaguely resembling a comprehensive post-election roundup.

As this keeps threatening to turn into a very long and unwieldy post, I’m going to break it up into chunks, with this installment centered on vote totals, race outcomes, and statistical facts about the election. We’ll save analysis, implications, and the saltiest examples of liberal tears for another time.

  • Assuming the current results hold, Trump flipped six states Romney lost (Ohio, Florida, Iowa, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Michigan), plus Maine’s second congressional district, which gives Trump 306 electoral votes.
  • That’s the highest electoral vote totals for a Republican since Bush41 blew out Dukakis in 1988 (426).
  • Hillary might still edge Trump in the popular vote (right now she’s up by 3/10ths of 1%).
  • Clinton lost over 5 million votes from Obama’s 2012 totals. Trump was down less than a million from Romney’s totals.
  • Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson pulled in over 4 million votes, triple his 2012 showing. Green Party candidate Jill Stein pulled in over 1.2 million votes, which was almost triple her 2012 showing as well.
  • Evan McMullin (or, as Ace of Spades refers to him, “Egg McMuffin”) pulled in less than half a million votes, about a third of which came from his native Utah, where he beat Johnson and Stein. He did not win any counties in Utah, though he did beat Clinton in a few.
  • 1996 was the last time West Virginia (formerly a reliable Democratic state) went for the Democratic presidential candidate. This year they went for Trump by nearly 69%, including every county in the state. Despite that, WV Democratic Senator Joe Manchin says he’s not switching to the Republican Party. Machin, 69, is up for reelection in 2018.
  • Republicans lost two seats (in Illinois and New Hampshire) but maintain control of the Senate. Louisiana will have it’s top two runoff December 9, where Republican John Kennedy will be heavily favored, likely giving Republicans a 53-47 edge.
  • Senators Pat Toomey (Pennsylvania) and Ron Johnson (Wisconsin) both won reelection is historically blue states.
  • Republicans only lost six House seats, easily maintaining control. Three Dem pickups were in Florida (where Republicans flipped two sets themselves), two in Nevada, one in New Hampshire, one in Virginia, and one in New Jersey. Republicans also picked up one House seat in Nebraska. Republicans are guaranteed to retain control of Louisiana’s third congressional district (two Republicans in the runoff) and likely to retain control of the 4th as well.
  • Not a single U.S. House seat in Texas flipped parties, which means that incumbent Republican Will Hurd retained the 23rd Congressional District over Democrat Pete Gallego. CD23 is the only true swing U.S. House district in Texas these days, and Gallego had been the incumbent when Hurd ousted him in 2014.
  • Senator Tim Scott was reelected to a full term. Scott still remains the first black Senator from the South since reconstruction.
  • Republicans control the House, Senate and White House for the first time since 1928.
  • Republicans also picked up three governorships, in Missouri, Vermont and New Hampshire, giving them 33 to the Democrats 15.
  • The North Carolina Governor’s race may not be decided until November 18. If Democrat Roy Cooper’s razor thin lead over Republican incumbent Pat McCrory holds, that will be the Democrats’ only gubernatorial pickup this year.
  • “Eastern Kentucky voters rejected [Democrat] House Speaker Greg Stumbo on Tuesday as Republicans appeared poised to take control of the Kentucky House of Representatives for the first time since 1921.”
  • Democrats pick up four seats in the Texas House.
  • Texas county-by-county Presidential race results. Clinton taking Fort Bend county is a surprise to me; Romney won that by six points in 2012, and Clinton beat Trump by about that much this year.
  • Libertarians maintained automatic ballot access in Texas because their railroad commission candidate pulled in 5.3% of the vote, over the 5% threshold. The Green Party, however, did not, and will have to submit 50,000 petition signatures to make the ballot in 2018.
  • National Review (ad blocker blocker warning) notes that the “Trump won because of racism” talking point is demonstrably wrong:

    Mitt Romney won a greater percentage of the white vote than Donald Trump. Mitt took 59 percent while Trump won 58 percent. Would you believe that Trump improved the GOP’s position with black and Hispanic voters? Obama won 93 percent of the black vote. Hillary won 88 percent. Obama won 71 percent of the Latino vote. Hillary won 65 percent. Critically, millions of minority voters apparently stayed home. Trump’s total vote is likely to land somewhere between John McCain’s and Romney’s (and well short of George W. Bush’s 2004 total), while the Democrats have lost almost 10 million voters since 2008.

    And all this happened even as Democrats doubled-down on their own identity politics.

