Turnout Got Low, Low, Low, Low

I'm just catching up on some light reading and I came across and an article from Yahoo news that does a really good job of outlining just how miserable turnout was in the 2014 elections.

Voter turnout in last week's midterm elections was terrible. How terrible? Just 36.3 percent of eligible voters cast votes — the worst turnout in 72 years, the New York Times reports. Only the 1942 election (33.9 percent) had a lower rate of voter turnout.

Here's a quick breakdown, based on preliminary estimates of voting data from the United States Elections Project:

• Less than half of the eligible voters in 43 states cast votes.

• The seven that saw more than half: Maine, Wisconsin, Alaska, Colorado, Oregon, Minnesota and Iowa.

• No state cracked 60 percent.

• Maine, at 59.3 percent, had the highest voter turnout percentage-wise in the country.

• Indiana, at 28 percent, had the lowest.

• In California, Texas and New York — the three largest states in terms of population — less than a third of eligible voters voted.

• New York, at 28.8 percent, had the fourth lowest turnout rate in the country.

I don't have anything particularly insightful to add, but I wanted to share it with you all and also keep it here archived so that we have easy access to these statistics later. We have to do better.

This Ad Though (Second Installment)

As election season wears on, the ads are getting weirder.

Bizarre, Sexist Ad Makes My Brain Explode

Ignoring for a second the misleading implications it contains about Obama and his presidency, and there are more than a few, this ad still infuriates me. Although Americans for Prosperity funder John Jordan claims the "the purpose of this is to treat women voters more like adults" the effect is quite the opposite. What this ad implies to me is that women are incapable of understanding anything outside of their burning desire to be loved and protected by men. "It's understandable that women got tricked by Barack Obama because he's a man and women are simple and gullible."

I didn't actually know I could want to vote for Democrats more than I already did, but now I do just to spite the sexist assholes who produced this ad.

Kansas Secretary of State Refuses to Remove Democrat From Ballot

Remember yesterday when I wrote that Democratic candidate Chad Taylor's withdrawal from the Kansas Senate race could lead to a possible upset in Pat Roberts' bid for re-election? Apparently Republicans were thinking the same thing.

Not only the did the national party dispatch top Republican strategist Chris LaCivita to take control of the campaign but Republican Secretary of State Kris Kobach is trying to block Taylor from removing his name from the ballot. Taylor says he did everything he was supposed to do to legally withdraw his name, Kobach says he didn't. Sounds to me like yet another example of Republicans trying to change the rules to the game when they stop winning.

Six Senate Forecasts Combined, Plus Meet My Friend Pete!

If you're like me, when you hear the phrase "Senate forecast" your first reaction is "cloudy with a chance of boring." It's not that I don't care what's going on in elections across our country (hi, have we met?) or that I don't appreciate a good data nerd out. It's just that there's so much information out there, so many numbers flying around, that it's hard to parse it all out- especially when it's your job to figure out how we're going to win rather than what the actual likelihood of doing so is.

Luckily there are some people not like me, including my good friend Pete Solecki (to be clear Pete also cares about how we're going to win but that's another blog post.) Pete, in addition to being my bro back from the whoa back, is a data and digital strategist of the Democratic persuasion. He has helpfully compared, contrasted and finally combined six leading forecasts for the 2014 Senate elections. (That's what you're looking at above.) He maps it all out for you on his new website here. He's very smart that Pete Solecki. Look forward to more links to Pete's page from CampaignSick or why not follow him all on your own?

Kansas Could Have An Independent Senator. So That's Exciting.

If you're a Republican Senator, you'd think your Democratic opponent dropping out before the general election would be a good thing. Not so for Incumbent Republican Senator Pat Roberts who just survived a tea party primary challenge. Democrat Chad Taylor's surprising announcement that he was withdrawing from the Kansas' US Senate race paves the way for a potential galvanization of anti-Roberts sentiment behind Independent Greg Orman.

Fox News (I know.):

"A recent poll from Democrat-leaning Public Policy Polling showed Orman had a 43 percent to 33 percent lead over Roberts if the race was just between the two of them.

On the other hand, if all three candidates were in the race, 32 percent of voters picked Roberts, 25 percent picked Taylor and 23 percent picked Orman, according to a Public Policy Polling poll.

Orman had positioned himself as Roberts' most formidable opponent, and his fundraising was more robust than Taylor's...

