Election Roundtable: Breaking Down the Results on Democracy Now!

Election Roundtable: Breaking Down the Results on Democracy Now!

Election Roundtable: Breaking Down the Results on Democracy Now!

Did the Tea Party set the agenda for last night’s elections? Is the Blue Dog coalition done for? Nation contributors Richard Kim, John Nichols and Laura Flanders explain.

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Last night, the elections saw two key Senate victories for the Tea Party and major losses for the Blue Dog Democrats. To explain the results, Democracy Now! host Amy Goodman moderated a roundtable discussion with The Nation’s John Nichols, Laura Flanders and Richard Kim, with journalist David Goodman joining in via telephone. 

"The Tea Party had some considerable wins last night, but also significant losses," says Kim. "The Tea Party is going to be very aggressive about pursuing their legislative agenda—which is to repeal everything. It’s a big question about whether sane Republicans will step in and [tell the Tea Partiers] that you are responsible for some but not all of the Republican victories and that the country is not where [the Tea Party] is."

When Flanders brought up the unprecedented and largely uninvestigated millions of dollars that corporations invested in the midterm election, Nichols warned that the GOP will go into 2012 with "dramatically more money than they spent this year."

—Joanna Chiu

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With the midterm elections now firmly upon us, the question is whether Democratic candidates will do more than merely occupy ballot lines as mild alternatives to the red-hot crisis that is Donald Trump.

As Trump spends over $1 billion a day on a globally destabilizing war on Iran and admits that he doesn’t “think about Americans’ financial situation,” millions across the country are struggling with the surging costs of essentials. Democrats must seize this moment and advance bold, small-“d” populist ideas—not settle for cynical caution that once again snatches defeat from the jaws of victory.

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Onward,

Katrina vanden Heuvel
Editor and Publisher, The Nation

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