2019 KY GOV Megathread, Andy Beshear wins

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https://www.insideelections.com/ratings/governor/2019-20-gubernatorial-ratings-juy-19-2019

KY Gov now a tossup

I dont see how Bevin loses.

Because Kentucky voters are going to realize that they actually don’t like obnoxious rich Republican assholes in executive power. Oh wait.

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For anyone deluding themselves into thinking Bevin can lose:

https://twitter.com/NilesGApol/status/1153853095484567552

He's going to get destroyed in those red districts that he kept to a respectable margin in 2015, and Louisville isn't going to come close to countering that.

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https://twitter.com/politico_chris/status/1159276367042830344?s=21

Reminder that polls always overestimate Democrats in Kentucky and Appalachia in the summer

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https://twitter.com/politico_chris/status/1159276367042830344?s=21

Reminder that polls always overestimate Democrats in Kentucky and Appalachia in the summer

Private polls generally overestimate Democrats by much less, though.

Just like that private McGrath poll showing her leading Andy Barr by 16% or whatever right? And Manchin up by double digits?

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https://twitter.com/politico_chris/status/1159276367042830344?s=21

Reminder that polls always overestimate Democrats in Kentucky and Appalachia in the summer

Private polls generally overestimate Democrats by much less, though.

Just like that private McGrath poll showing her leading Andy Barr by 16% or whatever right? And Manchin up by double digits?

That was a public poll

That was most definitely not a public poll lmao

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False. There is plenty of precedent with summer polls overestimating Dems in Appalachia. Every WV Senate race since 2012, KY-6 in 2018 and 2012. Do your research yourself before trying to say I’m wrong

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When Bevin inevitably wins, I’m going to resurface these posts where you are splitting hairs getting all lawyerly. Beshear is doomed if he’s only barely ahead now in the summer. Take it to the grave. Mississippi is more likely to flip.

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poll showing the man winning is not "bad news for Beshear" y'all, jesus. also, neither KY-06 nor most of the commonwealth of Kentucky are part of Appalachia.

Neither were polls showing Bredesen narrowly ahead. And polls showing Clinton consistently ahead 2-6 points in Pennsylvania and Wisconsin weren't bad news for her either. If you know polling history in this area of the country, you should understand the exercise of caution.

Bredesen was never up by 5-6 points at this point in the cycle.

You’re right. He was up double digits

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Lexington and its burbs may not be Louisville, but they aren't Hazard either. Big chunk of the Appalachians in KY-06 are 20-year-old kids who moved there to attend UK. The Appalachians in most of Eastern KY are...not that.

And McGrath was a first-time candidate for federal office. Beshear's had a chance to define himself and is running at the state level.

Doesn't make a lot of sense to compare the two.

You’re right. It doesn’t make sense. One was running a in a Trump +15 district. The other is running in a Trump +30 state

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Why is it that of the two governors Kentucky has had since the early 1970s that were Republicans (Ernie Fletcher and now Matt Bevin), they were both so horrible that even Republican voters could only barely stomach them?  Was their statewide bench so sparse that they simply were unable to field better-quality candidates?  

Yes, their statewide bench really was that sparse. There were no statewide executive office Republicans in the lead up to the 2003 gubernatorial election. In the lead up to 2015, James Comer was the only statewide Republican and he seemed pretty promising if I remember right, but he was accused of having his girlfriend from college get an abortion and that allowed Bevin to upset him in the primary

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I still think Bevin wins, but he is doing everything he can to lose, and if he was not in one of the reddest states in America, he’d be f:cked.

Yeah, some things never change

Does Bevin even WANT to win this race?

Why would he change a proven winning strategy?

He’ll win by double digits as soon as Trump throws a rally and the racist hicks go bonkers

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Ask Drew Edmondson how an extremely unpopular Republican gubernatorial administration led to him getting clobbered by double digits

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I don't think Beshear trying to run as more conservative would help him, though, since it would probably be seen as pandering, and people who basically just want someone conservative already have that in Bevin.

I’m not saying he should run a campaign more or as conservative as Bevin or anything, but a more conservative tone on a few hot-button social issues or some distance between himself and the national party certainly wouldn’t hurt. Was JBE's pro-life position viewed as pandering? Was Joe Manchin's Kavanaugh vote viewed as pandering? Hardly.

