The Senator with the greatest name ever has thwarted a Democrat Super-majority as Saxby Chambliss defeated Jim Martin in a run-off, since neither candidate won 50% in the November 4th General. But this time around the race was a blowout.
With 96 percent of the precincts reporting at 10:55 p.m., Chambliss captured 57 percent to Martin’s 43 percent.
In the end, Martin, a 63-year-old former state lawmaker from Atlanta, wasn’t able to get Obama voters back to the polls in large enough numbers to overcome the Republican advantage in Georgia, which has become an increasingly a reliable red state since 2002.
With most precincts reporting, turnout stood at about 35 percent. That’s higher than the 20 percent predicted by a spokesman for Secretary of State Karen Handel but far less than the 65 percent who voted in last month’s general election
Real Clear Politics’ live blog echoed those statements on being able to get Obama supporters back to the polls, where they break down some of the early voting demographics. RCP’s live blog had Chambliss winning with a margin of 68-32 in the early goings of the evening, but it seems as though that was without Atlanta’s metro area reporting.
Norm Coleman must be happy as hell about this, if he can keep the 50 vote lead he may or may not have. It pretty much eliminates the need for the Dems to fight for Al Franken to become a senator. There are a lot of conflicting reports about who is actually winning in this race. The Star Tribune does a pretty good breakdown of the recount too.
Even though the Dems we’re unable to nab the 60 seat super this time. Hot Air points out that 2010 will see 4 of the 5 oldest GOP-ers running for reelection, and Sen. Mel Martinez will be retiring as well, which Dems are foaming at the mouth over. None of that is good news for the Republican party, as again they’ll seem to have a tougher time fighting off a Super Majority. I think the Florida seat is savable. Jeb Bush has hinted at running, and though his last name does come with a lot of baggage, he was a wildly popular governor, and two years may be enough time for people to forget about W, as long as Jeb can play a role in distancing himself from his bro. Though it seems like there is a line forming for the seat as well.
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There’s an old saying:
I’d rather deal with 60 Democrats than 56 Democrats and John McCain, Olympia Snowe, Susan Collins and Arlen Specter.
Food for thought, our filibuster might not be effective on the fairness doctrine, card-check legislation, or ammunition exicse taxes.
It doesn’t matter. Moderate Republicans will not participate in worthless filibusters. Important legislation will pass regardless of what the GOP wants. Times are too tough to leave their constituents in the poor house.
Are you seriously sure that you’re an economics major, Richard?
The only way to get people out of the poor house and into employment is to have Chris Dodd and Howard Dean stop interfering in the economy and paying off Barney Frank’s lovers at Fannie/Freddie.
Congratulations to the draft dodger on his reelection. This time he didn’t have to trash a REAL war hero to win. What a turd.
Brian, I am not an economists, but merely one that aspires to achieve the title. We will see what grad school has to teach me.
You are a fool if you do not recognize the uniqueness of this crisis and the devastating consequences of inaction. Because of the last 40 years of careless dependency on credit and terrible foreign policy I question the very survival of our current economic/political model. Times change and what we once took as a given soon becomes scorned. Economic models evolve with time and circumstance like everything else.
If I had to make a guess, we will need government spending that dwarfs anything Roosevelt ever did. The consequences are severe and uncertain for committing to such an action, but I think events have outpaced us to the point that all previous models are becoming useless. Bernanke and Paulson are scared because nothing is working. If that doesn’t get your heart going, you are a blind partisan that refuses to acknowledge reality, which favors no political ideology.
I hope I am wrong and that all the fairy tales are true and the government never has to step to repair flaws in the neoclassical model. But my brain, not my heart, tells me otherwise.
So Brian, are you an advocate of less government intervention in the economy? I wonder, because it’s curious you’d support less government intervention in the economy at a time when a lack of governmental oversight over the economy seems to have directly contributed to our current economic morass.
I advise all of you to read up on the Austrian school of economics. It’s clear that state actions, not the lack of state actions, are the true culprit. Decades of interest rate maniplation by the federal reserve have created a bubble that can no longer be afforded. The current bust is a natural and necessary correction that will enable people to redeploy resources in a more efficient manner. Any more state maniplation only delays the inevitable (see Herbert Hoover from 1930 on).
Please explain to me how spending by the state will solve anything. The United States is BROKE and could very well loose its AAA credit rating. The only way to finance all of this spending is for the federal reserve to keep “printing” (i use the term loosely) more money. Call me Fredrick Hayek, but it seems like that’s how this whole mess began.
Mike, I know that the Austrian school of thought is quite popular among purists, or it once was. I believe, and I think many economists agree, that the creation of the Fed was done to purposely manipulate the economy to avoid the more serious problems of banking crisis that plagued Western countries since the early 1800′s. One could argue that facing a banking crisis every 20 years is better and more stable than constant government interference trying to avoid banking failure. I step aside because it is irrelevant. Right now we have a central bank and a Treasury Secretary whose tasks are to bring stability. Until a major shift takes place in how economic policy is carried out, I would like to stick to solving problems with the tools we have. You cannot remove the fed, the central bank, and all government spending overnight and expect things to get better.
Now another school of thought is Keynesian. I find this particular thinking more relevant for our present needs, even though I am wary of its overall implications.
There is little doubt that Hoover’s policy was utterly disastrous. Inaction fixed nothing and only left more people unemployed than before and a stall in production with no ideas for how to bring about a recovery. Roosevelt picked up from there and raised taxes and failed to bring banks back to normal operations. We can argue all day about who made it worse Hoover or Roosevelt, but I think it is safe to say very little could be done to correct the course the 1920′s set for the 1930′s. I agree that that credit played a big role in making the Great Depression, much like why we have so much trouble now.
You are correct that we can’t spend our way out of this. Lots of spending will need to be cut(Iraq war, Afghan war, military, subsidies to corporations, bailouts, foreign aid, religious subsidies, and about every other thing that would be considered superfluous) and the American people accepting a lower standard of living. But before we can get to those long term solutions we have a much bigger and more pressing problem: jobs and production. By the time Congress gets together to do something productive we may be facing 15% unemployment and negative 3% GDP. Plus all the standard bad stuff you been hearing reported. We can’t spend our way out and we can’t just let entire industries evaporate. After a certain point we have a negative feed back loop, that will screw up action or inaction more. At this point, I would toss a coin and go with chance, but it might not matter. In the end, I would go with government spending because it might work. It will add enough debt to make us all mourn, but I am mighty concerned about doing nothing. I think smart government spending could minimize the damage.