That headline sums up a couple articles from Governing, one about how Democrats have fared in elections since 2004, and another taking the same look at Republicans. The author of both articles, Louis Jacobson, looked at the least competitive states for each party, and concludes that rather than making up ground, each part has gotten weaker in its weakest states. The absence of Republicans in California and Democrats in Tennessee might be extreme examples, but they’re not outliers. They’re the trend.

What’s particularly disheartening for supporters of Howard Dean’s “50-State Strategy”, which includes me, is Democrats bucked this trend for a while. The gains in red states and districts weren’t huge, apparently not enough to convince the skeptics who took over the DNC after Dean stepped down as national chair, but the abandonment of the strategy coincided with massive losses for the Democrats. Yes, there were other factors, but some factors, like a general political polarization, were already around was Dean was chair. The strategy wasn’t based on any assumption of a favorable trend, but on competing where competing was hard. In other words, a strategy for exactly these circumstances.

Another sad irony is the DNC chairs who succeeded Dean and opted against his strategy for party-building were chosen by President Obama, who won with a strategy that was basically Dean’s. The trend of Democrats losing ground everywhere that’s safely read was actually bucked by the Obama campaign, which did better in red states in 2012 than Kerry did in 2004. The difference was quite small, but it was a small improvement rather than the big losses seen down the ballot.

In Minnesota, though Jacobson included us among states never seriously targeted by Republican presidential campaigns (I’m not sure that’s true, but let’s go with it), I think we know we’re not a safely blue state. We’re a purple state where the state Republicans are dysfunctional. It’s also the case the DFL is one of the stronger state Democratic parties. Maybe it’s feedback where the DFL took advantage of the MNGOP’s screw-ups, and the MNGOP screwed up when the DFL was best able to take advantage. That doesn’t mean it’s a permanent situation. Someone new to the state might see the Democrats holding most congressional seats, both houses of the state legislature, and every statewide elected office, and assume we can lumped in with Massachusetts and Maryland, but we can’t. This situation is new, and it’s going to take a bunch of work to maintain it.

At some point, both parties, if they want to form a stable governing majority, are going to realize that they can’t keep conceding huge areas, including whole states. I don’t know if this trend causes, is caused by, or has a common cause with the trend of both congressmen and state legislators voting more consistently with their parties, but unless something intervenes to change that, each party is going to have to figure out how to compete where it’s now weak.  If only one party does this, it will have a huge advantage, if only from a more accurate understanding of the challenge in front of them. Had the 50-State Strategy not been abandoned, that would be us. In my series “Democrats need to do better with white voters”,  I used population density as a way to identify districts that should be winnable, but it’s also a way to identify an underlying problem, that we’re losing where population densities are low. If Democrats crack the problem of winning low-density areas, we win a lot more often. If Republicans crack the problem of winning high-density areas, then they win a lot more often.  That’s the real race we’re in.

For reference, the series on “Democrats need to do better with white voters”:

Part 1 on why we need to do better with white voters

Part 2 on the variables of the problem

Part 3 on population density

Part 4 on strategy
 

Alas, for the failing, flailing GOP, their efforts at trying to inflate small quantities of political dirt into large, hot air turd balloons has resulted in nothing more than popped poop bubbles of failed scandal.

Yet again, Obama has proven to be the Teflon President; nothing sticks. While the popped poop appears to have fallen back onto the GOP and Tea Baggers, leaving them with dirty hands, and red  and smelly brown  feces, er, faces.

Despite the best and worst efforts by the right, President Obama’s approval rating on Monday, according to the Gallop Poll was at 48% Approval  / 45% Disapproval.

So how did he fare during the week of faux scandals?

On Saturday’s Gallop Poll, Obama’s Approval rating had JUMPED to 51%, and his Disapproval rating had DECLINED to 42%.

This is pretty much one of the better sets of polling numbers since the January start of his current term.

So, who feels this way, and how is this reflected broken down by party approval ratings?

On Jan. 27th Dems polled a 91% approval with Repubs at 11% approval; on May 12th, Dems approval polled at 84%, with Repubs polling at 15%.

The smart lesson to be learned from this is that like their wedge issues, dirty politics don’t work, and they can backfire badly, producing the exact opposite of intended results.  But with the ‘think tanks’ all advising the right to continue with the Turd Theater, and the past history of the right doubling down in repeating their mistakes, I think we know which is the more likely course: make up shit, and then try to smear Obama with it.

And in case you were wondering how much attention the GOP “poop-oop-a-dupe” had garnered, as of the May 16th poll:

This is one more example of there is no ‘there’ there for a scandal; it is utterly, completely and hypocritically contrived.

My thanks to facebookers for saving me an image search for GOP presidents back to Nixon with umbrellas held by military and non-military personnel.  I’m sure with enough digging, I could find pics of Gerald Ford and Ike having umbrellas held for them, but I think these make the point, that ALL our presidents have had umbrellas held for them, including by military members.

And so, btw, have our presidential and vice presidential wannabees.

It’s time to object to the fake outrage, and the utter and complete absence of facts by the right.

It is also time to object, loudly and effectively to the efforts by the right to use fake scandals as a distraction, and as a tactic, in place of governing.

Over at the Daily Kos, the blogger Wilbur wrote an excellent parody of the Umbrella-gate faux controversy, which you can read HERE.

It is a parody of the faux controversy over Benghazi.

Anatomy of a scandal: Umbrella-gate!

3:55  Obama appears in Rose Garden with Marine holding an umbrella