[Unofficial Thread] 2012 US EVERY OTHER ELECTION

[Dominus Atheos]

So... What's up with the Senate? What's up with the House? Governor Races?

Nate Silver says the Dems are going to end up with 52.5 Senate seats and has a 91.5% chance of holding the majority.

And I can't seem to find any information about who's going to hold the House.

[Grandmaster Jogurt]

Most of the analysis shows that the most likely outcome by far is continued GOP control of the House. From what I've seen, you'd have to go past "leans Republican" seats into the "likely Republican" ones before we hit a split house.

Edit: The New York Times estimate looks to be about 195 seats for the Democrats, assuming all "leans" go to their respective party and the tossups are split 50/50. Granted, their look into the electoral college seems a bit biased against Obama, putting Ohio as a tossup while North Carolina is leans GOP, but I can't be sure that holds for their house reporting, too.

[Guardsman Bass]

How about the elections in your respective states, if you're an American?

Three of the four elections here in Utah are pretty meh. The Republicans are going to glide to victory, and in the new District 2 the person in question is more or less running unopposed. District 4 and the fight between Jim Matheson (the incumbent Democrat) and Mia Love is much more interesting, because the race is in a dead-heat and totally flooded with outside money being spent on television ads.

I'm pulling for Matheson to win - he's pretty conservative as a Democrat, but he still has to throw us liberal Democrats a bone once in a while, and the Democratic primary keeps him from drifting too far to the right. If Love gets in office, the ultraconservatives in the Utah Republican primaries will yank her hard to the right, and then she'll stay in office regardless of that because of the gerrymandered district and tribal loyalty on the part of Republicans here in the state.

[Ahriman238]

In Mass. Republican incumbent Scott Brown and Democrat challenger Elizabeth Warren are flinging some of the meanest attack ads I've seen in a while at each other. I'm much amused that Mr. Browns slogan this time around seems to be "Vote for the man, not the party." Warren in the meanwhile doesn't seem to have much of a platform beyond insisting that Brown is a misogynist and if you vote him the Republicans will control the Senate and send us back to 1890.

We're also getting the legalization of medicinal marijuana and physician-assisted suicide as questions on the ballot.

[Skywalker_T-65]

In Missouri...well I don't think I need to explain much since everyone here has seen 'Aiken Foot-in-Mouth Syndrome' on display. I would be highly surprised if he won at this point. Though on the Presidential front we are probably going for Romney.

[Col. Crackpot]

In Mass. Republican incumbent Scott Brown and Democrat challenger Elizabeth Warren are flinging some of the meanest attack ads I've seen in a while at each other. I'm much amused that Mr. Browns slogan this time around seems to be "Vote for the man, not the party." Warren in the meanwhile doesn't seem to have much of a platform beyond insisting that Brown is a misogynist and if you vote him the Republicans will control the Senate and send us back to 1890.

We're also getting the legalization of medicinal marijuana and physician-assisted suicide as questions on the ballot.

that's been a shit show, and the ads have been vicious.

Meanwhile one state to your south there is a vicious battle for the RI first congressional seat. Rep. David Cicciline (former mayor of Providence) looks like he very may well lose his seat to former State Police Col. Brendan Doherty. The skeletons of Providence going broke on his watch while he painted a picture of rosy finances are finally coming back to haunt him. The unions have turned their back on him and endorsed the Republican Doherty (which NEVER happens here). Mosly because he tried for 6 years to fuck over the Firefighters union and failed. Even his days as a criminal defense attorney are coming back to haunt him. Doesn't help that his father was Consigliare for the Patriarca Family either.

[Fire Fly]

One of the most surprising senate races and most expensive so far--$40 million spent by in state and out of state groups--is taking place in Wisconsin between 7th term Congresswoman Tammy Baldwin (D) and the former four term governor of Wisconsin and the former Secretary of Health and Human Services Tommy Thompson (R). These two are running for the seat of four term Senator Herb Kohl (D) who is 77 years old and is retiring. When Tommy Thompson was governor, he governed quite moderately and was able to push through several major pieces of legislation that Republicans today would not dare touch. Tammy Baldwin represents Wisconsin's 2nd Congressional District which encompasses the capitol city of Madison, which is more liberal than the rest of the state. Moreover, she is openly gay, has a female partner, and is one of the more liberal members of the House.

