Tag Archives: Topic: Elections

NY Times: Mr. Obama’s more than three-to-one edge in exit polls among the 5 percent of voters who identified themselves as gay, lesbian or bisexual was more than enough to give him the ultimate advantage, according to the study, by Gary J. Gates of the Williams Institute at the U.C.L.A. School of Law, in conjunction with Gallup

Stuart Benjamin at the Volokh Conspiracy: The most commonly used scores for ideological distance are DW-Nominate scores, based on representatives’ actual votes. These measures reduce various flavors of “liberal” and “conservative” to a single metric, but they are the scores most widely used and trusted by political scientists and political commentators because they measure virtually all the actual votes in a careful and rigorous way. As many people have noted, there used to be lots of ideological overlap between the parties, and lots of moderates in both parties, but there is less overlap, and in particular there are fewer moderate Republicans.

Mark J. Rozell and Clyde Wilcox at the Washington Post: The Democratic triumph of this year could certainly be followed by disaster for the party in 2014 or 2016. What the Christian Right learns from this election and how it reconstitutes itself going forward will have a big impact on its future and those of the major political parties. Indeed, it will not surprise us if observers declaring the death of the Christian Right today are marveling at its big comeback in two or four years.

George Weigell at NRO via EPPC: It takes a certain kind of people, living certain indispensable virtues, to make the market and democracy work so that justice, prosperity, and human flourishing are the net results of freedom. That elementary truth–recognized by the Founders, ignored by the newly reelected administration, and avoided by libertarians and Republican campaign consultants–has to be at the center of the conversation about the American future, and about playing good defense during the next four challenging years.

Washington Times: The Republican Party of Florida is backing Rep. Allen West’s call for a recount of all early votes in St. Lucie County, saying it would be “unconscionable” not to answer lingering questions about the results — which show Mr. West trailing Democratic challenger Patrick Murphy.

Washington Examiner: Planned Parenthood, whose federal funding was threatened by GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney, is taking credit for President Obama’s reelection by keeping independent women scared long enough about Romney’s agenda for Obama to win them over.

Jeff Jacoby at the Boston Globe: Supporters of same-sex marriage have reason to cheer after last week’s election. Supporters of democratic self-government, even those of us who oppose gay marriage, do too.

Rasmussen: The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey of Likely U.S. Voters shows that 54% describe themselves as pro-choice on the issue of abortion, while 38% say they are pro-life. (To see survey question wording, click here.)

DailyCaller.com: By 6:00 a.m. EST Wednesday, more than 675,000 digital signatures appeared on 69 separate secession petitions covering all 50 states, according to a Daily Caller analysis of requests lodged with the White House’s “We the People” online petition system.

WorldNetDaily: U.S. Rep. Allen West, R-Fla., calls a mysterious 4,000-vote swing late on Election Night “unconscionable” as he continues his fight to challenge his razor-thin apparent loss to Democrat Patrick Murphy.

Baptist Press: The survey by the Polling Company shows that 60 percent of voters in this year’s election agreed that “marriage is between one man and one woman.” Fifty-one percent agreed strongly. All total, 34 percent disagreed with the statement.

It’s one thing for a Democratic presidential candidate to dominate a Democratic city like Philadelphia, but check out this head-spinning figure: In 59 voting divisions in the city, Mitt Romney received not one vote. Zero. Zilch.

PolicyMic: To date, citizens of 18 states have petitioned the White House for consideration of a peaceful withdrawal from the United States. That’s right, thousands of Americans have already signed petitions at whitehouse.gov asking President Obama to allow them to peacefully secede from the union.

AZFamily.com: Thousands of Arizonans have signed a petition calling for the state to secede from the Union. The petition, filed online through the White House’s petition page, shows that Arizona, along with several other states, is calling for secession to leave the United States and start its own new government.

ABC: The petition to “Peacefully grant the State of Texas to withdraw from the United States of America and create its own NEW government,” was submitted on Friday of last week. Just three days later, it zoomed past the 25,000 mark at 3:22 p.m. today and kept going.

NY Times: Christian conservatives, for more than two decades a pivotal force in American politics, are grappling with Election Day results that repudiated their influence and suggested that the cultural tide — especially on gay issues — has shifted against them.

Advocate: Kyrsten Sinema has officially been elected as the nation’s first openly bisexual congresswoman, the Associated Press reports.

Ken Klukowski at Breitbart: It’s enough to make your head spin with the implications. What would a “divorce” look like? Can you divorce one partner but not others? What about child custody? For that matter, how many of the adults in the marriage have parental rights over the children? So we’re in a brave new world when it comes to the very definition of what we call a family. It will be interesting to see if all of these other proposed family units make Americans rethink whether we want to redefine the institution of marriage at all.

