Thoughts from the ammo line (WTH Happened edition)

[Valin]

Power Line

Scott Johnson

Nov. 18 2022

Ammo Grrrll advises LET’S GET A GRIP! She writes:

Long-married people may theologically be “one,” but as any Marriage Counselor will tell you, they are also two extremely separate individuals. Since famous novelist, Max Cossack and I are both hard-core political junkies, we have been discussing the latest election more or less non-stop for a week.

(Snip)

I’ve never been a fan of hysteria. Well, maybe that one time that the Roseville Baker’s Square was out of Sour Cream Raisin Pie, but who could blame me? Certainly not the doughnut-loving cops on the SWAT Team that was eventually called. Haha, I kid. In the analysis of any situation, my favorite place to start is with the facts. I believe that Ronald Reagan once accidentally said “facts are stupid things.” He had meant to quote John Adams that “facts are stubborn things.” They are. And in analyzing the results of the 2022 midterm elections, the facts – though hardly cause for celebration — do not justify the level of hysteria.

As of November 10, Republican House candidates had won 50,113,534 votes, or 52.3 percent of the vote; Democrats had won 44,251,768, or 46.2 percent. (Updated mileage varies slightly.)

Famous novelist Max Cossack not only did the research but the math – you didn’t think it was me, did you? — and tells me that Republicans led by 6.1 percent, which is better than their average in those pre-election national polls, the source of the “red wave” prediction. The RealClearPolitics average had Republicans up by 2.5 percent.

(Snip)

Those who point to Trump are using the failure as a pretext to dump on him and in some cases, to paper over their own failures. Some have always loathed Trump and were just waiting for this chance to work up a mob. Some of them need to look in their own states and come up with ways to do as well as Republicans do in Florida.

Hey, Trump critics, I know that many of you – especially our Power Line hosts — have toiled valiantly in the Republican vineyards for many decades. But for others just hatin’ on Trump, how many doors did you knock on? How much money did you donate? How many rallies the size of Trump’s did you organize?

If there is an important lesson here, it is “put not your faith in princes” that you can then rip limb from limb if they fail to do it all alone. Going forward, we are going to need all hands on deck. And a lot less sniping when everything doesn’t work out perfectly. The circular firing squad gets tedious. Especially when the Democrats walk in lockstep like North Korean soldiers in a parade on Kim Il Sung’s birthday.

(Snip)

Oh, one more glass of lemonade from the lemons – since Biden doesn’t believe it was a repudiation election and he intends to change nothing, it will probably be tougher for the few remaining sane Democrats to dislodge him in 2024 and pry Dr. Jill’s hands off the White House door. Various people have suggested – not at all in jest – that Fetterman could be his running mate in 2024. Suits me. Two white guys with room temperature IQs (and by that I mean an uninsulated room with the heat off in Minnesota). One has age-related dementia and the other brain damage from a stroke – so there’s your Diversity right there.

And still 40 percent of the electorate would belly up to the ballot box to pull that lever. Therein lies the fundamental problem. If the Founding Fathers had had any idea how shallow the gene pool would become, they might have said, “Screw it, this may not be worth all our blood and treasure after all. Let’s just switch to coffee and stay with the Crown.”

[Valin]

"I Support The Rightward Most VIABLE Candidate."

WF Buckley jr.