The big surprise is that Tammy Baldwin is winning when she should really be losing. The state recently had a recall election against the sitting governor, Scott Walker (R), and it failed. The state also had a fierce election for a state supreme court justice between two people who were touted as liberal and conservative; the conservative justice won. Moreover, back in 2010, Russ Feingold (D) failed to be reelected. So all of the political winds suggested that the state was leaning rightwards, despite the energized liberal base of the state due to Governor Walker overturning public collective bargaining. And now, we have a liberal Democratic lesbian congresswoman running against a well-liked former Republican governor who governed for an unprecedented 14 years. Thompson should have been able to win this race easily.

However, several recent polls in the last week show that Baldwin is anywhere from tied to +4% ahead of her competitor. The running explanation for why she is winning is that because Baldwin was quite high profile, she faced a weak Democratic field and was able to secure her nomination early on. Thompson, on the other hand, faced a much more fierce GOP primary and had to tilt to the right to secure the Tea Party votes. When the GOP primary was over, Thompson was running low on cash whereas Baldwin was already campaigning and raising large amounts of money. Because she was able to campaign early, Baldwin was able to control the narrative and painted Thompson as being too extreme and no longer in step with the state. Moreover, outside groups were quick to pour money into Wisconsin on behalf of Baldwin whereas outside groups for Thompson had assumed he would be able to win easily and did not respond until a Marquette University poll in mid-September showed that she was ahead by +9%, at which point Thompson and conservative outside groups hit the panic button and began pouring in millions and began unleashing more and more negative attack ads.

Despite the senate election becoming nastier, Thompson has not been able to regain and maintain his lead whereas Baldwin has consistently held a small lead. With Wisconsin likely to vote for Obama, Baldwin will benefit from the increased turnout and will have a strong chance of winning on election day.

[TimothyC]

Ohio has two issues statewide this time around.

Issue one is the constitutionally mandated "Do we want to have a state constitutional convention?" It comes up every 20 years (as is mandated by the 1932 constitution).

Issue two is for the establishment of a bipartisan board to regulate redistricting (replacing the current system where the new districts are voted on by the statehouse) [The districts for the statehouse are managed by the Apportionment board which is the Governor, the Secretary of State, the State Auditor, The Speaker of the State General Assembly, and the President of the State Senate].

Ohio also has a rather contentious Senate race - which I expect will result in Sen. Brown retaining his seat (Ohio has a history of split Senate delegations), leaving the current state treasurer (who is running for the senate seat) to keep his job.

Edit: I also expect the Ohio congressional delegation to be 11 Republicans & 5 Democrats (down from 12/6).

[Crayz9000]

The bipartisan board to regulate redistricting sounds nice in theory, but how are the board members appointed? California passed a similar piece of legislation four years ago which now has another measure running to modify it/scrap it.

[TimothyC]

The bipartisan board to regulate redistricting sounds nice in theory, but how are the board members appointed? California passed a similar piece of legislation four years ago which now has another measure running to modify it/scrap it.

The League of Women Voters describes it thus:

League Explanation of Issue 2: The amendment would create a 12-person commission to draw legislative and
congressional districts. Final legislative and congressional districts are to be those that most-closely meet four
criteria: preserving whole communities; maximizing the number of competitive districts; balancing the number
of districts leaning toward one party or another to closely match the state’s political leaning; and keeping districts
compact. No map is to be adopted with intent to favor a political party, incumbent or potential candidate.
At least seven votes would be required to approve the districts. All meetings and records would be public. If
approved, new districts would be drawn for the 2014 election.
Any eligible Ohioan could apply to be a commission member. Specified elected office holders, candidates, political
party officials, paid lobbyists and public employees and family members would be ineligible. A panel of 8
state appeals-court judges would accept applications and pick 42 potential members, divided evenly among
Democrats, Republicans and Ohio voters unaffiliated with either major party.The House speaker and minority
leader could reduce the list to 24. From that pool, a random drawing would select 3 people from each party,
and 3 unaffiliated members.Those 9 people would select the final 3 members, one from each major party and
one unaffiliated member.