    But all this is based on exit polls. How do we know they’re any more accurate at capturing the electorate than those other faulty polls?

  • More exit poll analysis from Oren Cass. The thrust is that Trump did better among nonwhites than Romney. But when he gets down to differences of less than 2%, he’s counting angels on the heads of pins.

    • Remember all that MSM talk about Trump turning Texas into a swing state? Instead he turned Michigan and Wisconsin into swing states.

    Here’s a Tweet that encapsulates a New York Times interactive map indicating which areas of the country voted notably more Republican or more Democratic in the Presidential race than in 2012. Note the strong surge of Trump voters in the rust belt.

    As far as the senate, things don’t get any easier for Democrats in 2018:

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    Posted in Democrats, Elections, Republicans, Texas | No Comments »

    Trump Wins Early Louisiana Voting, Cruz Wins Election Day

    Tuesday, March 8th, 2016

    Heard about this election day, but Philip Bump in the Washington Post provides more details: Donald Trump won early voting, but Ted Cruz’s percentage of the vote soared on election day:

    One of two things happened in Louisiana. We know that the margins between the top three candidates in the state shifted dramatically between votes cast by absentee ballot and those cast on Saturday, the day of the election. That means that either that: 1) A candidate had a very strong get-out-the-vote effort, or 2) There was a broad shift in attitudes about the candidates.

    When we looked at this Saturday night, it wasn’t clear which was the case. Now, we have a better sense.

    If we look at the votes in counties* for which we have data (culled from the AP’s initial and final vote tallies), you can see that Ted Cruz gained strength after the absentee vote.

    Snip.

    this looks like the state of Louisiana bailed on Marco Rubio in favor of Ted Cruz. Which could explain why Cruz is targeting Florida all of a sudden. On Saturday night, Donald Trump called for Rubio to drop out of the race. If he can repeat what he did in Louisiana in Florida in just over a week, Cruz will take Rubio out himself.

    This pattern mirrors what Cruz did in the 2012 Texas Senate race. Dewhurst beat Cruz by 18% in early voting, but only 3% on primary day, a massive momentum shift that turned into a Cruz victory in the runoff.

    Cruz is a smart, disciplined, relentless campaigner, and after Trump’s early successes in open primaries, we’re finally seeing Trump hit his ceiling and Cruz surge ahead as the superior candidate, especially in closed primary and caucus states.

    That momentum, and the widespread distaste for Trump, is why many in the Republican establishment are finally, reluctantly, turning to Cruz as the only way to stop Trump.

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    Posted in Elections, Republicans, Texas | No Comments »

    Bobby Jindal is Running for President

    Wednesday, June 24th, 2015

    It’s now official: Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal is running for President.

    He’s a solid conservative reformer, but I don’t see him getting a lot of traction is a field this crowded. I think he’s more realistically a Vice Presidential possibility this time around.

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    Posted in Elections, Republicans | 2 Comments »

    Mary Landrieu Loses

    Saturday, December 6th, 2014

    So it was foretold, and so it has come to pass. Congratulations to Bill Cassidy for being elected to the United States Senate.

    But hey, she only lost by 12 points. Given some polls had her down by as much as 24 points, she still beat the spread…

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    Posted in Uncategorized | No Comments »

    Election News Roundup for November 3, 2014

    Monday, November 3rd, 2014

    Election day is tomorrow! Now would be a good time to locate your voter registration card…

  • Democrats come up with a brilliant new strategy to get their voters to the polls: threaten them. And yes, that letter did actually come from the New York Democratic Party. “Nice voter you got there. Be a shame if anything happened to it…”
  • Wendy Davis’ campaign may doom Battleground Texas efforts by alienating Hispanics.
  • “On Tuesday, it is all but inevitable that Greg Abbott’s campaign and Texas voters are going to beat Wendy Davis like a circus monkey.” I think this line is deeply unfair to circuses who treat their monkeys humanely…
  • Yet another area the Wendy Davis campaign isn’t strong in: math. Namely, their bragging that Democratic early voting was up from 2010 was false: “Hours later, the organization had to remove that memo from its website, after it became clear that Battleground Texas was using inaccurately low tallies from 2010.”
  • “Joni Ernst has charged to achieve a 7-point lead over Democrat Bruce Braley in a new Iowa Poll, which buoys the GOP’s hope that an Iowa victory will be the tipping point to a Republican takeover of the U.S. Senate.”
  • Speaking of Ernst, Tom Harkin has a unique pitch to vote against her: “Oh yeah, I’d totally bang that, but you shouldn’t vote for her because (R) and stuff.” Of course, I’m paraphrasing here…
  • Mary Landrieu says she’s unpopular because her Louisiana constituents are lousy, stinking sexist bigots. I’m sure they’ll enjoy hearing that…
  • The Charlotte Observer memory holes story on her family’s illegal graft. Reporting the news must rank considerably behind “Protecting Democrats” on The Charlotte Observer’s priority list…
  • Travis County GOP Guide to City Council candidates.
  • Travis County GOP on AISD, ACC, RRISD, etc. candidates.
  • More Travis County race information.
  • If you need additional reasons to vote against the latest rail boondoggle, here’s footage of the rally against it.
  • And here’s Holly Hansen’s rundown of RRISD races again.

