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Good Friday Morning! Except to Australia. We need to have a conversation with them about sleeping habits and what to do with pajamas. A social media post went viral this week asking people what they did with their pajamas after waking up. A bunch of Australians jumped into the poll, and the overriding response was: “putting them under your pillow.”
Australians were confused by the poll because everyone else was looking at them weirdly. But that’s what they do, apparently. They wake up, get dressed, make the bed, and throw the PJs under the pillow. I can feel the eye-twitches and glare at the screen from my ADHD/Type 1 readers already.
The NYPost adds, “Most commenters on the now-viral video thought that it was the obvious thing to do – most of them being Australian.” They said:
“Thought this was an Australian thing,” one commenter said.
“Aussie here. Pjs go under my pillow,” another agreed.
Lots were even more concerned about what the alternative would be.
“I didn’t know that people DIDN’T do this?? It makes most sense, where else do they go?” said one person.
“Wait, where are you putting them then? Why would you put pjs you’ve already worn back in your wardrobe??” another said.
If anyone wants to interrogate an Aussie at an Outback Steakhouse for the rest of us, please go ahead.
This week, I’m going to continue my election coverage and go through some additional thoughts looking ahead—links to follow.
Quick Hits:
- Ace of Spades drops a nuke. The last 2-3 weeks have been a cafeteria food fight among the online right. Tucker Carlson bringing Nick Fuentes onto his show, arguably the most popular racist on the internet at the moment, was a disaster. I’ve written in the past that I do not believe either Tucker Carlson or Candace Owens is a Christian, nor are either of them conservative at this stage. Their descent into continuing anti-semitism is bizarre, and frankly, demonic. The best rant on all of this came from long-time conservative blogger Ace, who runs Ace of Spades HQ. Ace helped practically build the early conservative internet blogs; he’s a legend in that regard. His piece is long, profane, and hits the nail on the head on everyone involved, but particularly Tucker Carlson. I recommend it.
- The American Almanac is growing! Hundreds of thousands of people now read us daily. I want to express my sincere gratitude to those of you who subscribe, share, and help us grow. You can subscribe here for free. Additionally, please check out Capital Digest (finance/economics), Conservative Legal News, and Real Talk Digest. There are more projects in the pipeline. If you don’t see anything in your inbox a day after signing up, check your spam folder.
Where you can find me this week
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Democrats Implode As 2028 Shadow Primary Begins – Conservative Institute
Takeaways From The 2025 Off-Year Elections – Conservative Institute
Inflation Is Not Solved And Voters Are Mad – Conservative Institute
Dem Civil War Brews While Trump Preps Vance
The broadest takeaway I have from the 2025 off-year elections is that the two parties have flipped their coalitions almost entirely from 20 years ago. This is particularly true of the Obama/Tea Party years. And that’s why it was a good night for Democrats, with some serious caveats.
The general takeaway is that it was a brutal night for Republicans. And I mainly ascribe to that view. There are warning signs in every state involved, and I noted them in my immediate reaction column this week. Sean Trende at RealClearPolitics picked up on a similar theme.
I want to note, especially, Trende’s point on candidate quality:
It’s an open question in our current polarized environment how much candidate quality or candidate radicalism matters, if at all. Virginia is a pretty good test case. Abigail Spanberger is basically a generic Democrat, while her opponent, Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears is a social conservative out of touch with the state’s pro-choice leanings and simultaneously not a MAGA darling. In the attorney general race, incumbent Jason Miyares is a pretty normal Republican running against a guy who fantasized about seeing his opponent’s kids die. Spanberger got 57.2% of the vote. Jones won 52.8%. So, a complete reversal of candidate quality is worth about 4.4 percentage points. That’s bracing.
I’d agree with that observation, though with a caveat: Mamdani underperformed his polls in New York City, showing there is some blowback. That matters more with more diverse setups.
And that’s the irony: Republicans now depend on having diverse states with more class splits in them. Virginia, New Jersey, and New York City are full of white, college-educated voters across all ages, and this cohort is overwhelmingly moving towards Democrats.
Mamdani, in his speech, talked about all these diverse people of different ethnicities who pushed him over. And it’s a great tale to tell yourself, it’s just wrong in his case. His supporters are white women with liberal arts degrees who work in New York City and have lived there for less than five years.
And I don’t say this to be pejorative; it’s literally the hard data. That’s why the policy positions, outlook, and shift in the Democratic Party represent this one cohort so hard. And also why every other group, from men to minorities, is struggling to maintain support for Democrats: they aren’t represented in any meaningful way anymore.
There was a similar tale in Virginia and New Jersey. In Virginia, Earle-Sears won white women, non-college white men, and white men non-college graduates – all by sizable margins. She lost white women with college degrees 65-34. There was the same story in New Jersey.
