WSJ's Peggy Noonan: Made case for a historic wave
The backlash was more stunning than many analysts predicted,
with voters taking out their anger over the war in Iran, the high cost of
gasoline and groceries, alleged government corruption and what many saw as
overly aggressive immigration enforcement. - Summary from Wall Street Journal
Republicans may console themselves that midterm defeats in second presidential terms are common. But this was more than a normal defeat. The loss of Senate seats and governorships in states that had become GOP redoubts will have ramifications for years to come. So will the cascading losses down ballot in state legislatures. - ''The Trump Reckoning', Wall Street Journal Editorial
The news headlines emerging from last night's thrashing of the Trump sycophant Reeps said it all:
From The Wall Street Journal:
DEMOCRATS TAKE CONGRESS IN STUNNING REBUKE OF TRUMP
The party makes historic inroads in deep-red states, and it flips governor's mansions in Texas, Ohio and Georgia
From The Washington Post:
Democrats take control of Senate -
Party racks up big wins across country
Democrats have won control of the House and Senate, seizing on voter discontent over high prices and the war in Iran as they flipped seats in several states, including Texas, Kansas and Ohio.
From The New York Times:
DEMOCRATS TAKE SENATE
Stunning Upsets Across the Country in National Rebuke to Trump
Democrats seized control of the Senate on Tuesday night, as
voters delivered a thorough rebuke to President Trump in places long considered
Republican strongholds. On a night shaping up as a romp, Democrats flipped
Senate seats in Iowa,
Kansas,
Ohio,
North
Carolina, South
Carolina and even Texas,
according to The Associated Press, and were in a strong position to take
control of the House.
The above results, embodying a veritable blue tsunami that few could have predicted, fulfilled the hopes (and prediction) of WSJ Op-ed columnist Peggy Noonan - in her recent column ('The Case for a Historic Wave', Oct. 31-Nov. 1, p. A15) As Ms. Noonan wrote:
"Early on, Mr. Trump asked people to vote as if he's running. They will and he will regret it. We all know the issues: affordability, inflation, corruption, and a general feeling of instability coupled with a lack of confidence there is any clear path to stability. Adding another dollop of existential dread is artificial intelligence and the calamities it makes possible.
Mr. Trump's problem is that everyone on both sides of the issue knows he is out of his depth in running a major war.
I believe a big, big wave is coming and I see it as composed of many voters: blue voters predominantly but indignant red voters too - and disappointed Trump base voters - many staying home. This t is what I hope for: that it won't be a close election, that the outcome is unmistakable. Let it be a clear and obvious rebuke - a rejection, a rebellion, a rout."
Well, Peggy, it was indeed all that and more with the Dems even sweeping Reep governorships in Georgia and Texas. What drove Noonan's ire to write such an 'anti- typical' WSK op-ed? Let her tell it:
"He never misses an opportunity to toy with the Republic - and it didn't start in 2020. A recent biography of Mitt Romney recounts how Trump reacted to Romney's 2013 loss to Barack Obama. 'That election was a total sham! We are not a democracy! We should march on Washington and stop this travesty!'"
Fancying himself an unchecked dictator in waiting even years before his insurrection in 2021 and aspiration to become one, so well described in every aspect in the brilliant book Regime Change. So Peggy knew - even if her edtors tors at the Journal didn't - that this wannabe tyrant had to be put in his place, his power checked. And that is essentially what this rout has done: make this senile fascist finally accountable - which his congress of Reep quislings and cowards refuse to do.
The greatest benefit of this blue tsunami? It was so mammoth - coast to coast- that Dotard grasped from early any shenanigans attempted would be futile.
Beyond the issues of affordability, the depravity and violence unleashed - both on the streets of blue cities and overseas - with Iran and off the shores of Venezuela - had to be addressed. And millions of black and brown voters did just that - as well as whites tired of the anti-DEI witch hunts and destruction of the nation's institutions - even while the orange narcissist built monuments to himself.
Whether the monumental change also makes the nation healthier - as Ms. Noonan hopes at the end of her piece- is another issue and question. Likely that won't happen until the last vestiges of Trumpism and MAGA recede into oblivion, but that means the incessant propaganda and disinformation has to end. Will FOX now control what it blathers over the airwaves? Doubtful. I tuned into FOX for its take on the election tsunami after the Dems had taken the Senate and saw Trey Gowdy babble this to the FOX election panel:
"Don't worry, the Dems will lose it all in another two years and I'll be back to say I told you so."
With an attitude like that, a snide belief in disinformation to continue to prop up a self-serving cult, I don't see changelings on the horizon. But one can always hope reality will prevail and the Dems showing a unified stance with a tempered- but just - agenda, will help. Most political pundits I saw and heard this a.m. are convinced this Dem control of Senate and House will be sustained - and into the 2028 campaign.
