For all his mounting failures—record levels of debt, handing Iraq to ISIS, record high numbers on welfare, in poverty, out of the workforce, on and on it goes—there’s one area in which Barack Obama is succeeding massively: handing election victories to Republicans.
When the governor’s mansion in Maryland was handed to a Republican last year people said, “No way! Impossible!” Illinois? “It’ll never flip Republican!” It did. Maryland? Ditto.
Tuesday night Democrats hoped the citizens of Virginia would hand control of the state senate to Democrat governor Terry McAuliffe. It wasn’t even close. Democrats could have gained control by gaining just one senate seat. Didn’t happen.
Going back to 1900 the state of Kentucky has had 28 governors, 22 of them Democrats. It’s a state that’s been in Democrat hands since as long as anyone alive can remember. Tuesday night Kentuckians voted a in Tea Party Republican. With the flipping of this seat Republicans now hold 32 governorships, Democrats just 16! And it’s going to get worse.
Barack Obama is doing damage to the Democrat party may last decades if not generations. From sea to shining sea his radical leftist policy agenda is costing lawmakers, mayors, city councils, school boards, dog-catchers to be at a disadvantage if the letter “D” is next to their name on an election ballot. He’s fortifying red state strongholds, turning purple states red, toppling Democrat seats in solidly blue states. Republicans should almost lament the 22nd Amendment, with another term in office Obama could well deliver the governorships of California and New York.
Many voters, Democrats in particular, are in love with the idea of Obama but not in love with Obama’s ideas. The notion of casting their ballots for a young, good-looking, articulate, black-American struck the right nerve for millions. But his obsessive desires to fundamentally change America into debt-laden, socialist utopia for bisexual transgender unionized illegals do not.
The Affordable Care Act, amnesty for illegals, adding trillions in new debt, weakening our military, expanding the IRS, increasing energy costs via reams of new EPA mandates, forcing transgenderism on schools, nor a myriad of other “nation changing” actions he’s taken while in office are electoral winners. (Which is why he does most of them via Executive Order.)
Prior to the last elections Obama commented how he was not personally on the ballot but his policies were. He was right. Americans are not just rejecting his policies they’re hopping mad over them. Since Obama isn’t on the ballot voter are taking that anger out on the next best thing — anyone with a “D” after their name.
Obama’s first mid-term elections in 2010 was disastrous for the Democrat party. The Tea Party wave swept oodles of Democrats out of office. The Democratic Party suffered massive defeats in both national and state level elections; some of the biggest losses by one political party since the Great Depression.
At the federal level the Republican Party gained 63 seats in the House thus recapturing the majority making it the largest seat change since 1948 and the largest for any midterm election since 1938. Republicans gained 6 seats in the Senate. As impressive as those gains were, state legislative results far outpaced D.C. Republicans gained 680 seats in state legislative races! The previous record pickup was 628 set by Democrats in the post-Watergate elections of 1974. The 2010 midterms left Republicans in control of 26 state legislatures and dropped Democrats to controlling just 15 of 50. Republicans took 11 governorships from the Democrats in 2010. The 2010 midterm also resulted in a Republican sleeping in 29 of our 50 state governor’s mansions.
To further highlight the degree of beat down, 54 incumbents lost re-election bids in 2010, of that 54, 52 were Democrats. Just two Republicans lost their re-election races. Fourteen open seats that were held by Democrats were won by Republicans, only one open seat held by a Republican was won by a Democrat.
The 2012 elections were basically a push. Obama won a second term with 51% of popular vote. In the U.S. Senate Democrats recovered one of the seats lost in 2010. Democrats held their majority in the Senate Republicans held theirs in the House. Democrats lost one governorship, Republicans gained one.
Then came November 4, 2014. Up for grabs; all 435 House seats 36 of 100 Senate seats, 38 state and territorial governorships, 46 state legislatures. Though it didn’t seem possible, Democrat defeats in 2010 were dwarfed. Republicans gained control of the U.S. Senate for the first time since 2006, increased their already commanding majority in the House and gained two more governorships.
The 2014 elections resulted in the largest Republican majority in nearly a century; 54 seats in the Senate, 247 in the House, 31 governorships and 68 state legislative chambers. Republicans gained their largest majority in the United States Congress and largest majority of state legislatures since 1928. Of the 36 Senate races, the Republican Party won 24 the Democratic Party won 12. Things at the governor’s level were even worse. Elections were held for the governorships of 36 of the 50 U.S. states. Republicans won 24.
As brutal as the 2014 governor’s elections were for Democrats, state legislature elections were worse still. A total of 6049 seats were up for election, fully 82% of the total number of state legislative seats in the USA. When the post-election dust finally settled the number of Republican-controlled state houses sat at 68. The highest number of state legislatures in Republican hands since 1928. The smallest number in Democrat control since 1860.
The severity of the pounding Democrats took in 2014 is almost impossible to understate. In a prize fight between Obama’s policies and the Great Depression, the Depression just barely eeked out a split decision. All across America scores of Democrat elected officials have been relegated to the scrap heap as Americans soundly reject the agenda of this president. He is the worst thing to happen to the Democrat Party in nearly a century and has done for the Republican Party what it could only fantasize about doing for itself.
Yet this president is so singularly focused on bringing about his vision for America, his version of the ‘fundamental transformation’ he believes the nation needs that he soldiers on –alone if necessary– pushing a radically far-left agenda harder with each passing day. If he cannot get congressional buy in (aka: the American people’s buy in) he goes the Executive Order route. Forcing through wildly unpopular changes that Americans do not want and forcing elected Democrats to walk a tight rope – stand by my man, on the one hand; realize that standing by my man may cost me my job on the other. Democrats should want this president gone more than they want their next breath of air. THEY should impeach him!
Half of the Senators who voted for Obamacare are no longer in the U.S. Senate. A good portion of those who are still there have yet to face voters since casting their votes for the ACA back in 2010. Their turn at the trough comes up in 2016 when, after another year of Obama continuing to govern against the will of the people, even more Democrats are likely to fall. If the next year of this presidency resemble the first seven, Republicans will extend their majorities from Boston to San Diego.
The Great Depression has held the belt for nearly a century. In this prize fight analogy the ring announcer is introducing the challenger now, “Fighting out of the blue corner, he hails from the island of Hawaii,….we think,….Barack ‘The Destroyer of Democrats’ Obama!”
Derrick Wilburn is the Founder and Chairman of the Rocky Mountain Black Conservatives and American Conservatives of Color.
He is a sought after speaker/presenter, and is also a renown author and columnist, contributing columns and editorials to the Colorado Springs Gazette and Colorado Common Sense News. He can also be read nationally on American Thinker, Allen B. West and the Tea Party News Network.
His online videos may be viewed on the ACofC YouTube channel and he frequently delivers the Tea Party National Weekly Address.
