Who’s to Blame?
Posted in Main Blog (All Posts) on January 20th, 2010 5:43 am by HL
Who’s to Blame?
Nate Silver tries to explain the 31-point swing in the Massachusetts vote: from Barack Obama’s 26-point victory in the 2008 presidential election to Martha Coakley’s 5-point loss last night.
He blames 10 points on the national environment, citing generic ballot tests that show “the Democrats’ position has worsened by a net of 10 points since November 2008.”
Another 11 points of blame “should be assigned to Coakley. That represents the difference between the 58 percent of vote that she received at her high-water mark in the polls to the 47 percent she received on Election Day.”
The remaining 10 points are spread out “as evenly as possible, giving 3 more points to Coakley, 3 more points to the national environment, and 4 to Massachusetts-specific special contingencies.”
Conclusion: “If you follow through on the math, this would suggest that Coakley would have won by about 8 points, rather than losing by 5, had the national environment not deteriorated so significantly for Democrats. It suggests that the Democrats would have won by 9 points, rather than losing by 5, had the candidate been someone other than Coakley.”
How the Vote Shifted in Massachusetts
Charles Franklin stayed up late crunching numbers and found that Scott Brown’s (R) vote totals in Massachusetts were essentially identical, in aggregate, to those Sen. John McCain received in the 2008 presidential election.
But it was a very different picture for Martha Coakley (D). Her best town gave her only about 80% of Barack Obama’s vote. Even in the towns she won, she was dramatically underperforming the Obama vote.
What Now on Health Care?
With political strategists in Washington and Massashusetts pointing fingers at who is to blame for yesterday’s U.S. Senate loss, the Washington Post notes “the real debate for the Democrats will be how to proceed. The most immediate problem is what to do with the health-care bill. Democrats from the House and the Senate have been negotiating furiously, trying to harmonize competing bills. Now the issue is whether they can quickly agree on how to pass a bill and whether they face a public backlash by doing so.”
The Wall Street Journal notes the loss “sparked what could become a bitter fight between liberals who urged Democrats to keep on course with health care, and centrists who argued the party needed to focus on the economy. Some of the latter suggested the party drop its health-care overhaul altogether.”
According to The Hill, White House officials “would prefer the House pass the Senate health care bill without changes, which would obviate the need for a second Senate vote on the legislation.”
“The problem is that many liberal lawmakers in the House don’t like the Senate bill. To compensate for this opposition, there is a proposal that the House would then pass a second measure making changes to the Senate bill. That measure could then pass through the upper chamber at a later date under special budgetary rules known as reconciliation, which allow legislation to pass with a simple majority.
Roll Call notes that discussions among Democratic leaders “were expected to get more serious today, as the reality of the Massachusetts defeat takes hold.”
