It matters more than usual which party controls the state legislatures, because 2020 was a census year, and it's time once again for the partisan game of redistricting. Even if you think you only care about Congress, the House of Representatives is at stake as these lines are drawn, creating safe districts and competitive districts for Republicans and Democrats.
I hadn't noticed any reports about the state legislatures, so I did a search. What came up first was this headline in the NYT: "Democrats’ ‘Blue Wave’ Crashed in Statehouses Across the Country."
When I see "wave," I picture a real wave, an ocean wave, so if it "crashes" on something, it hits with power and inundates. So I thought the Democrats had done very well at the state legislature level. Then I realized this is the problem of the dying metaphor that George Orwell wrote about. It began as a vivid image, and some of us still see the image in our head when we read it, but it's used routinely by some writers — it's just a go-to phrase — and they don't coordinate the image with the words they use alongside it.
In this NYT headline, the verb "crash" was chosen to go with "blue wave" perhaps because it feels like a strong action verb or perhaps because it seems to go with "wave." Waves do crash. But here "crash" doesn't properly express what happens when waves crash. If a wave crashes on a building — such as a "statehouse" — the wave succeeds. The building is dominated. The headline uses "crash" more like the way the stock market crashes. It just collapses. It doesn't crash on something.
Notice that the headline has the wave crashing "in" rather than "on" statehouses. The preposition indicates that the writer wasn't picturing the action of a wave at all.
How can a wave crash in a building?
I did have a moment where I thought Oh, the Democrats got control of the redistricting! But, no. It's the opposite:
On Wednesday, the results were not yet final, but the National Conference of State Legislatures, which tracks state-level races, said there were changes or potential shifts of control in just four chambers: the New Hampshire House and Senate, which Republicans took back from Democrats, and possibly the House and Senate in Arizona, though the contests for those chambers were still too close to call. He said it was the first time since 1946 that so few chambers were changing hands.
He? Who he?
“This is crazy in that almost nothing has changed,” said Tim Storey, an expert with the N.C.S.L.
Oh, him. Tim Storey.
“It really jumps off the page.”
Democrats failed to take control of the Texas House from Republicans, a prize that had seemed within reach. They also lost the battle for North Carolina’s House and Senate, chambers they had set their sights on after years of Republican control. And they failed to flip the Iowa House, according to the N.C.S.L. Democrats also failed to flip the Houses in Pennsylvania and Michigan, Mr. Storey said....
He said Democrats had achieved some victories, like preventing Republicans from gaining a supermajority in the Wisconsin Assembly, which will stop the Legislature from overriding any veto of electoral maps by the Democratic governor. And the election of Judge Jennifer Brunner to the Ohio Supreme Court reduces the court’s conservative majority from four to three, he said....
Before Tuesday’s election, Republicans controlled about three-fifths of all 98 partisan legislative chambers. If no other chambers flip as new results come in, that Republican dominance will not change.
“It was a huge night for state Republicans,” said David Abrams, deputy executive director of the Republican State Leadership Committee, which focuses on electing Republicans to state offices. “Democrats spent hundreds of millions of dollars to flip state chambers. So far, they don’t have a damn thing to show for it.”...
ADDED: 2 things:
1. “It really jumps off the page” is another dying metaphor.
2. The difficulty of flipping a legislature to the party that is winning statewide elections is evidence that the existing districting has given an advantage to the party that controlled the line-drawing the last time around.
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31 comments:
Good.
Down ballot the Republicans did very well. Picking up 6 seats in the House with more races too close to call, kept the Senate and stopped efforts to flip the state houses in both Michigan and Wisconsin but yet Trump lost?
I wonder how they know all the counts for the House and Senate, yet, they have no clue about the President who was on the same ballot.
“Perfect Storm”. Anyone who still says “perfect storm “ is a lazy thinker.
I am a little nervous about “kept the Senate” due to the obvious fraud in Michigan and the scores of millions the Democrats will spend in Georgia if the Senate is at stake in that runoff. Hopefully these vote counting issues will be settled by then and the count in Georgia will be fair and secure.
Those who say that there is no evidence of fraud will of course be so confident that no fraud is taking place that they won’t have any issues with enhanced security, since logically, it will have zero effects on the outcome, right?
