First of all Blake Masters was my favorite Senate candidate this cycle. It was a tragedy to see him lose this race by a whole 5 points. The gap between Lake and Hobbs was only .6.
Unfortunately it wasn't just McConnell withholding funding that sunk Blake Masters.
Masters faced three challenges in this race
He was undoubtedly running against the strongest Dem incumbent in all of the swing states.
We may hate Mark Kelly but he has great optics as a fake "moderate Democrat". Many McCain Republicans in Maricopa voted for Mark Kelly because he was seen as more moderate than Blake Masters who was tying himself to Trump in a state that doesn't like Trump that much. Masters made an ad in the primary saying Trump won 2020. That certainly hurt him in Maricopa.
McConnell deprived him of funding. More funding would have certainly helped Blake Masters but scumbag McConnell clearly fucked him.
Blake made comments about social security that hurt him.
Blake made comments about reforming social security in the primary which played terribly in the general election since Arizona is a state that has a lot of retirees.
Overall Blake Masters was amazing on policy but the way that he ran his campaign was unfortunately not amazing.
The Sunbelt electorate is aggravating for a populist Republican candidate.
The suburban voters in the sunbelt unfortunately vote more on optics and vibes. Masters could have a better shot at winning this race had he gotten the funding from McConnell and if he ran a campaign that avoided the social security reform comments and if he just focused less on tying himself to Trump.
Generic Republicans do well in the Sunbelt and populists struggle there.
I know this pisses off people here but that is the truth.
Candidates with good optics like Abbott, DeSantis and Kemp will do well in the Sunbelt. A populist candidate in the sunbelt really needs to play the optics game better and campaign more like a generic R. You cannot be a fire breather in the Sunbelt and expect to win comfortably.
Unfortunately it wasn't just McConnell withholding funding that sunk Blake Masters.
Obviously, things were relatively bad for the GOP across the board, and people blaming it on Trump or McConnell are deflecting and trying to play politics. That said, I haven't checked personally, but if it's true that he spent money on Murkowski (against a proper GOP) and Joe O'Dea, that is a huge waste.
Masters made an ad in the primary saying Trump won 2020. That certainly hurt him in Maricopa.
I doubt that very much, at least that incident specifically.
Blake made comments about reforming social security in the primary which played terribly in the general election since Arizona is a state that has a lot of retirees.
Rick Scott as well, except that he hurt other Republicans. They learned nothing from Trump 2016, or they don't want to learn.
Generic Republicans do well in the Sunbelt and populists struggle there.
Is that true though? The sample size is not great. Who are the 'generic Republicans' who won this time? Sure, you can point to way back when McCain won, but those were different years as well.
Candidates with good optics like Abbott, DeSantis and Kemp will do well in the Sunbelt. A populist candidate in the sunbelt really needs to play the optics game better and campaign more like a generic R.
They were all incumbents, and one is very different from the other two (or you would not be supporting him). In fact, if DeSantis had lost, the anti-populists (and I'm not saying you are one) would be citing him as proof that his populism was poison.
As for the people who claim that DeSantis is some sort of electoral juggernaut: Marco Rubio won by about the same margin. Both ran against terrible candidates, so that probably played no role. Does that mean that nominating Rubio in 2016 would have been electoral gold? I part from the pro-populists in arguing, as I have always done, that any Republican would likely had won in 2016. But I don't see Rubio as having some sort of special appeal, and by extension, DeSantis probably does not have that either.
DeSantis is definitely worlds better than Kemp and Abbott on actual policy but my point is that all three incumbent sunbelt governors have managed to keep good optics even when pushing controversial policies.
Ron DeSantis sent illegal aliens to Marthas' Vineyard and still managed to outright win the Hispanic vote. That is seriously an impressive feat in Florida.
Abbott and Kemp pushed stringent abortion bans and still won re-election by a decent margin against opponents who had a actual Dem cult behind them: Beto O'Rourke and Stacey Abrams. That takes some skill to pull off.
The lesson here is that populist candidates don't need to water down all of their policies to win. They just need to learn to not foster terrible optics.
Maricopa county is the home of what we call squishy RINOs. A lot of McCain fans in that county. Blake definitely lost some of them over the ad about Trump being the real winner of 2020. Some of these voters might have even voted for Biden in 2020. Him talking about social security spooked much of the elderly to vote Mark Kelly.
In terms of 2016, I think Rubio could have maybe won 2016 with a different electoral map than Trump. I think Rubio could win Arizona, Georgia, New Hampshire, Wisconsin and Nevada but lose Pennsylvania and Michigan.
Rubio was not as hated as Cruz and he didn't have Jeb Bush's GWB baggage and he wasn't a boring loser like Kasich. Rubio might have pulled it off if he was the R nominee.
Rubio has become a populist lite Senator these days. It has been a surprise how much he has changed for the better from 2013 when he was part of the Gang of 8 disaster amnesty bill in the Senate.
