It's amazing how we can have on set of election results and yet somehow both parties claiming victory.
Barack Obama won all 9 of the recall districts, 6 of which were Republican and 3 Democratic, while Scott Walker also did two years later. So these are clearly swing districts. A closer look shows that SD-32 leaned Democratic, while, SD-2, 10, 12, 14, and 18 had a Republican lean. It wouldn't be a surprise if the districts went either way. So Democratic victories shouldn't be a surprise. Last night the Democrats took the one district with a Democratic lean and a second district that had a Republican lean. The senator, however, recently had an affair with a 25 year old. His wife campaigned for his opponent. As Anthony Weiner and David Wu will tell you, it's tough to survive a sex scandal.
Democrats should have won both, even if they spent very little money. It wouldn't have been a surprise had the Democrats won any of the remaining four, especially if the electorate was leaning their way. Yet they didn't.
The Democratic goal was to retake the state senate. They failed. So any evaluation should begin and end there. Overall, Republicans got 53.4% of the vote, about what you expect in a normal year. So the Democrats haven't really won anyone over and the Republicans haven't either. If this is an indicator for 2012, it's one that says next year will be 50-50. That doesn't bode well for Democrats, as they can't retake the House in a 50-50 year and losing the senate would be fairly likely.
Yesterday only Republicans, despite there being toss-up districts
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