See Also:
by Robert Reich | November 4, 2026 - 6:22am | permalink
– from Robert Reich's Substack
Friends,
The great sleeping giant of America has awakened, taken a hard look at what’s become of the nation, and roared a thunderous “NO!”
What occurred yesterday was not — as some are saying — the inevitable mid-term swing of the pendulum against the party in power. Texas hasn’t elected a Democratic senator since 1988. The last time Kansas elected a Democratic senator was 1932.
Nor was it just the economy. Americans are unhappy with inflation, but the country is not in a depression or recession. Unemployment remains quite low.
Nor, finally, was it all due to Trump. Despite Trump’s repeated efforts to get voters to “pretend” he was on the ballot, he was not. Most Republican candidates barely mentioned him and many Democratic candidates stressed local or statewide issues rather than fixate on him.
And:
The Republican missteps that laid the groundwork for a historic midterm rebuke - The Washington Post
Excerpt:
Earlier this year, as President Donald Trump and his top
advisers stared down increasingly grim polling for Republicans, they devised a
strategy for staving off losses in the midterm elections: Put Trump front and
center. The president appeared in taxpayer-funded
campaign ads that showed him and U.S. forces in the Iran war, created a new
midterm convention to star in, and crisscrossed 20 states to appear in 30
rallies in the campaign’s final weeks.
Democrats would make the elections about him anyway, his
advisers reasoned, and at least this way the president could motivate his core
supporters to get to the polls in a way no other Republican could. “We turned
the typical midterm scenario on its head,” said Chris LaCivita, a co-manager of
Trump’s 2024 campaign, in an interview shortly before Election Day. “Instead of
running to the middle or running away, we decided to just run right into it.”
They ran into a wall of voters’ anger.
Trump — who entered his second term last year with some of
his highest approval ratings on record and optimism from an expanded electorate
that believed he could lower prices — led his party to generational losses,
including a Senate seat in Kansas that hadn’t gone blue in nearly a century.
He underestimated how angry voters had grown at his handling of the economy, tariffs and the war he launched in Iran this year, alienating key segments of the coalition Trump built in his historic 2024 win, including young men, Black men and Hispanics.
And:
Voters punish Trump with historic swing to Democrats - The Washington Post
Excerpt:
The American voter dealt President Donald Trump a historic
rebuke on a scale not seen since 1974, propelling Democrats
into control of both houses of Congress with commanding wins in places they
hadn’t carried in decades.
Democrats won both the Senate and governor’s races in Texas
— their first statewide victories there since 1994. They took a U.S. Senate
seat in South Carolina and the Georgia governorship for the first time since
1998. Kansas sent a Democrat to the Senate for the first time since 1932.
Among their early House victories were a Kentucky district that voted for Trump by 15 points and two Florida seats that Republicans redrew to shift right. The head of the House GOP’s campaign arm trailed in his own race with 99 percent of the vote counted. As of 12:01 a.m. Wednesday, Democrats led in every competitive House contest
The leftward
swing extended across demographics and geographies. Compared with
2024, the exit poll conducted for the Associated Press and the major television
networks showed double-digit swings toward the Democrats among Latinos,
Catholic voters and voters younger than 30.
And:
Commentary: Trump, who so bitterly divided us, was awful enough to unite us. At least temporarily - LA Times
Excerpt:
As the scale of the Republican Party’s losses came into
focus late Tuesday, President Trump watched from the White House and went
looking for someone to blame.
First it was Fox News. Just before midnight, with Democrats
projected to seize control of the House, Trump wrote on Truth Social that the
network “bears responsibility for these losses by constantly and consistently
putting on the Dumocrat opposition, and worse.” Then it was the fact that he
had not been on the ballot, otherwise, he said, “we would have won IN A
LANDSLIDE!”
Minutes later, Trump was on the phone with the same network he had just accused of sabotaging his party. And over a 22-minute interview, conducted before the Senate had been called for Democrats, his tone shifted from grievance to something closer to acceptance, though never to the idea that the election results were a rebuke on his administration.
And:
And:
Trump’s slapdown by America is one for the ages
And:
Angry Voters Usher in Beginning of the End to the Trump Era - The New York Times
Excerpt:
President Trump implored voters over the course of the
midterm campaign to “pretend I’m on the ballot.” He said it not once, not
twice, but 47 times this fall.
And voters did — just not the way he hoped.
The Democratic wave in the congressional elections on
Tuesday amounted to a stinging rebuke of a deeply unpopular president after
more than a decade in which he has dominated the national stage. More than any
of his predecessors, Mr. Trump deliberately made the midterm contest a
referendum on himself, only to pay the price.
The electoral backlash extended even into deep red states and indicated that President Trump has lost his hold over the coalition that lifted him to the White House twice. Trump implored voters over the course of the midterm campaign to “pretend I’m on the ballot.” He said it not once, not twice, but 47 times this fall.
And:
'Regime Change' - Perhaps The Best Political Expose in 20 years (A Review)
And:
