{"id":462,"date":"2010-10-01T23:35:16","date_gmt":"2010-10-02T06:35:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/scotshonor.com\/?p=462"},"modified":"2010-10-01T23:35:16","modified_gmt":"2010-10-02T06:35:16","slug":"the-picnic-and-the-panic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/scotshonor.com\/?p=462","title":{"rendered":"THE PICNIC AND THE PANIC"},"content":{"rendered":"

In November of 2008, the election was a picnic for Democrats.\u00a0 It would have been hard for a Democrat to lose an election anywhere.\u00a0 Now, just 23 months later, the picnic has morphed into panic.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Democrats have panicked and they are making major mistakes.\u00a0 For example Alan Grayson ran a really disgusting ad in his House race that has backfired big time:<\/p>\n

http:\/\/www.politico.com\/news\/stories\/0910\/42818.html<\/a><\/p>\n

While Grayson is a certified scumbag, well known for outrageous personal attacks on political opponents, this ad was really stupid.\u00a0 This ad shows that he is absolutely desperate.\u00a0 The same is true of Jerry Brown in California.\u00a0 No one is surprised by the classic: \u201cyou hired an illegal alien\u201d attack on Meg Whitman, but running it now was a huge mistake.\u00a0 Jerry Brown is an experienced politician and he knows that ad should have been saved until the Friday before the election.\u00a0 But, he panicked and ran it now.\u00a0 Once again, the only plausible explanation is panic.\u00a0 By running it now he just gave Meg Whitman more time to respond and this is likely to hurt him more than help him.<\/p>\n

There are currently 259 seats up for election that are currently occupied by Democrats.\u00a0 There are 176 seats currently held by Republicans.\u00a0 Obviously, the Republicans need to take 42 seats away from Democrats in order to win the House.\u00a0 Virtually all political pundits are now predicting that to happen.<\/p>\n

It appears that Republicans are leading in something like 70 races.\u00a0 In fact, the Republicans are leading in almost every race where the pollsters thought would be competitive.\u00a0 But, there are a lot of other races out there where no one is even running polls.\u00a0 Democrats are very concerned.\u00a0 For example Barney Franks is so worried that he asked Bill Clinton to campaign for him.\u00a0 Frank is the Chairman of House Financial Services Committee, one of the most powerful positions in congress.\u00a0 He is running in a \u201csafe\u201d Democratic district in Massachusetts, the most Democratic state in the country. \u00a0Wow!\u00a0 \u00a0John Dingell has won re-election 28 straight times, but his seat is considered to be in jeopardy.\u00a0 He is pleading for campaign contributions to help him get re-elected in one of the safest congressional districts for Democrats in the country:<\/p>\n

http:\/\/www.politico.com\/news\/stories\/0910\/42191.html<\/a><\/p>\n

These are just some of the well-known prominent Democrats who are in trouble.\u00a0 There are lesser known Democrats all over the country where no one is even polling.\u00a0 If people like Frank and Dingell are in trouble, everyone is in trouble.<\/p>\n

The solution, for Democrats, is to make this a lot of local elections.\u00a0 Democrats are trying to do just that.\u00a0\u00a0 A lot of them don\u2019t even admit they are Democrats and I haven\u2019t found any Democrats who are running for re-election based on their record.\u00a0 Instead they are running smear campaign trying to scare voters into voting against their opponent.<\/p>\n

But, President Obama is the gift that keeps on giving.\u00a0 He is oblivious to the political damage he is causing to the Democratic Party, so he is out there telling Democrats to buck up and take more credit for doing a great job.\u00a0 Each day he tries to find a new person to blame, since his previous tactic of blaming everything on George Bush clearly isn\u2019t working.\u00a0\u00a0 He is incredibly thin skinned and he constantly whines about how Republicans are picking on him.\u00a0 That makes him look weak and defensive.<\/p>\n

He is unlikely to help a single Democrat gain any votes, but he is managing to help Republicans make this a national election.\u00a0 If the Republicans keep a national election, that is very bad for Democrats.<\/p>\n

I used to think that if Republicans had a super good wonderful day they would win about 75 seats.\u00a0 I now think they are likely to win 100 seats and could win more than that.\u00a0 We may wake up on November 3 with a whole country full of Democratic incumbents standing there with a glazed look in their eyes wondering what happened while a whole bunch of newcomers are celebrating.\u00a0\u00a0 If Democrats don\u2019t find a way to stop the panic, this is going to get worse, a lot worse.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The only good news for Democrats is that congress has adjourned, so neither Pelosi nor Reid is capable of pushing through more dumb legislation before the election.\u00a0 But, as Yogi Berra used to say, \u201cit is getting late early.\u201d\u00a0 Obviously the economy is not going to turn around before the election.\u00a0 In addition, Obama is unlikely to give a great speech that suddenly makes everyone love him again.\u00a0 In fact, most of the things that could happen in the next four weeks, that could impact the election, would be bad for Democrats.\u00a0 The economy won\u2019t recover, but the stock market could easily crash.\u00a0 We won\u2019t win the war in Afghanistan, but things could quickly deteriorate.\u00a0 If there are no terrorist attacks, it won\u2019t help Democrats, but if there is a terrorist attack it will really hurt Obama.<\/p>\n

There are sure to be some October surprises by Democrats who are famous for last minute smear campaigns.\u00a0 Think of the DUI story that was released on George Bush the Friday before the 2000 election.\u00a0 That probably cost Bush the lead in the popular vote.\u00a0 But, while some Republicans candidates will fall victim to these kinds of tactics, it will not impact the nationwide trend.\u00a0<\/p>\n

There are more and more signs of a huge political storm poised to sweep across this country.\u00a0 Democrats know that, which is why they have panicked.\u00a0 But panic, in the face of disaster, only makes things worse.\u00a0\u00a0 I now think the Republicans win more seats in the House than anyone can even imagine.\u00a0 I also think they win the Senate and it won\u2019t even be close.\u00a0 \u00a0Republicans are always capable of blowing any individual election, but even the traditional Republican arrogance and incompetence cannot slow down this political storm.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In November of 2008, the election was a picnic for Democrats.\u00a0 It would have been hard for a Democrat to lose an election anywhere.\u00a0 Now, just 23 months later, the picnic has morphed into panic.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Democrats have panicked and they are … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_coblocks_attr":"","_coblocks_dimensions":"","_coblocks_responsive_height":"","_coblocks_accordion_ie_support":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-462","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-latest-headlines"],"yoast_head":"\nTHE PICNIC AND THE PANIC - SCOTS HONOR<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/scotshonor.com\/?p=462\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"THE PICNIC AND THE PANIC - 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