“Slip slidin’ away, slip slidin’ away, the nearer your destination, the more you’re slip slidin’ away.” — Simon & Garfunkel
Two men enter the runoff race, one man leaves with the Senate seat his. No, it’s not Thunderdome, it’s Georgia. And with Blake Masters washing out officially in Arizona and Adam Laxalt the next to declare his loss in Nevada (if we are to believe Sean Hannity’s dour prediction) the December 6 runoff between Raphael Warnock and Herschel Walker just got reframed. And it’s wonderful. Simply wonderful. Because what was an intense race on Tuesday and called for a runoff on Wednesday, has now become a cause for celebration, or in a worse case scenario, revenge. We.Can’t.Lose.
Come, let us reason together, as LBJ used to say. This is how it’s going to go down and why it’s going to be great. First, here is the state of play in Nevada right now.
Doubt we are seeing more updates tonight in NV.
Here's where we are approx:Laxalt +800
23K or so ballots in Clark
8K or so in Washoe
6K at most in rurals
5K provisionals
Also maybe 10K mail need to be cured, so some of those will be added to totalWe do close Senate races! pic.twitter.com/Ri93sS8QFh
— Jon Ralston (@RalstonReports) November 12, 2022
Clark and Washoe have the most ballots to be counted. Granted, it’s not over until it’s over but the combination of Adam Laxalt considering a recount earlier today, plus Sean Hannity even bothering to set his audience up for a loss is pretty much the death knell for Laxalt. That means that Herschel Walker is the last Gawd awful Trump senate candidate to go down in flames. Walker is the last of the Four Horsemen of the Trumpocalypse, with Oz and Masters gone and soon to be joined by Laxalt.
IF the Georgia senate seat had been the linchpin to control of the chamber, Mitch McConnell was set to invest heavily in it. Now it doesn’t matter. After the Nevada race is called for Cortez Masto, which I predict will be no later by mid-Monday (although it could go on to the 18th or longer, if the cured ballots end up playing a key role) then what I think will happen next is this: Republican turnout in Georgia is going to be depressed and stay home while the Democrats are going to be on an endorphin high and they will turn out in droves. Warnock will keep his seat and I believe by a good margin.
Remember, Walker is standing alone now. On Tuesday’s election he was on the ballot with Brian Kemp. Passions were high. I don’t see Republicans coming out to support Walker on his own, especially not after the trouncing that other GOP senate candidates have taken this week. I think you’re going to see a very depressed electorate in Georgia.
And there’s more good news. As these bad candidates have lost, they have accepted it and moved on. They have not gone along with Trump’s Big Lie. The Big Lie is dying as we speak. I don’t think Adam Laxalt is going to ask for a recount if he loses. An automatic recount could be triggered if the percentage is half a percentage point or less difference, but I don’t think it will be that tight. We will have to see. But assuming that Cortez Masto performs as expected with the ballots coming in from Clark and Washoe counties, we will see democracy affirmed and autocracy, based upon Trump’s Big Lie, recede back into the dark shadows where it belongs. American Prospect:
And if it’s clear that Democrats have kept control even without the Georgia seat, that is likely to depress Republican turnout more than Democratic turnout when Georgians vote. Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, an anti-Trump Republican, cruised to re-election, and we can expect an honest vote count.
More remarkably, the anticipated Trumpian claims of election fraud, as well as Republican attempts to use it to their advantage, totally fizzled. Trump’s calls were widely ignored. Almost everywhere, it was a normal election.
Efforts at voter intimidation at polling places were blocked. With a few exceptions, even conservative courts refused to connive with Republican strategies to deter or depress voting.
In every major race that the AP has called, the loser has accepted defeat. Most statewide Republican candidates who campaigned around claims of ballot mischief were defeated
Even Mehmet Oz didn’t make an ass out of himself and I don’t think Adam Laxalt will either. I believe demanding a recount was discussed and I believe it was considered, as the Daily Mail said, and as you may have read here earlier today. But I don’t see it happening.
And here’s the icing on the cake: I truly believe that the jazzed and invigorated Democrats will turn out to give Raphael Warnock his much deserved reelection. But even should something go wrong, and if the CTE-addled, wife-beating, pathological liar who loves to play Russian roulette and fantasize the violent deaths of car delivery men is elected, he will continue to make an unspeakable disgrace out of himself.
And that’s a good thing. If it happens, that’s what the GOP deserves, is six years of Herschel Walker making them look bad — and that’s assuming he doesn’t do something so pyrotechnically stupid that he doesn’t get himself removed before his term is up.
And I don’t think it’s going to happen that way. I only mention it because while it would be a terrible thing if a competent, decent man like Raphael Warnock lost to the likes of Herschel Walker, there is a silver lining. Walker would be a living reminder of the celebrity-worship idiocy of Donald Trump and his rule over the GOP.
The delusion that celebrity is some master key that allows its bearer to do equally well in all fields other than the one that s/he became famous for has been smashed and it’s high time. The defeat of Walker will be the coda to this deranged drama. (Unless Kari Lake throws a fit and she may drag this all on interminably.)
Trump’s MAGA candidates have fizzled. The Big Lie has fizzled. Lindsey Graham threw a little starter fluid on the grill earlier today with his suggestion on a conference call to Rick Scott that the Laxalt race was being stolen but but couldn’t get it to light up. He only succeeded in making himself look like an ass.
Trump is gone. Not that we are rid of him. Oh, by no means. The end is yet to come and it’s going to be prolonged and ugly. Anybody who says otherwise is wrong. But the corner has been turned. The nightmare of Donald Trump was a national fever that boiled our collective brain from 11/08/2016 and finally peaked on 11/08/2022. He wielded an unholy power during that time frame and poisoned our body politic. It’s appalling that one deranged man had that much power, but he did.
