California Conservative

Larry Sabato and David Wasserman’s Crystal Ball has been predicting a wave that capsizes the Republican majority in the House since midsummer. They’re still wrong but what should we expect since they’re relying outdated measuring sticks. We shouldn’t expect accuracy when they’re basing things on an outdated paradigm where the major news outlets dictated things. We shouldn’t expect accuracy when they’re relying on polls. If polls were accurate, the GOP wouldn’t be doing the amount of old-fashioned doorknocking that they’re doing.

Ohio GOP Rep. Bob Ney’s fall from grace and eventual withdrawal gave the weak Democratic nominee in his district an opportunity as wide as a barn door.

Ohio is as red a state as there is north of Florida and Texas and west of Kansas. Ohio Republicans were irate with Gov. Taft for his tax hike and his corruption. They were upset with Ney’s corruption, too. Now they’re history and people are looking for answers to what matters most to them. And Joy Padgett is a first tier candidate, too. Don’t look for the Democrats to take this seat.

Republicans in southern Arizona nominated a fire-and-brimstone conservative over a moderate state legislator in the district currently held by GOP Rep. Jim Kolbe, virtually ending their hopes of retaining the seat against the strong Democratic nominee.

Don’t bet on that, either. The leaders were going one direction, the activists another. Bet on the activists in this one because they’re demanding strict border enforcement. In fact, even the Democrats are agreeing with that. Expect this to stay in GOP hands.

Twelve years later, another Foley is (as we can all agree, thankfully) out of his job, and though he did not hold the speaker’s gavel, his name might well come to memorialize Speaker Hastert’s downfall, if such a downfall comes to pass as either the result of resignation or the election.

Joe Negron has been written off by the Crystal Ball prognosticators. Bad prediction. Jeb’s put together a machine in Florida. People were appalled with Mark Foley, not with the GOP. Mssrs. Sabato and Wasserman haven’t given the people enough credit for being able to differentiate between corrupt politicians and fresh-faced conservatives. That’s a typical liberal defect.

Notice that they haven’t talked about vulnerable Democratic seats like PA-12, where ‘Trader Jack’ Murtha is about to be run out of Dodge. They haven’t talked about Bill Delahunt’s troubles in Cape Cod, either. Delahunt’s now been linked with Hugo Chavez, which isn’t playing well even in liberal Massachusetts.

Mssrs. Sabato and Wasserman couldn’t have known that the Democrats’ playing politics with Foleygate has upset conservatives. This hasn’t demoralized us; it’s motivated us. Mssrs. Sabato and Wasserman misunderestimated the voters being moved by President Bush’s stumping on preventing terrorist attacks, whether he’s talking about Democrats filibustering the Patriot Act or the NSA intercept program or the detainee interrogation/military commissions bill.

Mssrs. Sabato and Wasserman would be wise to understand that most Americans prefer politicians who’d vote for border enforcement first immigration reform over the ‘comprehensive reform’ politicians because they know most of those politicians would side with Ted Kennedy and they wouldn’t do anything to enforce the laws they passed.

The real wave that’s coming is against people that (a) oppose real immigration reform and (b) aren’t serious about protecting us from terrorist attacks. Americans know that Democrats aren’t serious about preventing terrorist attacks. Americans know that Democrats would’ve given additional rights to terrorists being interrogated. That isn’t connecting with America. It’s chasing Americans away from them.

Mssrs. Sabato and Wasserman haven’t taken into account the crumbling monolith formerly known as the black vote. Don’t they realize the impact that hip-hop artist Russell Simmons and Kweisi Mfume’s son will have in Maryland races just by campaigning with Michael Steele? Don’t think that that won’t translate to other races either.

Mssrs. Sabato and Wasserman haven’t taken into account the impact that a strong finish by Rick Santorum and Lynn Swann will have on PA-6, PA-7 and PA-8 either. They haven’t taken into account how strong the reform movement and anti-immigration issue is in Pennsylvania.

Mssrs. Sabato and Wasserman also haven’t factored in the impact that the Nutroots victory in the Connecticut Senate primary has had in driving DLC-type Democrats from the Democratic Party. Shame on them for that. If they read the blogosphere more frequently, they’d know that so-called moderates are walking away from the Democratic Party in droves.

It’s time that Mssrs. Sabato and Wasserman understood the power internet activists have in moving votes. Conservative internet activists know how to persuade and inform people, thereby moving voters. Mssrs. Sabato and Wasserman don’t realize the power that blogs that average 200 hits per day have in shaping the debate. They’re able to do that because they know how to discuss issues better than most politicians and because they’re masters at staying current with facts.

Blogs of that size don’t get much traffic but are influential because the information in their posts are uysed by bigger blogs like Redstate.org, Captains Quarters, Gateway Pundit, Wizbang politics and others. The reality is that blogs are read by more people than watch the network news.

Hopefully, Mssrs. Sabato and Wasserman will join us on the cutting edge of the information revolution soon. There’s always room for more on the edge.

Technorati Tags: Election 2006, Bob Ney, Mark Foley, Illegal Immigration, NSA, CIA

Cross-posted at LetFreedomRingBlog

This entry was posted on Friday, October 6th, 2006 at 1:30 am and is filed under Author: Gary Gross, Elections, Homeland Security, Immigration, Intel, Internet, Terrorism. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.