Ruy Teixeira, a Democrat, wrote in The Liberal Patriot:
Indeed, comparing the 2024 and 2025 elections in Virginia and New Jersey using the preliminary AP/NORC VoteCast results indicates you can account for almost all of Democrats’ overperformance in 2025 relative to 2024 (both Spanberger and Sherrill ran ahead of Harris) by (1) a larger class gap (college vs. working class) in both states primarily because both candidates did way better among college-educated voters than Harris did in 2024, and (2) a greater share of college voters in both states (especially VA) relative to 2024.
The strong performance among the college-educated continues to be the Democrats’ hole card, especially their strength among white college women. Compare Democrats’ performance among this group to their performance among other white gender/education groups in Virginia and New Jersey. White college-educated women are clearly dwelling in a different political universe than the other groups.
In short, if Democrats have to jump out and start winning the non-college working-class vote again, they’re in trouble. Now, what Democrats may do is try to take this current coalition and re-win minorities. That may be possible, but it’s still a narrow path.
The demographics of New York City, New Jersey, and Virginia differ from those of Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Michigan, Georgia, Nevada, and Arizona. Kamala Harris won Virginia and New Jersey in 2024; she lost in the other states. New Jersey, Virginia, and New York City will not be super helpful in predicting what happens in the Rust Belt.
The Republican side of this is straightforward, though not easy: how do you drive out working-class voters if Trump is not on the ballot? Philip Wegmann had a good reported piece on the internal discussions about this in the GOP and White House.
This isn’t a unique question or problem. Democrats couldn’t drive their base out to the midterms or special elections during the Obama years; they struggled under Clinton, too. In fact, from 1994 – 2014, you can really only give Democrats one good midterm: 2006, when Pelosi became Speaker.
The Trump era has fared better for Democrats, with them taking 2018 and mildly over-performing in 2022 (which convinced Biden to run again). I expect, for now, Democrats to do well in 2026, but that’s just a baseline expectation for the out party to do better in a midterm.
What the 2025 races did show is the brawl coming for Democrats in the 2028 midterms. It’s going to be the AOC/Mamdani wing vs. everyone else. If AOC runs for President, which there’s growing expectation for her to do, she’ll become the new Bernie Sanders – he’s all but anointing her. If she runs for Senate, she’s targeting Schumer.
Either way, before we get to the primaries, the big fight among Democrats will be: which state gets to be the first presidential primary? States like Iowa and New Hampshire favor the socialist wing, whereas South Carolina will favor the moderates—Politico did a full spread on this, calling it an explosive fight in the party. Whatever wing wins the primary calendar fight gets an advantage. Whoever loses that fight will argue the contests are rigged.
On the Republican side, it’s likely going to be Vance and Rubio. I’m not expecting a hard primary. And Vance’s task will be figuring out how to hold onto those Trump voters. Obviously, I expect Trump to be hitting the campaign trail, too. He can’t stop. But Vance has to prove he can do it.
I know it seems early to talk about this, but the fights that are going to shape that 2028 contest are happening now, and Democrats have a civil war on their hands. On the GOP side, they have to keep losses to a minimum in 2026 and work on turnout with Vance headed into 2028.
Consider these points your early tracking points that will tell you the future. Trump and Republicans are focusing hard on boosting working-class turnout, especially low-propensity voters. Democrats are going to turn out college-educated voters and minorities. In the meantime, Democrats will fight the Democratic Socialists and the Party over who controls the calendar.
With Pelosi exiting the scene, Democrats are going to be even more at each other’s throats over these things. She had power over them all, even when she wasn’t Speaker. What now? Schumer doesn’t have it. And Barack Obama is losing his grip, too. It’s a leaderless party, which his how you get self-avowed socialists running New York City.
It’s a wild world, and we’re only getting started.
Links of the week
Vice, Virtue, and Victory: Dick Cheney, RIP – Free Beacon
The Big Tent is Overrated: It depends on who’s running the tent. – The Liberal Patriot
The NYT Glorifies Nick Fuentes: Then pretends to be shocked, shocked that Tucker Carlson would interview him. – Sasha Stone
The Electric Bill Election: On Tuesday, the soaring cost of power was a key factor in several races – Prospect
After Crushing Prop 50 Defeat, California GOP Turns to the Courts – RealClearPolitics
Supreme Court ruling on Trump tariffs comes down to a numbers game: Oral arguments reveal deep skepticism in tariffs but might result in a mixed decision – Jonathan Turley
X/Twitter Thread(s) of the week
Peter Thiel’s email to tech founds on the coming issue of socialism.
Satire of the week
Californians Approve Measure To Redraw ‘Garfield’ – The Onion
Mamdani Moves Mayor’s Office Under Children’s Hospital – Babylon Bee
State Department Issues Travel Advisory For New York City – Babylon Bee
How to Stop People Pleasing Unless Someone Seems Like They Want You to Start Again – Reductress
White House Honors Dick Cheney With a 21-Gun-To-The-Face Salute – The Hard Times
Average Age Of First Time Buyer Now 92 – Waterford Whispers News