FedSoc Blog: On Monday, November 5, SLF, on behalf of another Florida citizen and taxpayer, filed an original action in the Florida Supreme Court asking the Court to issue a writ of quo warranto regarding the actions of Secretary of State Ken Detzner in determining the Justices “qualified” to be placed on the ballot. The argument is not one of conduct, but instead contends that none of the three justices lawfully qualified for the retention election and that the secretary of state failed to properly carry out his constitutional and administrative duties in the matter.

Boston Globe: “Obviously we are very disappointed in losing four tough election battles by narrow margins. We knew long ago that we faced a difficult political landscape with the four marriage battles occurring in four of the deepest-blue states in America. As our opponents built a huge financial advantage, the odds became even steeper. We ran strong campaigns and nearly prevailed in a very difficult environment, significantly out-performing the GOP ticket in every state.

Washington Post: For the chairman and chief executive of Murray Energy, an Ohio-based coal company, the reelection of President Obama was no cause for celebration. It was a time for prayer – and layoffs.

Billings Gazette: Republican Tim Fox said Wednesday that he will fight what he called the over-reach of federal government as Montana’s next attorney general after winning the post by a six-point margin over Democrat Pam Bucy.

Ryan T. Anderson and Andrew Walker at the Heritage Foundation: But a little perspective on the setback is in order. The results were close, and marriage did better in these deep blue states than Mitt Romney did. Of the four states that had marriage questions on the ballot, traditional marriage outperformed the presidential candidate in each and every one:

The HIll: Democrats will be defending red-state Senate seats and facing a tough path to take back control of the House.

KDVR.com (includes video): Colorado House Democrats Thursday elected Rep. Mark Ferrandino to be the new Speaker of the House come January — the first time in state history that a gay lawmaker will preside over a legislative chamber.

Salon: “Rights should not be put to a vote,” Evan Wolfson, the founder of Freedom to Marry, told the Wall Street Journal. “While we have now shown we can do it, it doesn’t mean that we should have to do it, and it doesn’t mean that it is easy to do.” He added that “very few” states will be appealing as fronts to pursue more ballot measures, because of costs and the scale of organization needed.

Heather MacDonald at National Review: Hispanics will prove to be even more decisive in the victory of Governor Jerry Brown’s Proposition 30, which raised upper-income taxes and the sales tax, than in the Obama election. And California is the wave of the future. A March 2011 poll by Moore Information found that Republican economic policies were a stronger turn-off for Hispanic voters in California than Republican positions on illegal immigration. Twenty-nine percent of Hispanic voters were suspicious of the Republican party on class-warfare grounds . . .

The Hill: “Conservatives and Tea Partiers are just sick and tired of Republican leaders compromising on the state and national level with Democrats that grow the size of government,” Viguerie said. “We are going to hold their feet to the fire.”

LifeNews: Exit polling data from Tuesday’s presidential election shows the pro-life movement may have itself to blame partly as pro-life voters failed to either show up to vote in the election or did not support pro-life candidate Mitt Romney if they did.

Seattle Post Intelligencer: A Tennessee Republican congressman won re-election on Tuesday overcoming revelations that he once had an affair with a patient and urged her to get an abortion.

Ilya Somin at the Volokh Conspiracy: As co-blogger David Bernstein notes, the two of us conducted anonymous online presidential polls of our Constitutional Law I classes. Here are my results, for a poll conducted over the weekend just before election …

CNA: “We will continue to stand in defense of life, marriage, and our first, most cherished liberty, religious freedom,” said Cardinal Timothy M. Dolan of New York, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.

AZ Central: Judges are rarely voted off the bench in Maricopa County or in the Arizona appellate courts. And despite a campaign by “tea party” and other conservative groups to unseat certain judges in retention elections because of perceived political or judicial leanings, no judges were turned out this year, either.

Jess Bravin at WSJ: With the incoming leadership of the executive and legislative branches nearly a carbon copy of the current versions, Tuesday’s election could have the biggest effect on the sole unelected branch of government: the federal judiciary.

Adam Liptak at NYT: The victories for same-sex marriage on Tuesday, the first ones achieved at the ballot box rather than through courts or legislatures, are evidence of a remarkable shift in public opinion. They are also exceptionally timely data points for the Supreme Court . . . The justices tend to say they are not influenced by public opinion. But they do sometimes take account of state-by-state trends, and the latest developments will not escape their notice . . . “It bolsters our case,” said Brian S. Brown, the president of the National Organization for Marriage. “It’s very difficult to say you need a federal resolution of this question if states are resolving it for themselves.”

