Cause otherwise midterms discussion will be scattered around a bunch of separate Culture War thread posts. And it's nice to have more off-the-cuff rapid reactions in a dedicated megathread.
The first thing I've noticed so far: if the exit polls are correct, Americans are very pessimistic about AI.
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Yes, it's clear that ICE/Iran/Israel/Epstein etc... weren't decisive.
It was an all of the above scenario.
Let's not forget the NoKings movement.
There was evidence from early voting that the electorate was older and whiter this time around. (Not sure if that stuck around on election day). I think Trump lost a lot of high propensity voters in the senior bracket. I know my senior relations are absolutely off their rockers with Trump hate. There's an old woman stumbling around my neighborhood literally carrying a sign that says "Trump lied, people died".
I know it was super lame, but those grannies with signs are much more important electorally than podcast bros.
He lost those too. It's really quite stunning.
You mean the ones who were Democrats until like 5 minutes ago?
Yes, what a waste to lose new converts (who presumably know a volte face would be incredibly embarrassing and so would risk doing so lightly). They'll be much less likely to ever return to church.
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Oh, sure. The boomer demographic remains dominant in American politics, and the elderly are among the most sensitive to things that threaten their retirement prospects, such as inflation and energy prices.
That's also part of why I'm not inclined to read too much long-term into this particular election. Economic talisman voting is common, and the headwinds that worked against Trump this time are liable to get even stronger in the post-Trump election cycles. AI data centers aren't going to be dismantled, and will drive up energy costs and wipe out jobs. The middle eastern countries aren't going to go to the pre-2026 oil export methods, deglobalization will continue, and regional conflicts will provide ever-greater threat to inter-regional trade flows. And that's without the tripple-whammy of job-losing effects of AI, age-out retirements across the economic leader boards, and France-style welfare-budget crashes.
I think any premise, explicit or implicit, that MAGA will be held responsible for these forevermore is a bit silly. It'll a campaign accusation, sure, but economy-voting doesn't care about that.
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