When You Fight, You Win: Progressive Pushback Carries the Day
Yesterday, we previewed some of the hottest races and ballot questions. We’re pleased to report that progressives across the country triumphed against radical Republicans and their extremist agenda.
Here’s the rundown.
REPEALED: Ohio’s 99 Percent triumphed by overwhelmingly voting to repeal SB 5, the GOP’s anti-worker law. Ohio voters supported repeal by a 61 percent to 39 percent margin. In fact, more people (2,145,042) voted to repeal Gov. John Kasich’s (R) anti-worker law than voted for Kasich in 2010 (1,889,186).
ROUTED: The strongly pro-life voters of the Magnolia State rejected the extreme, anti-woman “personhood” amendment by a shockingly large 58 percent to 42 percent margin.
RETAINED: Democrat Liz Mathis soundly defeated Republican Cindy Golding in the Iowa state Senate District 18 special election, allowing Democrats to retain their majority — and their power to block Republican anti-worker and anti-equality measures. Of the effort by anti-gay groups to inject marriage into the election, a columnist for the Cedar Rapids Gazette wrote:
Marriage may not have mattered to most, but [Golding’s] call to put civil rights to a divisive majority vote likely turned off some district voters and motivated others to work for her defeat. For the National Organziation for Marriage and The Family Leader, it was a stinging rebuke.
REINSTATED: Mainers stood up and said no, by a 61 percent to 39 percent margin, to the GOP’s War on Voting and reinstated Maine’s nearly-40 year-old law allowing voters to register on Election Day.
RECALLED: The radical, racist Arizona state Senate President Russell Pearce, who led the fight to pass the state’s anti-immigrant SB 1070 “papers please” law, was recalled from office. The moderate Republican who will replace Pearce, Jerry Lewis, has likened Arizona post-SB 1070 to “1964 Alabama.”
RETAKEN: The Wake County Schools in North Carolina retook a majority on the school board, which has been under radical Republican control for two years after heavy spending in previous elections by Art Pope, a wealthy financier of right-wing causes and close ally of the Koch Brothers.
ROMNEY: Mitt Romney might turn out to be one of the yesterday’s biggest losers, having lent “110 percent” support to Ohio’s now-defunct anti-worker law and having said he “absolutely” supports radical anti-woman amendments of the sort that went down in flames in Mississippi.
IN ONE SENTENCE: Republicans across the country who embraced the most radical elements of both the Tea Party and social conservative wings of their party found themselves repudiated by voters eager for solutions that work for the 99 Percent too — be they workers, women, immigrants, or otherwise.
Evening Brief: Important Stories You May Have Missed
Newt Gingrich tries for the world record of fastest flip-flop.
The Washington Post’s ombudsman says that Jennifer Rubin “did damage to the Post and the credibility that keeps it afloat.”
Right-wing Israeli settler group urges supporters to storm U.S. Embassy Tel Aviv’s Facebook page to defend Benjamin Netanyahu after French President Nicolas Sarkozy called him a “liar.”
How Mississippi beat the personhood amendment.
Herman Cain and the sexual harassment perception gap.
Darrell Hammond, hero.
Diana Wueger, amid arguing for “incorporat(ing) gender analysis and awareness into our narratives of war,” also argues that “women are people too.”
As if Herman Cain’s foreign policy could be any more frighteningly bereft of substance, his top adviser channels Charlie Sheen when dealing with global affairs.
Though annoyingly boastful in victory, a national anti-gay group falls silent after an expensive defeat in an Iowa special election.