Religion Clause Blog: Pew Forum yesterday published its preliminary analysis, based on exit polls, of Tuesday’s presidential vote by religion, race and worship attendance.

Newsday: President Barack Obama captured 71 percent of the Hispanic vote as he won a second term, according to a national exit poll. That translated to a 44 percentage-point advantage over Republican challenger Mitt Romney, who won just 27 percent of the Hispanic vote — down from Republican shares of 31 percent in 2008, 44 percent in 2004 and 35 percent in 2000.

USNews.com: Looking at all 50 states, Obama won the youth vote 60 percent compared to 37 percent for Romney, according to exit polls.

National Review: Florida congressman Allen West trails his Democratic challenger Patrick Murphy by .8 percent and, though Murphy has declared victory, West isn’t conceding. West is behind by a margin greater than the .5 percent required to trigger a recount, but he is demanding one nonetheless, citing vote-counting irregularities.

Huffington Post: Tuesday’s elections brought two historic firsts for religion in American politics: A Buddhist senator and a Hindu representative — both from Hawaii — will join Congress. Democrat Mazie Hirono beat former Gov. Linda Lingle (R), making Hirono the first Buddhist in the Senate.

Victor David Hanson at National Review: Conservatives are divided, acrimoniously so, over three schools of explaining The Defeat . . . 1. The Near Fatalists . . . 2. The Should’ve, Could’ve, Would’ve What If-ers . . . 3. The Big Tenters.

AP: Los Angeles County voters have approved a measure requiring porn performers to wear condoms while filming sex scenes . . .

Nathaniel Frank at the Daily Herald (AP): After the losses in Maine in 2009 and California a year earlier, LGBT advocates knew they needed to craft an effective response to Schubert’s false message that gay equality harms kids. Enter Freedom To Marry. The umbrella group was founded in 2003 by the civil rights lawyer Evan Wolfson, who has consistently preached about winning hearts and minds in between elections rather than in the frenzied lead-up to them. While gay groups had spent millions of dollars on public opinion research before and after the Prop 8 loss in California, no one had ever stopped to pull it all together . . . Frank, author of “Unfriendly Fire” and a visiting scholar at Columbia’s Center for Gender and Sexuality Law, is writing a book called “The Anti-Gay Mind.”

Boston.com (AP): Ray Sullivan, campaign director for the group Fight Back RI, says the General Assembly should have at least four or five additional supporters of same-sex marriage following Tuesday’s election.

Huffington Post: “The Republicans’ insistence in unilaterally disarming on social issues means that only the left is discussing abortion and marriage,” said Penny Nance, president of the conservative Christian group Concerned Women for America. “Refusing to discuss this important issue left their candidates unprepared to intelligently engage on life.” Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of the anti-abortion group Susan B. Anthony List, said polling showed that if the Romney campaign and its backers had been willing to attack Obama on his support for abortion rights and Planned Parenthood and his contraception mandate, it “could have changed the outcome of the election.”

National Journal: Based on racial exit-poll data available from select states, Obama would have definitively lost 12 states to Republican nominee Mitt Romney if only white voters mattered. Add another three possible toss-up states and that’s a full 242 possible electoral votes that Obama would not have.

Bloomberg BusinessWeek: Don’t be afraid of raising taxes to rescue the budget. In Tuesday’s election, 54 percent of California voters approved Proposition 30, a $6 billion tax hike that staves off dire spending cuts. If the measure had failed, trigger reductions would have forced schools and community colleges to trim their budgets by $5.3 billion and made the state’s colleges and universities cut $500 million.

Reuters: World shares and the euro fell on Wednesday as investors worried that the deep fiscal challenge facing U.S. President Barack a day after his re-election could lead to a new recession.

Columbus Dispatch: Two sitting Ohio Supreme Court justices, one Republican and one Democrat, were unseated in yesterday’s election, marking the first time in recent history that two incumbents were removed from the state’s top court.

The AP carries the text.

WorldNetDaily: Tea-party advocate U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann, R-Minn., was declared the winner by the Associated Press with 98 percent of precincts reporting. She led Democratic Farm Labor Party millionaire Jim Graves, by just over 3,000 votes out of nearly 350,000 votes . . .

AP: A slim majority of Puerto Ricans sought to change their ties with the United States and become the 51st U.S. state in a non-binding referendum that would require final approval from Congress.

AP: Democrats strengthened their hold on the Senate but failed Tuesday to recapture the majority in the House of Representatives they lost two years ago.

