So, how did I do? Pretty well I’d say, although my super-secret strategy was basically to believe Nate Silver. I didn’t get everything right, but pretty much everywhere I was wrong I was too pessimistic: the DFL did take back the MN House, Obama did have a good night and won Florida, he won MN by a bit more than 5-6 points, and both constitutional amendments failed.
So now what? Well, there were a few big losers on Tuesday. The first is the conservative media. What was truly odd about this election is not that Obama narrowly won: lots of models predicted that. What is so odd is that so many Republicans, including the Romney campaign itself, was caught in a bubble where they were sure that Romney would win. Romney is a smart man and a successful businessperson; how could somebody used to dealing with real numbers be so blind to them?
Another big loser is the Tea Party. For the second consecutive election cycle, Republicans have blown the chance to take back the U.S. Senate by nominating crazy people who could not beat vulnerable democrats. When you can’t win in Missouri, North Dakota, and Indiana as Republicans, there is something wrong. I don’t think that the Tea Party is going to go away anytime soon, though, as it will probably take at least one more round of shellacking for it to sink in.
The last group of losers should be the pundits who keep on saying this is a Center-Right country. I’m talking about people like David Brooks who continually state that the retirement age for Social Security should be raised as they sit behind their computers in air-conditioned offices pulling down seven figures. I’m not quite sure this will actually happen, however, since these people tend to have no shame.
Big winners? Well, aside from Obama, I think the real winner here will be all those people who will have health insurance now that Obamacare will go into effect. As I’ve said before, this personally affects my family, and I couldn’t be happier.
Long-term, this could really be a turning point election for Democratic and Republican party fortunes. I’ll start with the huge caveat that plenty of things could go wrong in the next four years (Europe, China, Iran, terrorism, etc.) but assuming things get worked out, here’s the situation in 2016: An economy stronger than today. Obamacare implemented and not the end of the world. A Consumer Finance Protection Bureau that is putting forward strong regulations that consumers like. Lower deficits and maybe a long-term debt control plan. Under that scenario, how would Paul Ryan run against Hillary or Andrew and win?
Wishful thinking, sure. But this election has shown that the Tea Party bubble is not an effective strategy.