Two weeks ago, Democrat Terry McAuliffe was leading in the polls in the race for governor of Virginia by about 12%. He had opened the wide lead when the partial government shutdown had affected the tens of thousands of federal workers of northern Virginia in a more concentrated way than anywhere else in the country. On top of that, the Virginia electorate as a whole was not happy with the shutdown and moved towards the Democrat.
Yesterday, McAuliffe barely won. The race for governor was close despite the fact that all the polls of the last week had a much larger margin for the Democrats. What changed?
Maybe the polls were wrong. This answer is one I cannot accept. If there had been just one poll or one or two polling organizations, it would be possible that there was a flaw in the methodology, but there were at least seven different groups that did multiple public polls as recently as Sunday. What happened was something that moved voters since the end of last week.
Some will say that this was just the Virginia Republicans coming home. Again, I don't think so. Usually, if voters in an off year election are disenchanted, they just don't vote. They do not wait until the last minute and then suddenly decide as a group to come out an support the candidate to whom they have been indifferent or cool in the past.
Some may argue that this was the supporters of the Libertarian peeling off and voting Republican. Of course, the problem with that explanation is that Sardis, the Libertarian, did extraordinarily well in the election. In fact, had he not been in the race, it is most likely that the Republican would have won. Sardis had funding from the Democrats who kept him in the race just to divide the Republicans. He did not lose substantial numbers of votes at the end.
What seems to have actually happened is that anger about Obamacare hit the electorate. It was not just the broken website. It was not just the policy cancellations. Nor was it the uncovering of the lies by president Obama and the Democrats. It seems to have been the entire mess. My guess is that had the election been next week instead of this one, the Republicans would have won.
Yesterday, McAuliffe barely won. The race for governor was close despite the fact that all the polls of the last week had a much larger margin for the Democrats. What changed?
Maybe the polls were wrong. This answer is one I cannot accept. If there had been just one poll or one or two polling organizations, it would be possible that there was a flaw in the methodology, but there were at least seven different groups that did multiple public polls as recently as Sunday. What happened was something that moved voters since the end of last week.
Some will say that this was just the Virginia Republicans coming home. Again, I don't think so. Usually, if voters in an off year election are disenchanted, they just don't vote. They do not wait until the last minute and then suddenly decide as a group to come out an support the candidate to whom they have been indifferent or cool in the past.
Some may argue that this was the supporters of the Libertarian peeling off and voting Republican. Of course, the problem with that explanation is that Sardis, the Libertarian, did extraordinarily well in the election. In fact, had he not been in the race, it is most likely that the Republican would have won. Sardis had funding from the Democrats who kept him in the race just to divide the Republicans. He did not lose substantial numbers of votes at the end.
What seems to have actually happened is that anger about Obamacare hit the electorate. It was not just the broken website. It was not just the policy cancellations. Nor was it the uncovering of the lies by president Obama and the Democrats. It seems to have been the entire mess. My guess is that had the election been next week instead of this one, the Republicans would have won.
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