PLEASANT HILL, NOVEMBER 12, 2017 – Read some of the Google headlines, and you think that the Democrat party took 30 of the 50 states back in a landslide:

  • The State of The Democratic Party After Election Day Sweep – New Hampshire Public Radio
  • The Daily 202: Anti-Trump backlash fuels a Democratic sweep in Virginia and elections across the country – The Washington Post
  • Democrats, Republicans, take note: A new era has begun – The Washington Post (Opinion)
  • What Tuesday’s Democratic Sweep Means for 2018 – Esquire
  • Democrats Sweep Virginia, New Jersey Governor’s Races – Real Clear Politics
  • Democrats Sweep First Statewide Elections Since Trump Took Office

What do we know about New Jersey’s political leanings?  New Jersey, since 2002 has elected 5 out of 6 Democrat Party Governors and 1 Republican.  The odds, right now are against the republican.  The real surprise was Chris Christie in 2010 – but if you think about it, he was elected after then President Obama was elected.

I cannot think of a homogeneously Democrat or Republican state in the US.  The traditional split pits the big population centers with suburbia and the agricultural portions.  The center of the state tends to be more conservative and typically more self-sufficient.

Large population centers require rules and regulations and people depend on the city government for most things.  They get used to the Government providing, and each fight to get more from their government.

The counties and small towns do not provide nor require such government support.  Farming communities and the like, tend to teach hard work for the daily reward and becoming self-sustaining.

Democrat and Liberal Government centric large metropolitan areas outnumber the rural conservative parts of the state.  When a small government conservative wins, that’s the surprise in New Jersey.

Sweep in New Jersey?  No, not really.  The demographics told everyone to expect a liberal candidate to be elected, and the expected candidate was elected. No surprise there.

Perhaps in Virginia things were vastly different than in New Jersey.  Perhaps Virginia is a Republican State and the fact that a Democrat won the Gubernatorial election was truly a shock.  Let’s take a look at recent history.

Going back to 2002, 4 of the last 5 Governors have been Democrats.  Again, the only time Virginia elected a Republican – just like in New Jersey – was the 2010 election when Bob McDonnell surprised everyone and became Governor.

Virginia has the same split as New Jersey in terms of inhabitants of the large population centers (lean government centric liberals) and the smaller rural population (leans small government conservatives).

Looking at how the Virginia House has been controlled over the years, we see that from the 1900 to 1904 term till the 1998-2000 term (very nearly 100 years) Virginia’s house was under the control of the Democrats.  In the 2000 to 2002 election cycle, the Republican party took control and kept it till the 2017 election (2016-2018 cycle).  The fact that the perennially Democrat leaning state has gone back to Democrat control does not signify anything more than it has gone back to normal.

The statistical anomaly is not the return towards Democrat, it is that the Republicans have held such a lead for the past 10 years.

We hear so much about “fake news” and then people point to articles like the ones above and ask, what’s fake about them?  The answer is simple: the headlines are deceiving and the articles themselves bury the truth.

Two states have returned to the democrat fold after a 10-year absence.  That is the real story.  It is not a wave.  It is not a landslide.  It is not even a sweep.  It is, however, a ‘what took you so long?’

 

Respectfully Submitted,
The Lee’s Summit Conservative