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    Posted in Austin, Democrats, Elections, Republicans, Texas | No Comments »

    Why Mary Landrieu Sucks

    Monday, October 6th, 2014

    (I was trying to think of a more clever headline, but let’s just go with the obvious, shall we?)

    One of the last, best hopes for Obama and Harry Reid to keep control of the senate is Louisiana incumbent Mary Landrieu hanging on to one of the last Democratic seats in the south.

    Let’s discuss just the highlights of why Louisianans should vote for Rep. Bill Cassidy over Landrieu. The latest polls show Casserly up, but at under 50%. (And remember that the Democrat’s ground game surprised a lot of pollsters in 2012.)

    ObamaCare

    Remember how Mary Landrieu was one of the deciding votes for ObamaCare in the senate?

    Now she’s making all sorts of noises about protecting Louisiana citizens from the effects of the law she passed. Gee, maybe shouldn’t have bragged about how she didn’t need to read the bill:

    Contrary to popular belief and what FOX News said, people here read the bills. For 40 years we read the bills. But we did not have to read the bills; all we had to do was look at the faces of kids dying of cancer who had no way to get cured… I don’t need to read a bill. I listen to my constituents. That is what this is about.

    Somehow I doubt she’s going to listen to those whose policies were canceled, or whose prices doubled or tripled, thanks to ObamaCare. Maybe that’s why 59% of Louisianans oppose ObamaCare, and more than half disapprove of Landrieu’s performance.

    And Landrieu says she would vote for ObamaCare again. Maybe that’s why the National Federation of Independent Business has endorsed Cassidy. (More on Landrieu’s ObamaCare support here.)

    Poor Second Amendment Record

    Landrieu got a D from the NRA-PVF on her gun rights voting record. Despite crowing about her Second Amendment support, she has voted for several gun control measures. While not as hostile to Second Amendment rights as Nancy Pelosi or Andrew Cuomo, she’s betrayed gun rights enough for Louisiana gun owners to be leery of her.

    No less than Michelle Obama said that re-electing Landrieu was critical for gun control efforts. And remember: When push comes to shove, there’s no such thing as a pro-gun Democrat. I guarantee you that Mary Landrieu is no more “pro-gun” than Bart Stupak was pro-life.

    Ignoring Louisiana

    Mary Landrieu doesn’t actually live in Louisiana:

    In Washington, Sen. Mary Landrieu lives in a stately, $2.5 million brick manse she and her husband built on Capitol Hill.

    Here in Louisiana, however, the Democrat does not have a home of her own. She is registered to vote at a large bungalow in New Orleans that her parents have lived in for many decades, according to a Washington Post review of Landrieu’s federal financial disclosures and local property and voting records.

    On a statement of candidacy Landrieu filed with the Federal Election Commission in January, she listed her Capitol Hill home as her address.

    It takes a special kind of stupid to put your D.C. mansion down as your home address.

    Finally, for a hard-hitting look at how Mary Landrieu has ignored her constituents, take a look at this ad:

    Reminder: Louisiana has system whereby the top two candidates will go to a runoff on December 6. Unless Bill Cassidy is able to win outright in November (which seems doubtful at this point), he’s going to need help in the runoff. And if the control of the senate hangs in the balance, you know Democrats will pull out all the stops to keep Harry Reid in power…

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    Posted in Democrats, Elections, Guns, ObamaCare, video | No Comments »

    LinkSwarm for August 8, 2014

    Friday, August 8th, 2014

    Another roundup of news, a disproportionate amount from the Middle East, disproportionately bad.