He recently said that amnesty is a terrible idea. Rubio might actually be learning what policies works for the base and what keeps him employed.
Ted Cruz, Jeb Bush and John Kasich would all have definitively lost 2016 to Hillary Clinton.
Trump pulled it off in 2016 and Rubio might have done it. But no one else besides these two had any hope of winning against Hillary.
DeSantis is definitely worlds better than Kemp and Abbott on actual policy but my point is that all three incumbent sunbelt governors have managed to keep good optics even when pushing controversial policies.
Sure, but we're not clear on what "good optics" means exactly. Apparently that someone is popular. But there is no magic formula for that, and it's not Trump/populism related as you say.
Ron DeSantis sent illegal aliens to Marthas' Vineyard and still managed to outright win the Hispanic vote. That is seriously an impressive feat in Florida.
Maybe Hispanics are not as fond of illegals as Democrats assume.
Blake definitely lost some of them over the ad about Trump being the real winner of 2020. Some of these voters might have even voted for Biden in 2020.
I doubt anyone cares about that specifically.
Rubio has become a populist lite Senator these days. It has been a surprise how much he has changed for the better from 2013 when he was part of the Gang of 8 disaster amnesty bill in the Senate.
You're not out of the woodworks yet, especially as it comes to immigration. Although both he and Cruz have become less doctrinaire conservatives, which is very good - e.g. voting for railroad workers to have sick days. Clearly, that is the future.
Ted Cruz, Jeb Bush and John Kasich would all have definitively lost 2016 to Hillary Clinton.
Not sure about Jeb Bush, but I'm positive Cruz and Kasich would both have won.
Trump pulled it off in 2016 and Rubio might have done it. But no one else besides these two had any hope of winning against Hillary.
You are very confident about these counterfactuals, even though you have no reason to be. Truth of the matter is that it is impossible to say. However, there are very reliable PolSci models that make predictions without any regard to candidates or quality, which is not to say that the Q Shaman would have won in 2016.
Here’s why this makes no sense: optics are controlled by media, and the media did plenty to smear every Republican including Desantis. All of the leftists I know despise him, and their only window into his behavior is leftist media. So it really has to be something other than “muh optics”.
First of all Blake Masters was my favorite Senate candidate this cycle.
Heck, he was pretty much the only one I actually liked. I wanted the Republicans to win, even if I didn't like them, because they were better than their opponents, but Masters stood out as someone actually interesting, who seemed to share at least enough of my values where I thought he'd be a good fit.
GOPe did us fucking dirty this time, that's for sure.
John McCain, who never became President, who in fact ran a toothless campaign against Obama as though he never intended on winning to begin with. As senator, he campaigned on repealing Obamacare, and when finally given the opportunity, voted no, to spite the man who was capable of becoming President. John McCain is rotting in Hell and his fat daughter should be reminded of this fact whenever she opens her pig mouth.
McConnell wanted Masters to lose, and so lose he did.
Correct. No money to close races in swing states and, what, like nine million to campaign for Murkowski in Alaska...who was running against another Republican. Some of these traitors were even open about not wanting "MAGA" winners.
I think treason really is a pretty accurate description.
First of all Blake Masters was my favorite Senate candidate this cycle. It was a tragedy to see him lose this race by a whole 5 points. The gap between Lake and Hobbs was only .6.
Unfortunately it wasn't just McConnell withholding funding that sunk Blake Masters.
Masters faced three challenges in this race
We may hate Mark Kelly but he has great optics as a fake "moderate Democrat". Many McCain Republicans in Maricopa voted for Mark Kelly because he was seen as more moderate than Blake Masters who was tying himself to Trump in a state that doesn't like Trump that much. Masters made an ad in the primary saying Trump won 2020. That certainly hurt him in Maricopa.
McConnell deprived him of funding. More funding would have certainly helped Blake Masters but scumbag McConnell clearly fucked him.
Blake made comments about social security that hurt him.
Blake made comments about reforming social security in the primary which played terribly in the general election since Arizona is a state that has a lot of retirees.
Overall Blake Masters was amazing on policy but the way that he ran his campaign was unfortunately not amazing.
The Sunbelt electorate is aggravating for a populist Republican candidate.
The suburban voters in the sunbelt unfortunately vote more on optics and vibes. Masters could have a better shot at winning this race had he gotten the funding from McConnell and if he ran a campaign that avoided the social security reform comments and if he just focused less on tying himself to Trump.
Generic Republicans do well in the Sunbelt and populists struggle there.
I know this pisses off people here but that is the truth.
Candidates with good optics like Abbott, DeSantis and Kemp will do well in the Sunbelt. A populist candidate in the sunbelt really needs to play the optics game better and campaign more like a generic R. You cannot be a fire breather in the Sunbelt and expect to win comfortably.
