Everyone Agrees That Trump "Is Not Fit To Clean Toilets In The Obama Library"-- What Does The Alabama Election Tell Us About The Midterms?

Alabama's 4th congressional district-- it's whitest and most Appalachian district-- seat of dull right-wing backbencher Robert Aderholt, is likely to disappear after the next census. It's easily the reddest and most politically and socially backward part of Alabama-- cutting clear across the state from Mississippi (east of Tupelo) to Georgia northwest of Rome. There are no real cities, the biggest population center being Gadsden with 100,000 residents. Last November AL-04 gave Señor Trumpanzee his biggest margin in Alabama, 80.4% to 17.5% and Tuesday, it gave Roy Moore his biggest margin too-- 30.8% to 67.7%. What a hellhole! But even that was a 13.3% increased performance for Doug Jones over Hillary Clinton. As you can see from the map above, each of the Alabama congressional districts had significant performance increases from Clinton to Jones. The biggest increase was in Gary Palmer's 6th district-- suburban Birmingham and, by far, the wealthiest district in the state-- where the 2015 PVI of R+28 sent down to R+26, still the second reddest after the 4th but trending, ever so slightly, in the other direction. Trump won it with 70.8% last year. Moore with only 51.0%.The increased Democratic performance was 20.6%.

Do you know what would happen to the GOP in next year's midterms if every Republican-held seat saw a 20 point performance increase from 2016's congressional race? First let's look at the 16 House candidates in GOP-held districts who have been endorsed so far by Blue America.

• CA-49- Doug Applegate would beat Darrell Issa with 69%
• WI-01- Randy Bryce would beat Paul Ryan with just over 50%
• IN-09- Dan Cannon would beat Trey Hollingsworth with 60%
• MI-06- Paul Clements would beat Fred Upton with 56%
• TX-21- Derrick Crowe would beat whichever Republican they pick with 56%
• IA-03- Austin Frerick would beat David Young with 60%
• IL-13- David Gill would beat Rodney Davis with 60%
• ME-02- Jared Golden would beat Bruce Poliquin with 65%
• OK-05- Tom Guild would beat Steve Russell with 57% (Yes that OK stands for Oklahoma)
• CA-25- Katie Hill would beat Steve Knight with 66%
• CA-39- Sam Jammal would beat Ed Royce with 62%
• PA-16- Jess King would beat Lloyd Smucker with 63%
• NC-05- Jenny Marshall would beat Virginia Foxx with 61%
• TX-32- Lillian Salerno would beat Pete Sessions but it isn't clear by what percentage since the DCCC didn't run a candidate against Sessions. Hillary did win the district though
• KS-04- James Thompson would beat Ron Estes with 66% (using this year's special election as the baseline)
• TX-07- Jason Westin would beat John Culberson with 64%

And these numbers don't take into account how much better the 2018 candidates are and how much better financed they are. For example, in WI-01 Ryan didn't have a serious opponent last year at all, just a vanity candidate who spent $16,890. Polling already shows Randy Bryce beating Ryan and as of the September 30 FEC reporting deadline he had already raised $1,460,210.

Now let's just look at the state of Texas. Using the results in Alabama as a comparison, Beto O'Rourke would beat Ted Cruz and can you guess how many of Texas' 25 Republican congressmembers would be reelected? Maybe 9! Louie Gohmert, John Ratcliffe (although he had no Democratic opponent in 2016), Jeb Hensarling (another one with no Democratic opponent in 2016), Kevin Brady (no Democratic opponent in 2016), Mike Conaway (no Democratic opponent in 2016), Kay Granger, Mac Thornberry (no Democratic opponent in 2016), Jodey Arrington (no Democratic opponent in 2016), Brian Babin (no Democratic opponent in 2016). California has 14 Republicans in the House. I bet you can guess how many would be defeated. It wouldn't just be the ones in the districts on the verge of flipping; say goodbye to Devin Nunes, GOP Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy, Duncan Hunter (event he doesn't get indicted. In fact, every single Republican-- all 14-- would go down to defeat.

Nationally, the midterms would leave the congressional Republican Party as some kind of laughable rump for Trump-- something like 50-60 members of Congress, almost all of them insane crackpots like Paul Gosar (AZ), a couple of nuts in Idaho, Roger Marshall in Kansas, Cheney's loony daughter in Wyoming, Doug Collins and Tom Graves from Georgia, James Comer, Brett Guthrie, and Hal Rogers in Kentucky, John Shimkus (IL), Bill Johnson (OH), one or two in Indiana, Clay Higgins and Steve Scalise (meet the next Minority Leader) from Louisiana, Jeff Duncan (SC), Adrian Smith (NE), Bill Shuster (PA), Steven Palazzo in Mississippi, Blaine Luetkemeyer, Vicki Hartzler, Billy Long and Jason Smith in Missouri, Frank Lucas, Tom Cole and Markwayne Mullin in Oklahoma, probably a congressman in North Dakota, Phil Roe, Scott DesJarlais and if she doesn't run for governor, Diane Black in Tennessee, a couple in Utah, the West Virginians and one in Virginia... with a couple more, that would be about it.

The counter-argument is that we have a long way to go 'til the midterns and things could start looking better for Trump and the Republicans and that's true. However it's more likely that things will change for them for the worse. Trump is obviously insane and all the worst in him always comes out when he feels cornered. He's already the most unpopular president in history and his favorability ratings are very likely to keep dropping and keep dragging the GOP down the toilet with him. In fact, the new Quinnipiac poll that came out Tuesday asked respondents to come up for a single word description of Trump. The most often used words were "idiot," "liar" and "incompetent." You think that's going to change? Other popular words included "asshole," "arrogant" and "moron."

Art by Richard Serra, courtesy of People for the American Way