This is the right song for the occasion. We’ll play it again on December 6, after Raphael Warnock wins and the last of the dreadful Trump-endorsed losers washes out officially.
And make no mistake. Mitch McConnell, Rick Scott, Kevin McCarthy, all of them, have figured out what we have figured out here. They know it’s the way things are going to go down.
What’s to stop Trump-O the Assclown from starting his own MAGA party should he not get the Pube nomination???
He obviously doesn’t give a flaming rat’s ass about the Pube party or if they win or not, it’s all about the money and attention…….he could simply pull a Gingrich, announce his candidacy, fleece the rubes for as much in “campaign contributions” as possible before dropping out and keeping the money.
Gingrich has done just that every presidential cycle for years.
ross perot anyone? Although ross was pretty crazy, he did spend a lot of his real money on the campaigns. Something trump will never do.
Yeah but Perot didn’t start off trying to take over the GOP so the Perot example doesn’t exactly match.
The Rs are starting to Ask Questions about the former guy and his PAC and its money – since it seems to have a lot and isn’t spending it on campaigns.
The issue of Trump sucking up so many donations from regular folks (the kind who can’t afford to come close to maxing out the limit to an individual candidate, much less make five figure donations to PACS) has been simmering out there in the GOP all year long. The sane part of the GOP, the ones who are just heatless assholes figured that Trump wouldn’t share one fucking dime with even his candidates he endorsed. They were of course correct. The RNC wasn’t happy, nor were a lot of the GOP mega donors who had to cough up even more huge donations that they already had budgeted to make up for Trump’s grift. So he pissed those folks off too. But here’s the thing – even without being able to twitter-bludgeon them he had folks who would use the platform for him and the ever eager for ratings media was only to happy to spread his faux “From the Desk of the President” memos so almost everyone in the GOP feared to cross Trump.
Now? Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger sacrificed their political careers and others took note. BUT, by throwing their bodies on the rolled barbed wire so that others could run up over them and into enemy fire some, only some are starting to do so. It remains to be seen how much those who have started to speak up will inspire others, and whether a tipping point will be reached. Oddly enough, Trump himself and his unhinged rantings might be what does him in. Murdoch/Fox wants him to go away and are setting up to back an alternative. It would appear to be DeSantis but I’m sure they have another person or two in mind if DeSantis gets mortally wounded by Trump. We are in for some itneresting times.
The House is 435 members and even before gerrymandering became so brutally efficient there was a small collection of bomb throwing idiots. But while they made news sometimes they got drowned out. Sadly, that’s changed because there are more of them and they belong to the part of the GOP that has hogged the narrative.
The Senate is a different body. Only a hundred members and long prided itself on being an exclusive club. One with a more genteel manner, and they even tossed a bit of looking down their noses snark at the uncouth antics of the House. Sadly, that too has eroded. However, despite this, the Senate in my lifetime hasn’t had a Louie Gohmert or Paul Gosar in its ranks. Sure, Ted Crux is there and hated even by his GOP colleagues but he’s not the complet dumbass the two House morons I cited are. Walker would be like having the worst of BOTH of Gohmert and Gosar combined! The GOP Senators were willing to put up with all kinds of shit from Trump because he was a President. But Walker? No fucking way! Hell, I can see them looking for excuses to nail his ass on ethics charges and BEG Democrats to join them ina motion to expel Walker! After all, Kemp could then appoint a far more electable GOP asshat to run for re-election in 2028. It could make for an interesting decision for Democrats – do they help out the GOP in return for some concessions on key stuff or let them twist in the wind and gather material to slap the GOP upside the head with in issue ads and of course campaign ads in 2024? However, if NV turns out ok I agree it’s likely to be a moot point. As long as Democrats show up in droves on Dec. 6 and put an exclamation point on things. We need that seat. I was hoping for at least 52 Democrats (and it seemed within reach) to completely neutralize both Manchin and Sinema.
Trust me when I tell you Machin is going to make Democrat’s lives a living hell in the next two years. Even though he’s toast and has zero chance of getting another term. He’s won by increasingly lower margins and in WV he hasn’t got a chance in hell at another term. And wouldn’t win a GOP primary. Or even remain on the Energy Committee under Democratic control (which we’d still have) if he switches sides!
Denis, one slightly snarky question: There’s actually a WORSE than Gohmert and Gosar??? Herschel is just a CTE–Addled hypocritical moron. It doesn’t make him worse than those two genuinely STUPID evil bastards. Let’s just call Herschel “as bad”???
It’s for all the above reasons that I expect we’ll also keep the House. It always came down to the toss-ups in those races and we’ve overperformed there much as we have elsewhere.
Trump’s way of doing things ironically makes it harder for the GOP to get its agenda done. And there’s also the question of how many Congresscritters are about to be indicted for staying too close to Mango Mussolini.
The real.proxy is the 2% of Georgia redneck who vote Libertarian. These people think they should be allowed to have tactical nuclear weapons if they want them and generally are racists. They aren’t gonna vote for a Dem if Jesus ran as one. They now control the race. Let’s hope they stay home because they will put Walker in office. I hate GA,and cheer for any team playing against them, but PoC in that state don’t deserve Herschel.
Yeah, but the problem for those racist Libertarians is that BOTH of the candidates in the run-off are Black (and, honestly, on the tactical nukes issue, I don’t think any of those Libertarians would vote for a GOPer because none of them are willing to test the Second Amendment THAT far).
Um, Ursula? Minor correction but the song whose lyrics you’ve quoted at the start of the article was a Paul Simon SOLO effort–not a Simon & Garfunkel performance.
(Now, I’ll go back and read the article itself.)
I was under the impression that in Nevada a recount had to be specifically requested, and paid for by the candidate requesting it. Not automatic. Am I wrong?