Look, I know pundits gotta pundit, but I was reading a piece Mark Leibovich in The Atlantic, In Praise of Clarity, and was struck by his language. He writes of the Democratic Party’s, “electoral battering” and a “drubbing.”
Now, without any doubt, the Democrats lost. But let’s note the following:
- The final popular vote gap between Trump and Harris is going to be less that two percentage points. And that is a conservative estimate. Nate Silver is projecting it to be less than a point. And yes, Trump will have won the popular vote, which is a big deal. But, if Silver’s projection is correct, he will have won the plurality and the not the absolute majority. This, at least, has implications for how much of a “drubbing” we just witnessed.
- Yes, the House appears to be going to the Republican, but narrowly. Indeed, perhaps narrowly enough that Trump’s selection of Representatives to serve in his administration could temporarily give the chamber to the Democrats.
- The Senate went Republican, but that was expected even if Harris won. Manchin’s retirement and a generally unfavorable map for Democrats had signaled that outcome a long time ago. The only reasonable scenario that would have left it with the Dems, as I recall, was a 50-50 chamber and a Vice President Walz as tie-breaker.
I am not saying that Democrats should ignore the loss and not try and address strategic ways to win in the future.
I agree that the loss of the so-called “blue wall” states was a devastating loss for the party. But I would also note that it appears that the results comport with the polling: very close and within the margin of error, just for Trump. WI was less than a point, MI was less than two, and PA was two. That comports with the polling, if one understands how MOEs work.
This was not a wave election that has transformed the structure of power.
I think that the Electoral College distorts our thinking. It amplifies winning, especially when we look at the colors and shapes on the map and not the numbers behind them. But even 312 electoral votes is only 58%. That’s good, but it is still isn’t a devastating outcome. I will wait until there numbers are all in, or close thereto, to look deeper than that. People are writing like it was 1984 or something (that was a drubbing!).
My fundamental point is this. If a shift of a couple of percentage points is all we are talking here to have had a different outcome, the notion that there is some massive, dramatic change needed for the Democrats strikes me overblown. Especially, again, given the obvious role that inflation played in this election, which does not provide some strategic lesson for the future.
The loss is real, and it is a big deal mostly because of who won. But the autopsies need a sense of proportion.
