The shift to the Rs represents just over 1/2 of 1% of all state legislative seats (i.e., (44) / (7,297)). Interesting, 12 House state legislative chambers and 2 Senate state legislative chambers are controlled by 5 or fewer seats. Small changes in seat distribution can have highly significant effects.
Elections
“Trumping the Elites”
She had it all—the pliant media, the tech oligarchs, Wall Street, the property moguls, the academics, and the all-around “smart people.” What Hillary Clinton didn’t have was flyover country, the economic “leftovers,” the small towns, the unhipstered suburbs, and other unfashionable places. As Thomas Frank has noted, Democrats have gone “from being the party of Decatur to the party of Martha’s Vineyard.” No surprise, then, that working- and middle-class voters went for Donald Trump and helped him break through in states—Michigan, Wisconsin, Iowa—that have usually gone blue in recent presidential elections.
Yes, but. The Democrats also offer a vision of more taxes, more regulation for the ostensible benefit of unsubstantiated lefty causes such as global warming, more cronyism (see: more regulation), more divisiveness, more abuses of power against out-of-favor individuals and groups, and retrenchment in foreign affairs. Despite media spin, you don’t have to be an unemployed coal miner or small-business owner to oppose such things.
(Via The Right Coast.)
Quote of the Day
Nigel Farage, commenting on the election of Donald Trump:
“This is a big opportunity for all British business because once we’ve left that awful EU thing we can do our first trade deal with the United States of America. Isn’t that great?”