The Other McCain

"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

The ‘Blood Moon’ Eclipse and Other Cosmic Portents of a ‘Red Wave’

Posted on | November 7, 2022 | Comments Off on The ‘Blood Moon’ Eclipse and Other Cosmic Portents of a ‘Red Wave’

Dr. Peter Venkman: This city is headed for a disaster of biblical proportions.
Mayor: What do you mean, “biblical”?
Dr. Raymond Stantz: What he means is Old Testament, Mr. Mayor, real wrath of God type stuff.
Dr. Peter Venkman: Exactly.
Dr. Raymond Stantz: Fire and brimstone coming down from the skies! Rivers and seas boiling!
Dr. Egon Spengler: Forty years of darkness! Earthquakes, volcanoes…
Winston Zeddemore: The dead rising from the grave!
Dr. Peter Venkman: Human sacrifice, dogs and cats living together… MASS HYSTERIA!

Someone could have added, “Democrats losing in New York!”

The polls in the contest between Gov. Kathy Hochul and her GOP challenger Lee Zeldin are all over the map, and either way it turns out, some pollsters are going to have a lot of explaining to do. But the fact that there’s even a possibility of a Republican winning in a state that Joe Biden carried by a 23-point margin gives you an idea of how bad things are looking for Democrats on the eve of Election Day.

There will be a lunar eclipse in the pre-dawn hours Tuesday and, according to my source for all things space-related, John Hoge: “This is the first Election Day total eclipse in the history of the United States.” Make of this celestial omen what you will; my job is merely to report the facts, not to interpret the cosmic significance of such things. Sunday morning, I cranked out a 1,500-word column for The American Spectator, which got linked today by Instapundit, with this excerpt:

“Probably the smartest thing to do on election night would be to take a nap early in the evening — when the chatter on TV will be mostly speculation — and set your alarm for 11 p.m. or midnight, by which time 90 percent or more of the precincts will have reported in most Eastern states. The earliest tip-off to which way the night is heading will be the Senate race in New Hampshire. If Bolduc can score an upset there, it would portend a massive ‘Red Wave,’ in which Republicans win 240-plus House seats and 52 or more Senate seats. If, on the other hand, Hassan manages to hang on in New Hampshire, the GOP will likely win between 225 and 235 House seats and fall a couple seats short of a Senate majority.”

The meaning of this four-sentence passage seemed clear enough to me, but as I skimmed the comments at Instapundit, a couple of things became obvious: (a) most of the people commenting hadn’t bothered to click the link and read the whole column, and (b) some of the commenters had serious deficiencies in reading comprehension.

If you read the entire column — as I certainly hope you will — my main point is that it will be very late on Election Night, probably past midnight on the East Coast, before we know whether this is a true “Red Wave” election, with Republicans winning even in long-shot races. For most of Tuesday evening, we’ll watch the cable-TV personalities pointing at maps and declaring that the key Senate races are “too close to call.”

As I further explain in the column, practically everybody concedes that Republicans will win a House majority, because they only need to flip six seats to take the gavel away from Nancy Pelosi. So the two real questions — the source of deep mystery to serious political observers — are how big of a GOP majority Kevin McCarthy will get in the House, and whether Republicans can score a net gain of Senate seats, to give Mitch McConnell a majority there, as well. These two questions are linked, because if it is truly a “wave” election for Republicans, it can be expected that they will win majorities in both chambers. On the House side, McCarthy’s GOP currently holds 212 seats, and needs 218 to claim the majority. Getting to 225 House seats (a net gain of 13) seems to be the low-end estimate of how Republicans will fare on Tuesday, whereas a true “Red Wave” would mean the GOP scoring a net gain of 25 or more House seats.

The reason I chose the New Hampshire Senate race as the bellwether is because (a) the polls close there at 7 p.m. Eastern, and (b) unlike some other states with key Senate races, New Hampshire doesn’t have the kind of blatant corruption and/or incompetence that causes delays in reporting election results. Like, if you’re on a pins and needles about the Pennsylvania results, you’re going to be in hours of agony Tuesday waiting for them to count votes in Philadelphia. Ohio? No early decision there — Cuyahoga County will still be counting votes past midnight. Georgia? Fulton County won’t finish counting before Wednesday afternoon, if that soon. But there’s nothing like Atlanta or Cleveland in New Hampshire. Most of the state is still fairly rural, and even in Manchester, they’re usually pretty quick with the vote-counting. So by 10 p.m. ET, we can expect that 90% of the vote will be counted in New Hampshire, which will give us a good idea of whether Dan Bolduc has pulled an upset victory — which, I believe, will be the biggest early indicator of whether this is going to be a real “Red Wave” year.

Some of the commenters at Instapundit, however, didn’t seem to get my point, which either means (a) they’re dumb or (b) I’m wrong.

But maybe it’s just too close to call . . .




 

Category: Election

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