This says it all – from J. Miles Coleman, at Larry Sabato’s Crystal Ball. I saw it this morning on The Bull Elephant, which focuses on Loudoun. Would Virginia Beach and Henrico look the same? If you have any doubts the Trump era has produced a true realignment, dispel them. SDH
(comments below)
(comments below)
from the NYT (excerpts):
The fields of Loudoun County are disappearing. In their place is row upon row of cookie-cutter townhouses, clipped lawns and cul-de-sacs — a suburban landscape for as far as the eye can see. Unlike three decades ago, the residents are often from other places, like India and Korea. And when they vote, it is often for Democrats.
“Guns, that is the most pressing issue for me,” said Vijay Katkuri, 38, a software engineer from southern India, explaining why he voted for a Democratic challenger in Tuesday’s elections. He was shopping for chicken at the Indian Spice Food Market. “There are lots of other issues, but you can only fix them if you are alive.”
Mr. Katkuri’s vote — the first of his life — helped flip a longtime Republican State Senate district and deliver the Virginia statehouse to the Democratic Party for the first time in a generation.
Once the heart of the confederacy, Virginia is now the land of Indian grocery stores, Korean churches and Diwali festivals. The state population has boomed — up by 38 percent since 1990, with the biggest growth in densely settled suburban areas like South Riding (Loudoun). One in 10 people eligible to vote in the state were born outside the United States, up from one in 28 in 1990. It is also significantly less white. In 1990, the census tracts that make up Mr. Katkuri’s Senate district were home to about 35,000 people — 91 percent of them white. Today, its population of 225,000 is just 64 percent white.”
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/09/us/politics/virginia-elections-democrats-republicans.html
And as I’ve been asking – if many immigrants from other countries tend to be Conservative in their political philosophy, – i.e. family-oriented, person responsibility, hard work ethic, etc – then why are they not a natural constituency for the GOP?
They are, but Lee Atwater’s big tent was burned down long ago. Just mentioning the idea fondly makes me a RINO to many…..
Kinda of challenges the narrative that the Dems have moved way left and are now radical/socialists but the GOP has not moved right.
But to be fair, the current immigrants do not feel welcome by many on the right AND they do align with some Dems principles – health care, education, perhaps gun laws (was not aware of that).
Lots of things that can be done. The first and hardest would be to give up crony capitalism. Both parties are mired in it up to their ears. Giving it up allows one to expose it. The sweetheart deals are repulsive to most people. But one must be clean to expose other party’s special deals.
Expose the Democrats rampant discrimination against Asian Americans. It’s clear there are quotas on the number of Asians in many colleges and universities. The Democrats will try to expand this to K-12–think Thomas Jefferson HS. Expose the facts.
School redistricting. The new, all-D Fairfax County School Board is going to send lots of Asian, Subcontinent and Middle Eastern students from their local school (where their parents pay big real estate taxes) via bus to lower performing schools. That’s a kick to the groin. Fight it. Turn the fight into one that is broader than us versus students of European ancestry. I’ve seen a lot of D-voting Asian women turn militant when proposals mess up their neighborhood or family.
The Democrats are going to try to do something similar by reducing single family house zoning to permit by-right duplexes and triplexes. That will PO people of all races and ethnic backgrounds.
Support the fight against Democrats trying to take away private health insurance, including employer-provided insurance. Stop the focus on Obamacare and harp on preserving insurance for those who have it. Those perceived to be taking away something lose elections.
But the first step must be walking away from crony capitalism.
That is, by far, the best plan for resurrecting the Republican Party in Virginia I have read since the elections. The problem is that corruption is ingrained in Virginia’s plantation elite. They are the car dealers who benefit from franchise purchase laws. They are the beer and wine distributors who benefit from liquor distribution laws. They are Dominion, Altria and Omega Protein executives. They are the downstate members of Virginia’s Republican Party. Can you really imagine Tommy Norment going on an anti-corruption crusade?
We need an alternative political party in Northern Virginia. People here don’t accept The Virginia Way or the endless corruption of our state government. Either a new branch of the Republican Party or a new party altogether. Disown Tommy Norment, Richard Stuart, Kirk Cox and the rest of the crony capitalist apologists downstate.
As for the school redistricting … I think you are right. Here’s what Chap Petersen wrote on his political update (distributed on Facebook) …
“(ii) there is no “redistricting agenda” for County Schools, notwithstanding all the rumors. (Side note: You can trust Megan McLaughlin, the coolest mom in the history of Woodson High School).”