Obviously, things were relatively bad for the GOP across the board, and people blaming it on Trump or McConnell are deflecting and trying to play politics. That said, I haven't checked personally, but if it's true that he spent money on Murkowski (against a proper GOP) and Joe O'Dea, that is a huge waste.
I doubt that very much, at least that incident specifically.
Rick Scott as well, except that he hurt other Republicans. They learned nothing from Trump 2016, or they don't want to learn.
Is that true though? The sample size is not great. Who are the 'generic Republicans' who won this time? Sure, you can point to way back when McCain won, but those were different years as well.
They were all incumbents, and one is very different from the other two (or you would not be supporting him). In fact, if DeSantis had lost, the anti-populists (and I'm not saying you are one) would be citing him as proof that his populism was poison.
As for the people who claim that DeSantis is some sort of electoral juggernaut: Marco Rubio won by about the same margin. Both ran against terrible candidates, so that probably played no role. Does that mean that nominating Rubio in 2016 would have been electoral gold? I part from the pro-populists in arguing, as I have always done, that any Republican would likely had won in 2016. But I don't see Rubio as having some sort of special appeal, and by extension, DeSantis probably does not have that either.
DeSantis is definitely worlds better than Kemp and Abbott on actual policy but my point is that all three incumbent sunbelt governors have managed to keep good optics even when pushing controversial policies.
Ron DeSantis sent illegal aliens to Marthas' Vineyard and still managed to outright win the Hispanic vote. That is seriously an impressive feat in Florida.
Abbott and Kemp pushed stringent abortion bans and still won re-election by a decent margin against opponents who had a actual Dem cult behind them: Beto O'Rourke and Stacey Abrams. That takes some skill to pull off.
The lesson here is that populist candidates don't need to water down all of their policies to win. They just need to learn to not foster terrible optics.
Maricopa county is the home of what we call squishy RINOs. A lot of McCain fans in that county. Blake definitely lost some of them over the ad about Trump being the real winner of 2020. Some of these voters might have even voted for Biden in 2020. Him talking about social security spooked much of the elderly to vote Mark Kelly.
In terms of 2016, I think Rubio could have maybe won 2016 with a different electoral map than Trump. I think Rubio could win Arizona, Georgia, New Hampshire, Wisconsin and Nevada but lose Pennsylvania and Michigan.
Rubio was not as hated as Cruz and he didn't have Jeb Bush's GWB baggage and he wasn't a boring loser like Kasich. Rubio might have pulled it off if he was the R nominee.
Rubio has become a populist lite Senator these days. It has been a surprise how much he has changed for the better from 2013 when he was part of the Gang of 8 disaster amnesty bill in the Senate.
He recently said that amnesty is a terrible idea. Rubio might actually be learning what policies works for the base and what keeps him employed.
Ted Cruz, Jeb Bush and John Kasich would all have definitively lost 2016 to Hillary Clinton.
Trump pulled it off in 2016 and Rubio might have done it. But no one else besides these two had any hope of winning against Hillary.
Sure, but we're not clear on what "good optics" means exactly. Apparently that someone is popular. But there is no magic formula for that, and it's not Trump/populism related as you say.
Maybe Hispanics are not as fond of illegals as Democrats assume.
I doubt anyone cares about that specifically.
You're not out of the woodworks yet, especially as it comes to immigration. Although both he and Cruz have become less doctrinaire conservatives, which is very good - e.g. voting for railroad workers to have sick days. Clearly, that is the future.
Not sure about Jeb Bush, but I'm positive Cruz and Kasich would both have won.
You are very confident about these counterfactuals, even though you have no reason to be. Truth of the matter is that it is impossible to say. However, there are very reliable PolSci models that make predictions without any regard to candidates or quality, which is not to say that the Q Shaman would have won in 2016.
Here’s why this makes no sense: optics are controlled by media, and the media did plenty to smear every Republican including Desantis. All of the leftists I know despise him, and their only window into his behavior is leftist media. So it really has to be something other than “muh optics”.
Heck, he was pretty much the only one I actually liked. I wanted the Republicans to win, even if I didn't like them, because they were better than their opponents, but Masters stood out as someone actually interesting, who seemed to share at least enough of my values where I thought he'd be a good fit.
GOPe did us fucking dirty this time, that's for sure.
John McCain, who never became President, who in fact ran a toothless campaign against Obama as though he never intended on winning to begin with. As senator, he campaigned on repealing Obamacare, and when finally given the opportunity, voted no, to spite the man who was capable of becoming President. John McCain is rotting in Hell and his fat daughter should be reminded of this fact whenever she opens her pig mouth.
Correct. No money to close races in swing states and, what, like nine million to campaign for Murkowski in Alaska...who was running against another Republican. Some of these traitors were even open about not wanting "MAGA" winners.
I think treason really is a pretty accurate description.