I think someone like Rocky Adkins would be doing better against Bevin right now.

I’ll grant you if Rocky Adkins was the nominee that’s i think Bevin could actually lose. He actually has credibility to disassociate himself from the national party and Beshear doesn’t even seem to be trying to do that. It’s almost as if he’s going along advice from Bandit the Worker on Atlas

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I don't think Beshear trying to run as more conservative would help him, though, since it would probably be seen as pandering, and people who basically just want someone conservative already have that in Bevin.

I’m not saying he should run a campaign more or as conservative as Bevin or anything, but a more conservative tone on a few hot-button social issues or some distance between himself and the national party certainly wouldn’t hurt. Was JBE's pro-life position viewed as pandering? Was Joe Manchin's Kavanaugh vote viewed as pandering? Hardly.

I think someone like Rocky Adkins would be doing better against Bevin right now.

I’ll grant you if Rocky Adkins was the nominee that’s i think Bevin could actually lose. He actually has credibility to disassociate himself from the national party and Beshear doesn’t even seem to be trying to do that. It’s almost as if he’s going along advice from Bandit the Worker on Atlas

At the rate things are going, I wonder if Beshear will even manage to keep it within 5% in November, or if he will win Elliott County.

Sometimes I wonder how much of the 'rural racist hicks' is poes law around here. Because even if you think Beshear will lose, he will still do decently because Bevin is hated  in some circles. This means that some rural counties, like Elliot where the dem base is still reasonable, Beshear will carry. But he will probably carry far fewer then before, and will instead be getting his votes from places like the Cincinnati and Evansville suburbs.

My confidence about Elliott is less because in 2018, for the first time ever in a competitive race, Hal Rogers won the county. And we've seen how the urban-rural divide is only becoming more and more significant, and that the Democrats are continuing to bottom out in Appalachia. But I suppose that, if Beshear manages to do as well as Jim Gray did in rural areas in 2016, he might manage to win Elliott, and probably Rowan County as well.

But at this point, so many Kentuckians are unwilling to vote for a Democrat at any level, regardless of how moderate they are, because they view them all as socialists in the vein of Bernie Sanders. We saw this in West Virginia with Manchin as well last year.

I have a little secret for ya, bud: it’s not because the hicks all view Democrats as socialists now (Republican have been saying that for a hundred years). Think of who the last president was, what his name was, and what his skin color was. I want you to pause and reflect on why you think those rural areas are suddenly so anti-Democrat now all of a sudden. I mean, really, really think on that one.

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I would LOVE to hear your explanation for it then. And please spare me the socialism BS. And before you blame “cultural liberalism” or social leftists, consider the name Barack Hussein Obama, a black man from the south side of Chicago in the context of that

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I would LOVE to hear your explanation for it then. And please spare me the socialism BS. And before you blame “cultural liberalism” or social leftists, consider the name Barack Hussein Obama, a black man from the south side of Chicago in the context of that

Uhhh because Bill Clinton of the 90s would be a moderate Republican now, and the Democratic Party has shifted super far left in comparison to that, especially on the environment and guns? You realize that Kentucky, like West Virginia, has large coal and fossil fuel industries that they don’t want shut down or regulated out of existence by the EPA?

There are plenty of policy reasons that Kentucky, among other states, has shifted so far right in the last decade or so. I don’t doubt that Obama being black had something to do with that, but it’s not nearly as large of a reason as you keep insinuating it to be.

Even if you accept the ridiculous premise that rural voters care that much about an industry that has less than 4,000 jobs total in their region, many of which aren’t elanywhere near the same part of the state, how do you explain the rural trends in literally any of the other continental 46 states. Is that because of “coal” and “energy” too?

And lol at Bill Clinton being a moderate Republican today. He was just as socially liberal in the 90’s as Barack Obama was in 2008.