I am curious what kind of rationalization they will come up with for that one.
Another example of bad writing:
He said it was the first time since 1946 that so few chambers were changing hands.
It doesn’t make sense to say “the first time since 1946” unless either 1946 or the number of chambers were a threshold or benchmark. What he meant to say is that the last time so few chambers changed hands was1946.
The difficulty of flipping a legislature to the party that is winning statewide elections is evidence that the existing districting has given an advantage to the party that controlled the line-drawing the last time around.
Maybe, if that’s what you want it to be evidence of. It might also be evidence that the more local the race, the less important national party identity is.
Blogger MeMySelf said...Down ballot the Republicans did very well.
The dominance of Trump is obscuring that fact—except for the president, it was a good night for Republicans. I don’t know what the current situation is with the White House—the media wants us to believe it is over, but from what I can tell, it is still all dependent on PA and PA is still undecided.
As for lessons, it seems that even if Trump loses, Trumpism won. If Republicans can find a less abrasive Trump, they could win it all in 2024.
Can anyone write anymore?
THEOLDMAN
"layers and layers of editors...."
Headlines are usually written by someone else than the author of the article, which is the usual excuse. Back in the day, those who composed headlines would read the first few paragraphs quickly and come up with a headline that FIT due to typeface size constraints. With the advent of digital stories, headline-composing might still have time constraints (I doubt much, though) but would not fall under the other. I enjoy the Hostess' take on this subject.
P.S. I don't hold informal blog posts or comments to the same standard.
They didn't think to cheat all the way down ballot.
That comes later.
Well, that, and the fact the cheating happens in cities that are already completely controlled by Democraticals.
You cannot steal what is already yours.
The Democrats never seem interested in governing.
They want the power to change things.
But the actual running of the government and bring accountable to the people isn’t something that interests them.
The sloppy writing and editing shouldn't be a surprise given the folks in those roles were likely chosen for their identity characteristics and not their relevant skills. This focus on writing that "makes sense" is just further perpetuation of an oppressive cisheteropatriarchal white supremacist society.
"2. The difficulty of flipping a legislature to the party that is winning statewide elections is evidence that the existing districting has given an advantage to the party that controlled the line-drawing the last time around. “
It’s also evidence of fraud concentrated in a few urban precincts helping them to win statewide elections.
"If Republicans can find a less abrasive Trump, they could win it all in 2024.”
I can’t believe I am saying this, but I am going with Ted Cruz until somebody changes my mind.
If Republicans can find a less abrasive Trump, they could win it all in 2024.
...but that's the thing, innit? You need the antagonism in order for it to work.
I see the crashing wave metaphor the opposite way that Althouse sees it. A wave out is the ocean can be huge and powerful, moving along. When you encounter it out there on your surfboard, it tosses you at will. However, when it meets the rocky shore *i.e., Statehouse", it crashes and looses all of its power - its gone. The big rocks remain as they were - it takes eons of countless waves crashing into them before any noticeable change.
I had the same impression. A wave "crashes" into buildings and destroys them. Of course waves also break and crash before they reach the shore, but that just leaves an ambiguity about what happened. This had to be a mixed metaphor based on what can happen to airplanes.
Also, I'm suspicious about the 1946 reference. In the congressional elections, it was a major Republican landslide after years of Democrat rule. Surely more than a few state legislatures changed hands as well.
As a life long surfer waves that can't be ridden are worthless. A good wave will allow a long ride with moments of exquisite religious like rapture. What happened on Tuesday was just shore pound closeouts washed up on tbe reef of the Republican Senate and if litigated the Supreme Court. The tide WILL change and the waves will get better. Do what surfers do: chill out and wait foe the swell and tide to coincide. 🤙
Wendy, I wonder how so many newly found votes seem to be going exclusively for Biden, when there is so much evidence on down ballot options that the vote was far more split, if not in the GOP's favor, then very close to 50/50 rather than 100%.
The next thing I wonder is how that near 50% of the population will feel about their vote being suppressed in mass.
Republicans retained control in Montana and picked up seats, AND the rec pot initiative passed easily.
Also we voted in a Repub governor for the first time in 20 years. A very religious guy though volatile.