Weasel words in my opinion. The One Fairfax resolution opens the door to all kinds of liberal mischief. I believe that following Richmond’s ill conceived school busing plan is absolutely on the school board agenda. Maybe not officially but it’s being quietly discussed. I need politicians like Chap Petersen to say that the “redistricting agenda” will not be implemented. Saying that it hasn’t been implemented so far is beyond hollow.
The only hope for conservatives in Virginia is to change the political structure of Virginia. Turn core NoVa (including Eastern Loudoun County) in to a big city. Give the new city constitutionally guaranteed autonomy over most of its own taxation and operations. Baltimore is specifically called out in such a way in the Maryland Constitution. Cap the transferred amount out of NoVa at some percentage of total local and state taxes paid. When people in New NoVa start thinking of their aldermen and alderwomen as their primary politicians they may not care much what happens downstate. New NoVa would be just about as big as Rhode Island with far more people. They can enact their own gun laws, tolls, etc.
Hey, I just had a great idea. Restore the original boundaries of the District of Columbia and make it the state of Columbia (well, not named for him, he was an oppressor….) But with Arlington and Alexandria back as part of the district, I’d be HAPPY to give them two senators and three electoral college voters, because Virginia would be competitive again! (Or would it……?) Never mind. We might be 20 years past that working….
In endorse your grand proposals with four caveats, namely:
1. Northern Virginia keeps to itself within its own boundaries, its own garbage, its own trash, and its own human waste, including without limitation, its garbage politics and trash talk, buried deep and safely within its own local ground in perpetuity.
2/ All tolls in N. Virginia be removed from impositions on all drivers merely passing through Northern Virginia.
3/ Reverse tolls be assessed against N. Virginia on behalf of all drivers passing through N. Virginia who during such passage experience traffic delays in N. Virginia at the rate of $75 per hour of delay, assessed and paid to such drivers on pro-rata basis as drivers exit N. Virginia, all as fully justified by, and as compensation for, N. Virginia’s brazen theft of America’s inter state highways within a rogue and lawless N. Virginia.
4/ A massive tariff be imposed in perpetuity on all agricultural produce, and electric energy consumed in N. Virginia but produced outside N. Virginian as punitive reparations for the ongoing theft of America’s Interstate Roads within N. Virginia.
Let’s face it…the complaint here is that the current Republican party has no place for Libertarians…it’s based on Trumpism and its focus on an alternative reality that fosters crony capitalism, anti-science, and fraud. The Dems won based on rejecting Trumpism. Where will Libertarian principles like fiscal responsibility, individual liberty, and justice find a home politically? Most likely in a new party or in a new re-focused GOP. Running against Dems or simply making the Dems the boogyman for their support of a fiscally responsible national healthcare program, originally developed in a Libertarian think tank, is not practical nor reasonable. What does the GOP now stand for except for lower taxes for the wealthy, removing needed regulations, and Trumpism? Running against Democratic current moderate to liberal ideas will not be enough in the near term without the help of Russian hacking, spreading ignorance of the reality of climate change, or fear mongering about the Dems and their platform (selling the idea that Dems are communists to scare the voters). It’s time for conservatives to stand for something substantial beyond the current GOP anti-Dem propaganda. I remain interested in exploring the idea of seeing two states emerge from Virginia…a more conservative South Virginia and a more liberal NOVA.
Out of state rates for Tech, UVA and W&M. I like it! (NoVa won’t…)
re: “stop the Dems”!
umm… that’s called elections…
It sounds like the people of NoVa …LIKE the Dems when threatened with the alternative!
re: let NoVa succeed and become it’s own wholly-independent pseudo-state!
NO city is truly independent – even in Home Rule states!
The Feds trump the States and the States trump the counties/cities/towns!
But what exactly would NoVa be able to do that has obvious benefits that they cannot do right now? What Virginia laws are hobbling it?
As a postscript, last night I was at a community event and wound up in a post-event conversation with an Asian woman who is an active Democrat. Extremely personable individual. She brought up the topic of keeping a group home for teens with emotional or mental problems out of her neighborhood. I explained that both federal and state fair housing laws prohibit discrimination against people with disabilities and that those same laws classify people with certain emotional or mental illnesses as disabled. Moreover, the laws provide that localities must treat these homes as a by-right use so long there are not more than 8 residents.
After listening to my explanation, she said there must be some way to keep these uses out of residential neighborhoods. I believe she is far from the only Democrat of all genders and races who feel the same.
The instinct to protect oneself and one’s family, including one’s kids, from perceived threats is strong irrespective of political party.
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