[Losonti Tokash]

Nebraska's Unicameral has put forrward two proposals to our state constitution this year. One to increase their term limits from 2 to 3, and another to more than double their salaries. I voted against both, but the first one is amusing to me because until recently there were no term limits. They pushed that one through to get rid of the fantastic Ernie Chambers since they were unable to get him defeated in an election due to the overhwleming support of his constituency. So they changed the rules to make him unable to run, but now it's biting them in the ass. Maybe when they're all gone I'd support it again, but they made their bed.

[Broomstick]

Let's see... in Indiana our current governor is term-limited, so we had to vote on a new one. I expect the Republican will win, because that's what usually happens. My district's Federal representative is Visclosky, and I expect he'll win (again) because that's what's been happening for the last half dozen elections and he hasn't had any sort of scandal hit the news. Richard Mourdock captured attention recently, being one of the "no abortion for rape cases" crowd, and it appears that race might go to the Democrats (trending, but close results and too early to be certain) in which case the Dems will get that Senate seat.

Nothing else really exciting. Well, in the race for county coroner I voted for the gal who actually has forensic credentials rather than the dude who's strongest asset seemed to be "I'm a village trustee, and gosh darn it, people like me!". Well, OK, he's a dentist, too, but that's not what he emphasized in the running.

[Rogue 9]

I still cannot for the life of me figure out why we elect the coroner.

My former boss who owes me $500 in delivery fees and tried to extort me into not filing for unemployment when he fired me is running for the county council, so I voted for the other people.

[Broomstick]

I find it puzzling we vote for the coroner, too, but as long as we do I'd like to see someone competent for the job elected.

[Dominus Atheos]

I still cannot for the life of me figure out why we elect the coroner.

My former boss who owes me $500 in delivery fees and tried to extort me into not filing for unemployment when he fired me is running for the county council, so I voted for the other people.

You should have wrote a letter to the editor to your local paper.

[Raw Shark]

Here in sunny Colorado, we don't have any Senate seats up for grabs, and some aggressive redistricting has made most of the House races not very interesting (we currently have 4 red, 3 blue, and it will probably stay that way).

The two most exciting ballot measures, IMHO, are one to set policy on limiting corporate money in state elections, and one to finally legalize marijuana for recreational use here on the official level (which has been the de facto reality for most Coloradoans for the last four years, to the generally-agreed-upon benefit of the state). There is strong support for the latter in theory, but I'm concerned that its supporters are also the most likely to not give enough of a shit and stay home, fuck up their ballot, etc...

[Executor32]

Other than a bunch of local offices for which there were only Republican candidates, the only thing that stood out on my ballot was a referendum for the Illinois Public Pension Amendment. I voted against it, and hopefully a majority of the public does the same.

[Ahriman238]

Heh, voted no on question 2 (physician assisted suicide) and yes on 3 (legalize medicinal marijuana) but I'd forgotten all about question 1 on the MA ballot, requiring auto dealerships to provide the same depth of information to buyers as to mechanics.

[Dalton]

NBC is calling Connecticut Senate for Chris Murphy over Linda McMahon

[Losonti Tokash]

Heh, voted no on question 2 (physician assisted suicide).

Why?

[Dalton]

Elizabeth Warren WINS

[JLTucker]

Heh, voted no on question 2 (physician assisted suicide).

Why?

Indeed. What are your objections to that, Ahriman?

[Broomstick]

I can NOT fucking believe Jesse Jackson, Jr. has been re-elected! He's been on medical leave for what, 5 months?

Although it does look like Richard Mourdock - the guy who stated pregnancy resulting from rape is a gift from his God - is going down. That's 1 more Democrat in the US Senate and one less religious asshole making laws about women's bodies. Not sure if that's definite, though.

[Skywalker_T-65]

In Missouri News, Aiken is losing at the moment. He's rather higher than I had hoped though.

[Losonti Tokash]

I can NOT fucking believe Jesse Jackson, Jr. has been re-elected! He's been on medical leave for what, 5 months?

Although it does look like Richard Mourdock - the guy who stated pregnancy resulting from rape is a gift from his God - is going down. That's 1 more Democrat in the US Senate and one less religious asshole making laws about women's bodies. Not sure if that's definite, though.

Donnelly is pro-life, though?