Seattle Times: Attorney Sheryl Gordon McCloud wins a six-year term on the state Supreme Court, turning back former Justice Richard Sanders, with King County heavily in her favor.

Free Republic: Mitt Romney has fewer votes than John McCain received in 2008! Republicans stayed home!

“Suffering patients need understanding and sound medical treatment, not encouragement to kill themselves. The people of Massachusetts were right to reject this attempt to masquerade doctor-prescribed death as compassion.”

“The caring concern of parents for the health of their young daughters is more important than an abortionist’s bottom line. Montana voters have wisely passed this common-sense law to ensure that parents can protect their daughters from abortionists who prey upon vulnerable young girls. The voice of an abortionist should not be allowed more weight than the voice of parents when their daughter is pregnant.”

Politico has a robust interactive map that covers all states and ballot measures.

Politico reports.

The Hill: Democrats will retain control of the Senate next year, having held on to enough of their endangered seats along with picking up three currently Republican seats.

Politico: Here’s a round-up of the House and Senate incumbents who have lost their races. All races have been called by the Associated Press.

AL.com: Roy Moore, forever known as Alabama’s Ten Commandments judge, has been re-elected chief justice in a triumphant political resurrection after being ousted from that office nearly a decade ago.

Seattle Post Intelligencer (AP): ustices R. Fred Lewis, Barbara Pariente and Peggy Quince each led about 67 percent to 33 percent with about 80 percent of the precincts reporting.

The Hill: McCaskill was leading Akin 52.9 percent to 40.8 percent, with 84 percent of precincts reporting. Libertarian Jonathan Dine pulled in 6.3 percent of the vote.

Telegraph Herald: Democratic Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal won re-election Tuesday as his party fought to retain its narrow hold on the chamber and prevent Republicans from gaining control of most of the levers of state government. As of early Wednesday, The Associated Press had declared Democrats winners in 9 Senate races. With 13 Democrats not up for re-election, that gives the party 22 of the 26 seats it needs to retain outright control. More than a half-dozen other races remained too close to call or appeared headed for recounts, according to AP’s vote tallies.

Politico: “I think this is premature,” he added. “We’ve got a quarter of the vote. Now remember, here is the thing about Ohio. A third of the vote or more is cast early and is won overwhelmingly by the Democrats. It’s counted first and then you count the election day and the question is, by the time you finish counting the election day does it overcome that early advantage that Democrats have built up in early voting, particularly in Cuyahoga County.”
Rove said the network needs to be “careful about calling things when we have like 991 votes separating the two candidates and a quarter of the vote yet to count. Even if they have made it on the basis of select precincts, I’d be very cautious about intruding in this process.”

LifeNews: With 87% of all votes recorded, Question 2 is behind 51-49 percent, losing by about 29,000 votes out of approximately 2.5 million cast.

Mercury News: Democrats appear to have seized a super majority in both legislative chambers, which would give them the ability to approve taxes without Republican support.

Baltimore Sun: Marylanders made history Tuesday as they voted to make same-sex marriage legal — a question that had been defeated each of the 32 times it had been on the ballot in other states.

LifeNews: With 87% of all votes recorded, Question 2 is behind 51-49 percent, losing by about 29,000 votes out of approximately 2.5 million cast.

Foreign Policy: For the head of Libya’s national election commission, the method by which Americans vote is startling in that it depends so much on trust and the good faith of election officials and voters alike. “It’s an incredible system,” said Nuri K. Elabbar, who traveled to the United States along with election officials from more than 60 countries to observe today’s presidential elections as part of a program run by the International Foundation for Electoral Systems (IFES).

Catholic Culture: Bishop R. Walker Nickless of Sioux City purchased a half-page ad in the Sunday edition of the Sioux City Journal to urge readers to vote pro-life.

Catholic Culture: Because politics is the place where competing moral visions of a society meet and struggle, our democracy depends on people of conviction fighting for what they believe in the public square, yet doing so with an abiding respect for one another. That struggle includes and depends on all of us, precisely as Catholics. For if we believe that a particular issue is gravely evil or that it will result in serious damage to society, then we have a duty, both as Catholics and as Americans, to hold political candidates accountable.

Gary Bauer at Human Events: Everyone knows the presidential election will hinge on the economy. But I think abortion will also be on many voters’ minds. That’s because the candidates are presenting voters with sharply contrasting agendas on the defining civil rights issue of our time.

KDVR.com: According to the Boulder Daily Camera, those voters have been welcomed by a sea of tiny white crosses. Above them, an inscription: “3,300 Abortions Daily in the USA.”