And that may be a good thing.
To recap 2022, Despite the expected midterm election headwinds we democrats held on to just about everything, save for losing what will now definitely be the “lower house” and gaining the odd U.S. Senate seat, governorship, and now the senate as well as the house and every statewide office here in Minnesota. This has been taken as a vote of confidence for our President Biden and he’s rising in the polls too, so the usual pilgrimages of democratic presidential hopefuls to neighboring Iowa will be down and on the “down low”, especially with Iowa’s lead off position in jeopardy.. Same on the republican side where even on the continual eve of indictment Trump’s reign of terror keeps any serious GOP candidate’s Iowa travels to plausibly deniable social calls and support at Iowa GOP fundraisers.
So this year you and I will be spared the joy of chasing democratic hopefuls in the candidate rich environment that is Iowa the year before caucuses. As for the GOP, they’re packing firearms and now COVID too, so I’ll give them a wide berth. Not much lost there- Used to be fun to record the republican hopefuls saying crazy stuff in deep red western Iowa where they thought no mainstream media was around, now they put their wacky Neo-nazism out for all to see on their websites and social media. So looks like I’ll spend 2023 riding motorcycles and watching the races and blogging over at http://www.GearheadGrrrl.com instead of here.
Out here in rural Minnesota 2024 doesn’t look real exciting either- The Republican Party has lost every statewide election since 2008 and the only statewide races will be for president and senator, which Joe Biden and Amy Klobuchar should win easily. Minnesota’s 8 congressional seats are devolving into an even 4 to 4 DFL to GOP split, so few surprises likely there. Down ballot the state senate gets a bye and while our DFL doesn’t quite have a supermajority in the house yet, the GOP is unlikely to win it back in a presidential election year. And out here in rural Minnesota the GOP is wasting almost as many votes “running up the score” with 40% and bigger victory margins as the DFL does in the cities.
So what’s a rural Minnesota democrat to do? Build up the party, run for and win “non-partisan” down ballot seats and take over every township, city, county, and conservation district. Better yet, become the “deep state” and go to work for the government and get paid for making Minnesotan’s lives better!