So here we are headed for the 2021 session with the GOP vowing to undo the will of the people! Lol.
This should be fun.
Well, Blue wave turns out to be tempest in a teapot
wouldn't work because most people not use teapots
(and it would have been true, which is the opposite of what the media are about)
This election may go to the House, where the vote will be about 28 to 22 to keep Trump in office. I pray Madame Speaker Pelosi may have the opportunity to call this vote in the House, and to have her leadership as Speaker end with it. After listening to Trump give his next State of the Union speech, of course.
The Dems needed to take state houses in 2020 to achieve redistricting in their favor with the Census that has occurred this year, despite the pandemic. That ain't happening. The last time the Dem Party was faced with this unbearable situation, during Texas state redistricting, they ran and hid in New Mexico in an attempt to block the redistricting. Didn't work then, won't work now. This is a party in its death throes, reduced to attempting to steal a national election in broad daylight because despite having academics, news media, business elites and China behind them since 2016, they could not win outright.
Trump dominates all the space in a room.
It was looking very much like a Red Wave until lots and lots of votes were "found."
Heartless Aztec said...
As a life long surfer waves that can't be ridden are worthless.
so, Aztec... Let's move on to serious issues? Long Board? Short Board?
Can we agree, that bogie boards are bogus?
What about Vals vs. Locs? Is this My Beach? or our beach?
Wild Chicken - Isn't the new Montana R governor the one that body slammed someone?
How about another bad metaphor: "Blue Wave is Toothless in 2020"
"Blue Wave Doesn't Hold Water". Better?
Even if fraud allegations have legs, it still seems Republicans are more popular overall than Trump. Odd that what amuses Althouse about Trump horrifies others. I'd hoped people would see beyond the bombast to the policies and practices, but that apparently didn't happen. Maybe the "Trump-is-divisive" argument really does hold water. Or maybe the non-stop daily references to Trump, who seems to be the cause of everything bad from kids in cages to COVID to the heartbreak of psoriasis, wore too many people down.
I'm still mystified any "swing" voter would find the atrocious Biden-Harris duo to be a better choice. I suppose their priorities are not mine.
"Early voting" doesn't help either.
Isn't the new Montana R governor the one that body slammed someone?'"
Yes that's him. Hadn't acted out lately though.
2. The difficulty of flipping a legislature to the party that is winning statewide elections is evidence that the existing districting has given an advantage to the party that controlled the line-drawing the last time around.
Or it could mean that Democrats are super-concentrated in cities and college towns. That's the premise of the voter efficiency gap, anyway. One tactic for drawing districts to your party's advantage is to pack the other party into as few districts as possible, but Democrats are packing themselves of their own free will, without any action necessary by the GOP.
Crashed as in crashed from their drug high, not a crashing wave. I don't know the specific drug in this case but back when I was in college people who used diet pills to stay up all night studying had to take care not to "crash" during the exam.
This is a rather clear sign that Biden's "victory" is fraudulent.
Pretty much every place outside of CA (where Democrats legalized ballot harvesting to steal elections) and Detroit, Milwaukee, Philly, and Atlanta, the GOP in generally and Trump in particular, did better than in 2016 (and 2018).
It's only in the 4 cities where what looks like straightforward vote fraud took place, where Trump does worse.
In the normal course of human events, it doesn't happen that 4 cities are just completely different in their reaction than the entire rest of the country.
So when it happens that the voting, in just those 4 cities, differs from historical and current norms, while at the same time the vote counters in those 4 cites are acting like they're committing fraud (if you're objecting to outside observers from eh other Party watching your counting, that's a pretty strong fraud tipoff), the proper expectation is that fraud took place.
Those 4 cities "flipped" 4 States from Trump to Biden. "Flip" any three of them back, and Trump wins.
So, what's the true story of this election?
Trump one. GOP Kept the Senate, GOP almost took back the House, GOP keep the State Houses, GOP improved on governors
And the polls were complete and utter garbage
Susan Collins won by 8.8%, getting over 51% of the vote. In the entire race, she never once led in ANY public poll.
https://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2020/senate/me/maine_senate_collins_vs_gideon-6928.html#!
Going forward, if you pay attention to 538, or any of the pollsters they approve of, you're simply asking to be lied to
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