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(Mildred Younger campaigned for California State Senate - Doing it the old Fashioned way)

Coming up on the off-year elections in 2010 I ran across a documentary produced in 1954 about the off-year elections of that particular year.

Alben Barkley(former Vice-President to Truman): “Finally I said to him ‘how’s politics?’ – ‘well, he said, ‘it’s pretty badly mixed’. That created some suspicion in my mind, well I said ‘well, how am I running?’ ‘Well, he said ‘it’s gonna be pretty close’. Well I said ‘you’re for me aren’t you?’ Well, he said ‘I thought I’d vote for Chandler’. Well, I said ‘my friend, how can you do that? Now don’t you remember that when you couldn’t get your allotment fixed up that I did it? ‘ He said, ‘yes you did’. ‘And when you couldn’t get your insurance I got that straightened out”’ He said ‘yes, you did’. And I said ‘and when you were injured over there in France didn’t I sit on the bed with you for an hour?’ And he said ‘yes, and I never enjoyed a mans visit in my life like I did yours.’ And I said ‘ when I came home and the Armistice came didn’t you want to get home at once and didn’t you write to me and didn’t I write General Pershing and weren’t you on your way home in a month?’ And he said ‘yes, you did that.’ And I said ‘didn’t you want a loan on your farm, and didn’t I help you?’ And he said ‘yes.’ ‘Didn’t you have a loan on your property when the flood washed it away?’ He said ‘yes, you did that’. I said ‘well, how can you vote against me?’ Well he said ‘my friend, what in the thunder have done for me lately?’

Seems the styles have changed, the methods, the dirt - but then as now, it's all about politics and the art of the horse race.

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Rachel breaks through some of the spin on the election results from last night. Unlike most of the pundits in the “mainstream” media who have been doing their best to paint what happened in New Jersey and Virginia as some sort of shift by the electorate back to the Republican Party, Rachel does a very nice job keeping the results in perspective. As Rachel also notes, the Tea Baggers are gearing up for more conservative challengers in 2010 and for some more Astroturf protests on Capitol Hill, undeterred by the loss in NY-23.

MADDOW: But we begin tonight with the end of election 2009 and the very exciting beginning of election 2010 -- which, of course, starts with the breathless spinning of last night's results.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GOV. HALEY BARBOUR ®, MISSISSIPPI: There's no question that these elections propel Republicans into 2010.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We won one in California, we won the big one in New York 23, where the Obama agenda was at play were in the two congressional races, both of which were won by Democrats.

REP. ERIC CANTOR ®, VIRGINIA: Taking away from this, you know, we look to '010. People have clearly made a choice in our state. They have said no to the one-way street of the economic policies of the Obama administration and the Pelosi Congress.

MICHAEL STEELE, RNC CHAIRMAN: Assume the Heisman position. Yes, baby.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I told you!

STEELE: There you go. That's my moment.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MADDOW: Yes, baby.

Spin aside, the political map in this country did change last night. Before last night, here was the partisan breakdown of governor seats across the country: 22 Republican governors and 28 Democrats.

After last night, this is what it looks like. Yes, I know, stunning, right? Republicans picked up Virginia and New Jersey. So, we're now at 24 Republicans and 26 Democrats.

In terms of congressional races, last night California's 10th district stayed blue, but it got a little blue-ier as moderate Democrat Ellen Tauscher was replaced by progressive Democrat John Garamendi.

The congressional race that got all of the attention last night was, of course, in the northeast. It was New York's 23rd congressional district.

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Jim Tedisco finally conceded and it's official. The GOP's ship has sunk completely.

GOP congressional candidate Jim Tedisco has conceded the congressional race in the 20th district. Tedisco moments ago called Democrat Scott Murphy to concede and Murphy has declared victory.

Murphy will be issuing a press release shortly, and will organize a press event with volunteers tomorrow in Glens Falls. The location has not yet been determined.

Here's the DCCC's remarks:

“In trying to win the NY-20 special election, the RNC, NRCC, and their Republican allies went all in on the losing gamble that voters would prefer their ‘just say no’ approach to President Obama’s bold plans to get the economy back on track.

“Scott Murphy’s victory in this district where Republicans outnumber Democrats by more than 70,000 represents a rejection of the obstructionist agenda and scare tactics that have become the hallmark of House Republicans.

This race should never have been close, but to think Murphy beat Tedisco in a mostly Republican district is stunning. He was up by over 20 points before they turned into the Limbaugh National Committee and Michael Steele and the GOP started blocking everything President Obama tried to do. Don't forget, there were ads there targeted at Limbaugh and they did not disappoint. As for Steele, has the Death Watch begun? I wrote this a little while ago.

The latest word on the street is that if he fails to deliver NY-20, a Republican district, he will be ousted, but Tedisco has a solid lead in the polls.

According to multiple former high-level RNC staffers familiar with the dynamics involved, Steele is unlikely to survive in the post if favored Republican Jim Tedisco loses his open-seat race to Democrat Scott Murphy. The special election, scheduled for March 31, is to fill a vacancy left when Kirsten Gillibrand took Hillary Clinton’s Senate seat. If Tedisco loses, the ex-staffers said, “Steele is done.” Completely, definitively?

In all likelihood, NY-20 will turn Republican no matter who had won the RNC job, but that won't give Steele a reprieve for very long.

If Tedisco had won, Republicans and the media would be screaming that Obama's leadership caused the win for him and that the Democratic Party is in BIG trouble. The media would have done segment after segment asking the question, Is President Obama's agenda in trouble? And then he would have had to defend himself over and over again. Let's see how it plays out in the media.
And now for the some comedy musings of Rep. Pete Sessions:

Rep. Pete Sessions (Texas), chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee, said that although Tedisco came up short that his message of fiscal discipline provided GOPers a blueprint on which to run next year.

"Since Election Day, we continue to hear the growing chorus of frustrated and concerned citizens who demand more from their government than profligate spending and mountains of debt that will be paid for in higher taxes by our children and grandchildren," said Sessions. "Although Jim was unsuccessful in his hope to change Washington, he has shed light on our Party's efforts to win back the majority in the House."

Chris Cillizza gives a mild response to the outcome, but does say:

As we have said before, the closeness of the result makes it tough to draw too many national conclusions from this race. One thing is for sure: this is an opportunity lost for Republicans.

With the Teabaggers leading the way, Tedisco never had a chance.

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