Independents

Do we know who the Independents in the Virginia House caucus with?

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by: benjso @ Wed Nov 07, 2007 at 23:00:19 PM UTC

From the WaPo

"Del. Lacey E. Putney (I) caucuses with the Republicans, Del. Watkins M. Abbitt, Jr. (I) and Del. Katherine B. Waddell (I) do not caucus with the Democrats or Republicans. Democrats need a net gain of 11 seats to close the gap."

Waddell was beaten by a Republican last night, so of the two remaining indies, Putney caucuses with the Republicans and Abbitt is a lone gunman.

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by: James L. @ Wed Nov 07, 2007 at 23:09:33 PM UTC

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Now they only need 7 more seats though. NT

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by: JeremiahTheMessiah @ Thu Nov 08, 2007 at 00:22:49 AM UTC

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Both caucus with Republicans.

Lacey Putney (I-Bedford) of the 19th is an institution in Southern Virginia. He's been serving since 1961 (a Democrat until 1968). Dixiecrat-esque, I'd imagine.

Watkins Abbitt (I-Appomattox) of the 59th also caucuses with the Rs.

I think the other independent from this session, Katherine B. Waddell of suburban Richmond was defeated by Republican Manoli Loupassi in the 68th. I think she caucused with the Democrats.

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by: jeffmd @ Wed Nov 07, 2007 at 23:10:20 PM UTC

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Never mind. n/t.

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by: jeffmd @ Wed Nov 07, 2007 at 23:12:00 PM UTC

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Does Anyone Have a Link....

...to a county map for the Mississippi gubernatorial election?

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by: Mark @ Thu Nov 08, 2007 at 00:23:27 AM UTC

Try this

US Election Atlas.  Be careful, though -- they've swapped red and blue.

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by: James L. @ Thu Nov 08, 2007 at 00:44:29 AM UTC

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2 Chamber Flips

That's pretty great, continue on that momentum to 2008!  Although MS's state-wide takeovers suck a bit.

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by: Andrew @ Thu Nov 08, 2007 at 00:26:50 AM UTC

Glad others had a better election night than me!

First of all, to everyone who worked on a campaign that ended yesterday, win or lose -- thank you, well done, all that good stuff.

Yesterday was a disaster for Indianapolis Democrats -- and we deserved it.  We lost an election we should have won.  Mayor Bart Peterson lost, despite outspending his opponent something like 30-1.  Our 15-14 majority on the City County Council turned into a 17-12 deficit.  We have 25 council districts and four at-large members.  Our three lost seats came from the at large members -- they went from being 4-0 Democrat to 3-1 Republican.  In the neighborhoods we picked up a seat or two, and lost a seat or two -- and actually ran pretty well in traditionally Republican neighborhoods.  We won a seat in very middle class and rapidly growing Pike Township in the NW corner of the city, and took back a Democratic central-city district from a fairly moderate/liberal Republican.

What happened?  There certainly were issues of property taxes and crime -- not to mention the ethics of Council President Monroe Gray (who was one Democrat I was not thrilled to see win re-election last night).  But more than that I think we forgot of the first rules of politics -- Run like you're 15 points down, not 15 points ahead.  We took this election for granted, didn't work for it, didn't make a positive case for keeping power (and there is a lot of good that has happened in the city recently) -- and in the end, were caught flat-footed.  There was nothing negative or underhanded that the Republicans did here -- they just beat us.

I don't think this destroyes the progress we've made in Marion County -- and if anything, that our at-large city council members came as close to keeping their seats as they did given what happened to the mayor shows that this was a bump-in-the-road, hopefully.  But it also shows Indianapolis is a very, very pale blue city, and all elections need to be fully contested start to finish.

We've got some decisions to make now, especially in terms of who leads Democrats on the council.  There was a changing of the guard last night, especially among black Indianapolis Democrats, as Rozelle Boyd (who was on the council for like 30 years) and Lonell "King Ro" Connley both lost their at-large seats.  These were well respected, familiar insiders who represented black majority districts for years, and then won at-large four years ago, only to lose last night.  So we'll see some new people come to the fore.

Finally, I do wish our mayor-elect Greg Ballard well.  I think, or at least hope, he's a pretty reasonable person (i.e. not a right wing loon).  This is a wonderful city to live in, but also is facing a number of tremendous challenges that now are going to come across his desk.

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by: IndianaProgressive @ Thu Nov 08, 2007 at 02:10:36 AM UTC

My main worry there...

...is what it means for IN-7. If the GOP is feeling their oats and Carson is still MIA, that could be a pickup that shouldn't happen. Of course, I'm not on the ground there, so that's not the most informed worry.

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by: Seth D @ Thu Nov 08, 2007 at 16:55:31 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Not overly worried, but ...

Of course, right now ANYTHING to do with Julia Carson is cause for concern, and losing the election like we did certainly doesn't help.  And the longer Julia is MIA, the more the themes of corruption and secrecy (which were legitimately used against us in these elections) will continue.  That said, we did much better in the parts of Marion County that include the 7th District than in the county as a whole -- a good chunk of Marion County is in Dan Burton's 5th District, and those are many of the real hard-core Republicans in the county.  Both Bart Peterson and our slate of at-large candidates carried the part of the county in the 7th District.

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by: IndianaProgressive @ Thu Nov 08, 2007 at 18:12:38 PM UTC

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Tough shakes, man

We feel your pain. Every time Dems lose, it sucks. I hope you're able to take your mayoralty back soon. We lost our way here in NYC and will clock in sixteen straight years of Republican rule by the time we'll even have a chance to put a Democrat back in Gracie Mansion. (Oh, not that our current mayor even deigns to live there.)

Jesus, by the time Bloomberg's reign is finally over, Republicans will have run this city for half my life. That is so wrong.

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by: DavidNYC @ Fri Nov 09, 2007 at 08:22:18 AM UTC

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Sounds like our current governor

The Indiana Gov. has a beautiful, recently renovated Victorian mansion on North Meridian Street (the really wealthy, old money part of the city) to live in, but that's not good enough for My Man Mitch, who recently spent I don't know how many millions of dollars to build a gillion-square-foot home in the 'burbs.

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by: IndianaProgressive @ Fri Nov 09, 2007 at 16:08:42 PM UTC

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Oh well

Our former Governor, George Pataki, did the same thing. Never moved into the Governor's Mansion (stayed in his home in Peekskill), and would helicopter back and forth to Albany at huge taxpayer expense all the time.

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by: DavidNYC @ Sat Nov 10, 2007 at 04:12:29 AM UTC

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