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If people were voting on pocketbook in WV and KY where half the state is on food stamps and free and reduced school lunches, they definitely wouldn’t be voting for the party that tries to gut those programs every time they get power. If you are truly naïve enough to believe what you just said, then man, I will pray for you. You seem incredibly gullible and susceptible to a scam

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McDowell County, WV, 2008:
OBAMA: 53%
McCain: 45%

McDowell County, WV, 2016:
TRUMP: 74%
Clinton: 23%

The rural hicks of West Virginia are all voting Republican now b/c they hate Barack Obama, which is why they... voted for him.

You’re the guy that thinks McGrath can win right, because McConnell stiffed a bunch of coal miners. I guess we’ll see who ends up right about this one in a year

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If people were voting on pocketbook in WV and KY where half the state is on food stamps and free and reduced school lunches, they definitely wouldn’t be voting for the party that tries to gut those programs every time they get power. If you are truly naïve enough to believe what you just said, then man, I will pray for you. You seem incredibly gullible and susceptible to a scam

Here's the Difference, Republicans dont openly like to claim that they want to destroy the industry the region relies on . So they blame the Democrats for wanting to put them in position where they have to get food stamps in the first place, and guess what when a party openly says they wanna destroy your career you would think that as well.

The most fundamental thing to a pocketbook is a job, so when it comes to pocketbook voting that is what will come up first.

Is that why so many coal mining counties swung so heavily Republican in 2008 after the economy crashed, because they trusted the Republican Party more on “pocketbook” and economic issues? That’s a real puzzler there

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Also you bring up Douglas Wilder...you clearly haven’t seen the swing map from 1985–>1989

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Also you bring up Douglas Wilder...you clearly haven’t seen the swing map from 1985–>1989

That happened more in Central VA then SW VA. Again I didnt say racism was no part of the reason it changed but a very minor part. BTW Wilder still one SW VA while losing Prince William County, the and Richmond Suburbs

Orange County, CA didn’t change overnight either dude

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You’re the guy that thinks McGrath can win right, because McConnell stiffed a bunch of coal miners. I guess we’ll see who ends up right about this one in a year

Nah, the #1 thing I think is that you're an idiot who's evading the question. What happened between 2008 and 2016 that turned a bunch of people who were fine with voting for Barack Obama into these reactionaries that you think they are?

You conveniently left out the violent swing from Kerry to McCain in a lot of these places despite a cratered economy, two wars, and tons of Republican vorruption

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You’re the guy that thinks McGrath can win right, because McConnell stiffed a bunch of coal miners. I guess we’ll see who ends up right about this one in a year

Nah, the #1 thing I think is that you're an idiot who's evading the question. What happened between 2008 and 2016 that turned a bunch of people who were fine with voting for Barack Obama into these reactionaries that you think they are?

You conveniently left out the violent swing from Kerry to McCain in a lot of these places despite a cratered economy, two wars, and tons of Republican vorruption

Not relevant. What happened between 2008 and 2016?

A black man was President. Duh. I’m sure all these places will stop swinging Republican next year though after the coal industry has all but died out under Trump.

🙄

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Not relevant. What happened between 2008 and 2016?

A black man was President. Duh. I’m sure all these places will stop swinging Republican next year though after the coal industry has all but died out under Trump.

🙄

You think they found out he was black after they voted for him? Walked into the polling booth, saw "Barack Hussein Obama," thought "huh, sounds like a Slovak or something," saw him on TV later and realized he's black? Because right now you're arguing that the very fact of Obama being president made people who voted for Obama get more racist.

Yes. And frankly I have better things to do with my time than argue with someone who thinks Mitch McConnell has a decent chance of losing to a Democrat

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I actually don’t think all Republicans are racist. I have plenty of Republican friends and family, and think no less of them because they vote and support Trump. I am merely making the observation that the only thing substantial that changed from the mid 2000’s to 2016 was a black president with a funny name that caused a lot of formerly Democratic-voting people to throw their hands up in anguish in a lot of these rural counties. Barack Obama in 2008 wasn’t noticeably different from Bill Clinton in the 1990’s policy-wise in any substantive way. They definitely didn’t switch from Kerry to McCain and Romney over economic issues, lol.

That’s the last I’ll say about this, because clearly it’s really controversial on here to even suggest racism played a big part in the rapid Republicanization of these rural areas