Over the last three weeks, I have said that I don’t think Democrats understand just how much they have “stepped in it” over their treatment of newly minted Supreme Court Justice, Brett Kavanaugh.
Many of on the right, like me, are critics of President Donald Trump and were not very excited about his choice. I would have rather seen Judge Amy Coney Barrett appointed. We were appalled at the treatment of Kavanaugh.
The grandstanding that took place during his initial hearings was terrible enough, but then Democrats weaponized the #MeToo movement. We were disgusted by the smearing of a man with no corroborative evidence.
As David French recently said on his podcast responding to the allegations – “I don’t believe her. I don’t believe him. I believe the evidence.”
And there was no evidence backing up the claims made about Kavanaugh. But who cares about evidence as long as it achieves the ends Democrats truly wanted – pushing a confirmation vote past the mid-terms.
This circus made me angry, and I rarely get mad over politics. I know I’m not alone. My view that there will be a price to pay at the ballot box was somewhat anecdotal, I didn’t have any hard data to back it up, but I could see that this conduct by the Democrats was an energizing and unifying for Republicans and even independent conservatives like me.
U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham’s rebuke of Senate Judiciary Committee Democrats was a sign, but some polling data suggests Democrats may have succeeded in stunting the predicted “blue wave” that is coming.
Last week, National Public Radio reported on their polling that showed the Democrat’s enthusiasm edge “evaporated.”
Just over a month away from critical elections across the country, the wide Democratic enthusiasm advantage that has defined the 2018 campaign up to this point has disappeared, according to a new NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist poll.
In July, there was a 10-point gap between the number of Democrats and Republicans saying the November elections were “very important.” Now, that is down to 2 points, a statistical tie.
Not only that, but the lead Democrats had in generic polling was cut in half.
Democrats’ advantage on which party’s candidate they are more likely to support has also been cut in half since last month. Democrats still retain a 6-point edge on that question, but it was 12 points after a Marist poll conducted in mid-September.
Granted, that’s just one poll, but any chance Democrats had to take back the Senate has evaporated and it’s entirely possible that Republicans may extend their majority.
- Incumbent U.S. Senator Bill Nelson (D-FL) is statistically tied with Republican Florida Governor Rick Scott in the last two polls taken of the race.
- Incumbent U.S. Senator Dean Heller (R-NV) who trailed his Democratic challenger Jacky Rosen three polls taken in September, led the leads in the latest NBC News/Marist poll by two points so that race is in a dead heat.
- In Tennessee, where Democrats hoped to pick up a seat, the last two polls show Congresswoman Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) with a five and eight-point lead respectfully. Former Governor Phil Bredesen (D-TN) lead an early September CNN poll by five points.
U.S . Senator Joe Donnelly (D-IN) is in a statistical tie in a three-way race in Indiana.U.S . Senator Claire McCaskill (D-MO) is running neck and neck with Republican Missouri Attorney General Josh Hawley.- Republican challenger Kevin Cramer has extended his lead over incumbent U.S. Senator Heidi Heitkamp to 12 points in the latest poll to come out. Her vote against Kavanaugh probably sealed her fate.
- The U.S. Senate race in Arizona, which is a seat Democrats hope to pick-up is a toss-up.
- U.S. Senator Joe Manchin (D-WV) may be safe since he voted to confirm Kavanaugh, but it wasn’t a courageous vote (he made sure he wasn’t the
tie breaker ) and he’s taking heat from both sides. A poll commissioned by Judicial Watch showed that 58 percent of West Virginians wanted Kavanaugh confirmed while only 28 percent opposed. The latest poll in that race was late September and he led by eight.
It was more likely that Democrats would win control of the House of Representatives, but pollsters are issuing warnings:
New York Times pollster Nate Cohn tweeted:
FiveThirtyEight’s Nate Silver concurred:
Then the kicker is that a new CNN/SSRS poll says independent voters overwhelmingly disapprove of their own handling of the nomination by a 28-point margin with only 36 percent approving overall.
I don’t want to make any grand predictions here because the election is little less than a month away, but it seems like the blue wave may not be as big as Democrats hoped.
They only have themselves to blame for that.