Orman, the co-founder of a business capital and management services firm, ran for Roberts' seat in 2007 as a Democrat but dropped out early in 2008. He said he grew unhappy with both parties.

On Wednesday, Orman received the endorsement of Traditional Republicans for Common Sense, a group of former moderate GOP state legislators unhappy with the party's conservative leanings."

Huh. This just became a race to watch.

Michelle Nunn's Original Campaign Memo Winds Up Online

Guys, what, what, what, are we doing? Why did this wind up online? Check and double check that you have the correct email addresses when sending emails!! (That's what I'm assuming happened. If this was on purpose then...I can't even. No one cares about your level of access. Shut up.)

The memo itself isn't particularly earth shattering. It shares insights like, "a Democrat needs minority votes to win in Georgia" and "Jews have money." It also predicts that she will be seen as a carpet bagger since she grew up outside the state and spent her residence in Georgia in an affluent Atlanta suburb while most of the state is rural. My favorite part is that this model (even within the memo) is marked as "Confidential and Proprietary"

Really, Blue Labs? Groundbreaking stuff.

The real revelation (and in my opinion kind of a buried lede) is that the foundation that Nunn runs could be construed as kind of a shit show. According the National Review (I know)"The document also makes reference to a 2010 audit that concluded Points of Light’s accounting system was 'not adequate to account for federal funds.'"Points of Light also gave a $33,000 grant to Islamic Relief USA, which has uncomfortably close ties to Hamas. No wonder her policy on Israel was listed as "TBD."

To her credit, Nunn had a pretty good line on the flap at a recent campaign stop. “I always thought I wanted to run an open and transparent campaign but this has gone beyond what I anticipated or intended.”

Today in Voter Suppression: Husted Ruling Made Permanent

You may remember one of my favorite cases from last election cycle was OFA v. Husted because of the clever legal angle and the fact that Husted was just so blatantly a jerk about it. This ruling simply says that the decision (in OFA's favor) remains in place for this November.

"The Obama Campaign sued Husted and the state of Ohio in 2012, alleging the change violated Ohioans rights to participate equally in elections. The courts sided with the plaintiffs, concluding it was wrong to treat some voters (non-military) different than others (military). The Ohio Supreme Court rejected a request for an emergency stay, and Husted released new hours including the weekend voting days.

The 2012 case remained open and Wednesday's summary judgment makes the ruling permanent. The decision does not change cuts made earlier this year on the front end of Ohio's early voting period."

So...yay! I just wanted to share some good voting news.

Eric CANT-or Loses His Primary

In case you live under a rock (or just not in DC) Republican Majority Leader, Eric Cantor, lost his primary to a guy named after sausage on Tuesday. So on the one hand everyone is all, "Woo! Take that Eric Cantor" and on the other people are wondering what it means when the House Majority Leader is deemed not extreme enough to win his own primary. Meanwhile, something funny happened and it was this.

When You Support CampaignSick, It's Actually Going To Fox News

Okay so that would be CRAZY and is absolutely totally not the case, but if the National Republican Congressional Committee has anything to say about it, it's not that far-fetched. The fundraising scheme (and scheme it is) is summed up nicely by Jay Bookman at the Atlantic Journal Constitution.

Kyrsten Sinema is a Democratic congresswoman running for re-election in Arizona. So if you wanted to make a donation to Sinema, you might Google her campaign and find yourself directed to the website http://contribute.sinemaforcongress.com/ .

At the "contribute.sinemaforcongress.com" site, you'd find a large, attractive picture of Sinema, with a large banner reading "Krysten Sinema for Congress" in the same color scheme as her campaign signs, along with a checklist of possible donation amounts.

Except the site is a Republican fundraising site, with contributions going to defeat Sinema. It does say that, in smaller type below the banner: "Make a Contribution Today to Help Defeat Kyrsten Sinema and candidates like her". But by design that single word "defeat" is easy to read past or overlook, and is the only real clue of what's going on. From the URL to the banner headline to the candidate's picture to the candidate's colors, the overwhelming intent of the site is to defraud.

This is pretty freaking gross, you guys and it demonstrates once again both that Republicans don't think their candidates can win on their own merit and that rather than resort to things like more sensible platforms and more likeable candidates, they are all too happy to cheat.

By the way if you still want to support CampaignSick, I promise it will not go to other blogs.