{"id":36438,"date":"2022-07-01T05:47:27","date_gmt":"2022-07-01T10:47:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/?p=36438"},"modified":"2022-07-01T05:47:27","modified_gmt":"2022-07-01T10:47:27","slug":"jumping-ship-soon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/2022\/07\/01\/jumping-ship-soon\/","title":{"rendered":"Jumping Ship Soon?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>It&#8217;s no doubt too early for this sort of speculation, but I cannot resist. I&#8217;ve watched the <a href=\"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/2022\/06\/29\/sixth-televised-meeting-of-the-jan-6th-panel-ctd-2\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">January 6th hearings<\/a>, seen at least some right-wing media evaluate the hearings as devastating for the former President, and now the <a href=\"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/2022\/06\/30\/the-2022-senate-campaign-updates-4\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">first few polls<\/a> have come out indicating a shift in independent voter sentiment, from Republicans to Democrats. Will it be both seismic and persistent?<\/p>\n<p>Let&#8217;s assume so. Further, if this is a well-deserved disaster for Trump, it&#8217;s not unreasonable to assume his allies in the elected official pool, at least those running for election or reelection, are facing their own disasters, even if they don&#8217;t comprehend it just yet. Well-deserved guilt by association.<\/p>\n<p>And the Republican Party is splashed with dishonor, not because Trump was a member in good standing, but the nauseating personal allegiance that so many members had to him, loudly proclaimed.<\/p>\n<p>Who will be the first Republican member of Congress to leave the Party?<\/p>\n<div style=\"width: 136px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/upload.wikimedia.org\/wikipedia\/commons\/thumb\/0\/0d\/Lisa_Murkowski_official_photo.jpg\/330px-Lisa_Murkowski_official_photo.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"126\" height=\"147\" \/><p class=\"wp-caption-text\"><em>Senator Murkowski.<\/em><\/p><\/div>\n<p>If any do, my guess is the most likely is Senator Murkowski (R-AK), who, as a moderate politician of independent mien, does not get the respect she deserves from an <em><strong>Alaska GOP<\/strong><\/em> that appears to be out of its mind. Further, she voted &#8216;aye&#8217; on the Alito, Gorsuch, and Barrett nominations to <strong>SCOTUS<\/strong>, leaving her mighty embarrassed by <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Dobbs_v._Jackson_Women's_Health_Organization\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><em>Dobbs<\/em><\/a>. Given that she won the 2010 campaign as a write-in candidate after being primaried, she almost certainly has the strength to leave the Republicans and set up shop as a successful independent. And I can&#8217;t imagine she&#8217;s delighted by many of her fellows in the Republican Party &#8211; it&#8217;s not the Party of her father, Senator and Governor Murkowski.<\/p>\n<div style=\"width: 140px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/upload.wikimedia.org\/wikipedia\/commons\/thumb\/e\/e4\/Senator_Susan_Collins_2014_official_portrait_%28half-body_crop%29.jpg\/296px-Senator_Susan_Collins_2014_official_portrait_%28half-body_crop%29.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"130\" height=\"182\" \/><p class=\"wp-caption-text\"><em>Senator Collins.<\/em><\/p><\/div>\n<p>But she may have a competitor in Senator Collins (R-ME), who has made public her dismay at the poor behavior of the <em>four<\/em> Justices for whom she voted (Kavanaugh in addition to those for whom Murkowski voted) who lead her to believe they respected <em>stare decisis<\/em>, or judicial precedent, and then have proceeded to overturn several rulings that the Federalist Society has hated.<\/p>\n<p>As independents, these two Senators would join Senators Sanders (I-VT) and King (I-ME), making for four independent Senators, each a power in their own right as they don&#8217;t, or no longer, owe allegiance to either Party.<\/p>\n<p>If Even McMullin (I-UT) were to defeat Senator Mike Lee (R-UT), that&#8217;d make five. That&#8217;s almost a bloc in itself. And Senator Romney (R-UT), although formerly a steadfast Republican and even Presidential nominee, has over the last few years seemed more and more out of place. A sixth?<\/p>\n<p>But it all has to start with some Republican. I won&#8217;t speculate about House members, as I don&#8217;t track them much. But it&#8217;s my guess the first defection, if any, will be in the Senate, and won&#8217;t take place until very near the election, or shortly thereafter.<\/p>\n<p>Longtime Senator Republican leader Senator Mitch McConnell (R-KY) may be facing more losses than he anticipates, and not entirely his direct fault. Not that I am sympathetic about it, as he&#8217;s been a destructive force all of his own.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It&#8217;s no doubt too early for this sort of speculation, but I cannot resist. I&#8217;ve watched the January 6th hearings, seen at least some right-wing media evaluate the hearings as devastating for the former President, and now the first few polls have come out indicating a shift in independent voter \u2026 <a class=\"continue-reading-link\" href=\"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/2022\/07\/01\/jumping-ship-soon\/\"> Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr; <\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-36438","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36438","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36438"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36438\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":36440,"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36438\/revisions\/36440"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36438"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=36438"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36438"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}