[Posted by Karl] Despite an unprecedented push from Big Labor, involving tens of millions of dollars and turnout near the level of a regular election, the left failed to gain control of the Wisconsin senate in recall elections sought after Republicans passed budgetary and collective bargaining reforms in the state. From Allahpundit’s usual yeoman aggregation, note the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel held an editorial until late yesterday (presumably today in print) stating: So it turns out that the sky isn’t going to fall on all local governments in Wisconsin. The numbers now starting to come in show that Gov. Scott Walker’s “tools” for local governments apparently will help at least some of them deal with cuts in state aid imposed by the state budget. That’s contrary to the expectation and the rhetoric of critics in the spring, and it’s to Walker’s credit. It bears out the governor’s assessment of his budget-repair bill , although we still maintain he could have reached his goals without dealing a body blow to public employee unions… This grudging admission from the establishment media ignores that the union reforms broke up the cozy dominance of the WEA Trust as health insurer for public school teachers (and forced the trust to offer competitive rates in other districts), creating savings all across the state . The MJS knows how uncompetitive these rates were , too. As Walter Russell Mead notes, Wisconsin is simply a preview of the future elsewhere: The tide is running hard against the public sector unions. Wisconsin has been a big, Battle of Gettysburg style defeat, but the unions are suffering almost as much at the hands of their “friends” — Democratic politicians in blue states — as from open enemies like the Wisconsin GOP. In New York, in Chicago, even in California, Democratic politicians are playing hardball. They can’t help it. There isn’t any money. The public sector unions aren’t fighting a party; they are fighting arithmetic. Sooner or later, numbers win. Eventually, even the establishment media may figure this out. –Karl
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Math is hard. On progressives
According to the latest Gallup poll , Republicans now lead by ten points in the generic ballot — 51 percent to 41 percent. That is the largest lead Republicans have ever had in sixty years of polling on this question by Gallup. Much smaller leads, such as in 1994 and 2002, have translated into significant Republican gains. Yet as one Robert Stacy McCain recently reminded us, polls are not campaigns . The Republican ground game is nowhere near the level of the Democrats in 2008 or the Bush-era GOP in 2004. There is no evidence the Tea Party has compensated for this. Many Republican challengers in key swing districts remain underfunded. The Republicans’ national campaign committees are generally at a disadvantage to their Democratic counterparts and it has shown in most of the recent House special elections. Quin mentions some other factors cutting strongly against Republicans here . Then again, I’ll repeat the same thing I was saying to Republican dead-enders in 2006: If your base is disenchanted, the other side’s base is fired up, and swing voters hate you, you are going to lose elections. We are seeing Republican primary turnout in states like Colorado and Washington exceed Democratic turnout. In Colorado, the losing Republican Senate candidate, Jane Norton, got more votes than the Democratic winner, incumbent Sen. Michael Bennet. Republican complacency could still blow the midterms elections. I fully expect Republicans to lose some races that they would have won in either 1994 or 2002. But there does come a point where the national mood is so powerful that not even the Republicans can bungle it. Take a look at the rare special election victory for Republicans, Scott Brown in Massachusetts: it came in a case where the swing voters were fed up, the Democratic candidate was a walking turnout-depresser, and the national GOP got involved too late to screw things up. Whether that happens on a massive enough scale to flip a house of Congress remains to be seen. But the proper Republican mood at this point is neither triumphalism nor despair.
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Gallup: Republicans Take Ten-Point Generic Ballot Lead
