A Jolly Good Night In Florida

The first big electoral test for Republicans came Tuesday night in a special election for the Florida 13th congressional district and it was a success for the GOP.
Former congressional aide David Jolly won a very contested election to finish the term of the late Congressman C. W. Bill Young. Mr. Jolly defeated Democrat candidate Alex Sink in a close race. A race made closer by a Libertarian party spoiler candidate, Lucas Overby.
The results of the election were as follows:

Jolly (R)             89,099     48%     
Sink (D)             85,642     47%
Overby (L)           8,893       5%

So what is the spin the Dems are putting on this loss?
First, a couple of things about this district.
It is a marginal Republican district. The late incumbent, Mr. Young, won the last election in 2012 with 58% of the vote. It was his second worst showing in his 42 years in congress. This same district voted for the Dear Leader, President Obama, in both 2008 and 2012. So it can at this point be called a swing district. In fact, the Democrat candidate, Jessica Erlich, ran 12 points better than the Democrat candidate in the 2010 mid-term election. So it can easily go Democrat at any point.
Now, for the unreal spin from the Democrats.
DNC chair, Congressman Debbie Wasserman-Schultz, one of the dimmest bulbs to service in public office, tried to spin the loss this way:

“Republican special interest groups poured in millions to hold onto a Republican congressional district that they’ve comfortably held for nearly 60 years. Tonight, Republicans fell short of their normal margin in this district because the agenda they are offering voters has a singular focus – that a majority of voters oppose – repealing the Affordable Care Act that would return us to the same old broken health care system.”

OK. Sure, Dim Debbie, go with that.
Consider a few things before buying that spin.
The Democrat party in Florida and Washington D. C. forced a local Democrat pol out of the race so that Mrs. Sink could run. The party and outside groups spent $5,400,000 on the Sink campaign. This is a congressional district that went for the Dear Leader, President Obama, in both his presidential campaigns. Essentially the Democrats used the Obama formula to try to win this seat and they lost.
Oh yeah, Mrs. Sink ran for Florida governor in 2010 as a Democrat. She won this district in that race as well, Yet she also lost that race to the current governor, Rick Scott by a similar close margin.
I throw this out there for the public.
Is it possible that Mrs. Sink is an overrated candidate and she actually sucked here and in the governor's race?
Mr. Jolly was a lobbyist and an obscure aide to the late congressman, Mr. Young. He is going through a divorce and is dating a gal quite a bit younger than he is. Not really an ideal Republican candidate, right?
I would agree that he is not the best candidate in either party.
But guess what?
Mr. Jolly was relentless on one issue.
Obamacare, or as it is referred to on this blog as O-Care.
Mr. Jolly drove home the point that he wanted to vote to repeal O-Care and replace it.
And it worked.
For all the money that was spent by the Democrats and their allies in this race, Mrs. Sink only garnered 46% of the vote. And that is only a four-point gain over the previous election in which the Dear Leader, President Obama, won. And if we take out the Libertarian candidate and assume most of his votes, not all but most, would have been for Mr. Jolly, he probably would have gotten roughly about 53% of the vote.
The thing about these seemingly outlier elections is that there will be momentum for the party that wins these elections.
Take Texas.
They recently had their primaries and Republican voters outnumbered Democrat voters by a more than two-to-one margin. Yes, it is a pretty Red state. But there was the Democrat savior, state Senator Wendy Davis on the ballot. And her and her opponent did not manage more than about 600,000 votes. Republicans saw roughly about 1,600,000 for their primary.
That is reason alone to think that Republicans will have a good night the first Tuesday in November.
That will be a Jolly good night for the United States.