  • Old and Busted: “Never again!” The New Hotness: “Genocide? Meh. Case-by-case basis.”
  • More on the ISIS campaign to wipe out the Yazidi and other religious minorities.
  • Obama says he’s authorizing air strikes “if necessary.” Even when threatening military action, Obama manages to sound wishy-washy.
  • There are conflicting reports as to weather ISIS or the Kurdish Pesh Merga hold the Mosul dam.
  • Hamas demands that Israel kick their ass some more.
  • Rick Perry: “Since September of ’08, we have seen 203,000 individuals who have illegally come into the United States — into Texas — booked in to Texas county jails…These individuals are responsible for over 3,000 homicides and almost 8,000 sexual assaults.”
  • Quiz: Real Salon or Parody Salon? Difficulty: Impossible.
  • Leland Yee pleads not guilty to racketeering charges. (Hat tip: Dwight.)
  • Won’t someone think of the poor federal employee who have nothing to do all day but spank their monkey to online porn?
  • Why did Austin mayor Lee Leffingwell proclaim a day in honor of convicted Louisiana felon Ed Edwards?
  • It has to be said: Hillary Clinton doesn’t have the fashion sense God gave a turtle. Two words: Lane Bryant.
  • Soldiers’ military kits from 1066 to 2014.
  • There’s a website dedicated to the world’s tallest men.

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    Posted in Austin, Border Control, Crime, Democrats, Elections, Foreign Policy, Jihad, Military, Texas | No Comments »

    Small Grambling Update

    Wednesday, October 23rd, 2013

    While the Grambling football team is back practicing, from Dwight comes news that Grambling fired David Lankster, online editor ofThe Gramblinite student newspaper, supposedly over posts made on the official Twitter feed. Lankster played a key role in exposing the deplorable facilities football players were complaining about. (Fox News has pictures of the facilities.) Lanskster’s firing was overturned, but he plans to resign.

    I do wonder if I had some small hand in Lankster’s firing, since he used his personal Twitter account to retweet my suspicion that someone in the Administration was embezzling funds:

    And it’s not just the athletic department; large parts of the rest of the university are falling apart. And as a well-known book collector, this picture just breaks my heart:

    Just budget cuts and the higher education bubble bursting? Maybe, but that doesn’t seem to explain everything. If I were Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal or Treasurer John Kennedy, I’d seriously consider auditing Grambling…

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    Posted in Media Watch, Waste and Fraud | 1 Comment »

    LinkSwarm for March 23, 2013

    Friday, March 22nd, 2013

    Another Friday roundup of random news:

  • Republicans offer bill to outlaw Cyprus-like bank account seizures.
  • What did Dianne Feinstein’s gun-grabbing “assault weapons” bill actually accomplish? “These efforts have driven some law-abiding Americans into the loving arms of the NRA.”
  • “In Harry Reid’s Senate there are more votes against Chuck Hagel than there are in favor of an assault weapons ban.”
  • “[Ted Cruz’s] infraction was asking the right question. What Cruz wanted to know was this: Why do liberals cherish the First and Fourth Amendments, but trash the one in between – the Second Amendment?”
  • Bill Maher wakes up and suddenly realizes he’s getting ripped off by California taxes.
  • Dwight has an update on the laughable, doomed boondoggle that is EarthQuest.
  • Surprise! The U.S. is now more hated in the Middle East than under Bush.
  • Iran exporting Chinese-made portable antiaircraft missiles to terrorists. I’m sure that will make the Middle East all the more stable.
  • ObamaCare is slowing hiring.
  • Tides Foundation vs. Koch giving, in graphical form.
  • The UK decides that they don’t need any stinking freedom of the press.
  • Germany abandons some of its green energy fantasies.
  • Louisiana judge rules that ex-felons can own guns. Some caveats: This is based on a newly passed, pro-gun amendment to the Louisiana Constitution, and Louisiana law (as opposed to the other 49 states) is based on the Napoleonic Code rather than English common law.
  • Don’t suspect a neighbor; report him!

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    Posted in Crime, Democrats, Foreign Policy, Guns, Jihad | No Comments »

    Ex-Louisiana Governor Buddy Roemer Looking to Run for President

    Wednesday, February 9th, 2011

    If Buddy Roemer’s name is unfamiliar to you, that’s because he was last governor in January of 1992, which was the year after he switched from the Democratic to the Republican Party. Twenty years is an awful long time time for someone to go between elections, much less for someone most famous for losing to ex-Klansman David Duke. (Duke has been thankfully absent from our political landscape as of late, his support for left-wing anti-war catspaw Cindy Sheehan notwithstanding.)

    If anyone outside his immediate family has been urging Mr. Roemer to run, it has escaped my attention…

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    Posted in Democrats, Elections, Republicans | No Comments »

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