Some final thoughts on the midterms: The US debate about its own political system way too often confounds elements from hypothetical popular vote systems and elements of the actual US system.
For example - in his recent column in the NYT, Bret Stephens explains how the Dems have failed, in his opinion and were not able to create a real wave: nytimes.com/2018/11/08/opi…
I see a major problem with this conclusion, since 1) the Dems were waaay more over-exteneded post-2008 than the Republicans were post-2016 and - yeah, i can see R eye-rolling - gerrymandering AND urbanization were of course additional factors, which harmed the final Dem result.
2) More importantly, by all available means, this was a real wave election - and a high turnout election. The real problem for Dems is, that a high turnout election is "bad" for them in a hyper-polarized time rn, since they must play on way more red turf than Rs on blue turf.
3) Those red state Dems who lost their Senate seats on Tuesday did not fail, they were crushing it but if the sleeping potential in a state is more rural than urban, this is impossible to prevent.
4) Under the existing US system, the Dem results were even better than they looked at first - the Dems easily won the hypothetical electoral college this week and kind of blocked off the midwest to Trump, even if he should hold OH and FL.
5) The real question is: As long as the political environment is so polarized and the general turnout high on both sides, how can Dems at all compete in the Senate for the coming decade, at least? Winning the House/POTUS AND Senate has somehow become 2 separated worlds.
Running up margins in urban areas is necessary for Dems but the policies and rhetoric necessary to do that, makes it impossible in many states to reach other, more rural areas. Besides the point, that Dems are in many red states way more unelectable than the other way around.
The success of moderate, blue state Republican governors is of course also connected to the fact that most Dems don't feel as personally threatened regarding their way of life or "values" as many Republicans do, which is why having a moderate Republican Gov. is not that bad.
6) Summa Summarum: Going out on a limb here but i'd argue, that as long as both parties are glorifying the SCOTUS and are sacrificing themselves to gain new judges, it's going to be nearly impossible for Dems to become competitive again in high-turnout elections in many states.
(Talking about state-wide elections of course. ;)) Since i know that Pelosi/Schumer have argued for quite some time, that local Dems can run on whatever platform they choose - and local Dems are often trying their hardest to show off their independence - adaption is really hard.
As long as the current climate holds up, every Dem running for state-wide office in a majority rural state should look and talk like Amy Klobuchar or even Joe Manchin. Yeah, sure, GA/AZ/FL/NC or even TX are going to come around at some point, possibly but until then - be smart.
POTUS can be won without rural states, even under the rules of the EC but ignoring the Senate or even Governorships in those states would be a major mistake, even costing those Dems who are running in the liberal parts of those states.
Make no mistake: This WAS a wave election - Suburbia is going Dem all over the country - but such decentralized seats are not enough to create real change. Which is why the nr1 question for Dems in 2020 should not be: How to defeat Trump - but how to make people stop fearing us.
PS: I am no fan of trying very lib test ballons in states becoming purplish but...oh boy, are many RW pundits trying to spin it like that was very normal and to-be-expected senate result in TX. Losses are losses but if you go by 20, you are out, if you go by 2,6,...try again.
