Amazon to Split New HQ Between Crystal City, Virginia and Long Island City, New York

Long Island City, New York

Crystal City, Virginia

It is expected that Amazon will announce today that its new headquarters will be split between Crystal City, Virginia and Long Island City, New York, handing Virginia governor Ralph Northam a major economic victory.  The other victor is the Long Island City portion of New York City which has already seen amazing redevelopment and gentrification over the last 20 years.  When the announcement comes, it will underscore the reality that red states are making themselves increasingly unattractive to progressive corporations and businesses that want educated populations that are welcoming to a diverse work force.  A piece in the New York Times looks at Amazon's decision and its likely economic impact.  Here are highlights (the Washington Post also has a piece here): 

After conducting a yearlong search for a second home, Amazon has finalized plans to have about 50,000 employees in two locations, according to a person familiar with the decision-making process.

The company has decided to move to the Long Island City neighborhood of Queens, and to the Crystal City area of Arlington, Va., a Washington suburb, the person said. Amazon, which plans to officially announce the decision on Tuesday, already has more employees in those two areas than anywhere else outside of Seattle, its home base, and the Bay Area.

The need to hire tens of thousands of high-tech workers has been the driving force behind the search, leading many to expect it to land in a major East Coast metropolitan area. Many experts had pointed to Crystal City as a front-runner, because of its strong public transit, educated work force and proximity to Washington.

About 1,800 people in advertising, fashion and publishing already work for Amazon in New York, and roughly 2,500 corporate and technical employees work in Northern Virginia and Washington. Amazon announced plans for a second headquarters in September 2017, saying that the company was growing faster than it could hire in its hometown, Seattle. The company said it would invest more than $5 billion over almost two decades in a second headquarters, hiring as many as 50,000 full-time employees that would earn more than $100,000 a year on average.

HQ2 would be the “full equal to our current campus in Seattle,” the company said. Picking multiple sites allows it to tap into two pools of talented labor and perhaps avoid being blamed for all of the housing and traffic woes of dominating a single area. It could also give the company greater leverage in negotiating tax incentives, experts said.

The HQ2 search sent states and cities into a frenzied bidding war. Some hired McKinsey & Company and other outside consultants to help them with their bids, investing heavily in courting Amazon and its promise of 50,000 jobs. Even half of that would amount to one of the largest corporate location deals on record, according to Greg LeRoy, executive director of Good Jobs First, which tracks corporate subsidies. “These are very big numbers,” he said.

As Amazon’s search dragged on, residents in many of the 20 finalist cities worried about the impact such a massive project could have on housing and traffic, as well as what potential tax incentives could cost the community. The decision to split HQ2 into two sites could alleviate some of that resistance.

Seattle has been one of the fastest growing cities in the country, in part because of Amazon’s growth. The company has about 45,000 employees in the city, and the company said it needed to hire more employees than the city could attract or absorb.

The piece in the Post notes as follows:

The choice of Crystal City in Arlington County as one of the winners could cement Northern Virginia’s reputation as a magnet for business and potentially reshape the Washington region into an eastern outpost of Silicon Valley over the next decade. The decision hands Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam (D) and local leaders the largest economic-development prize in a generation — one promising billions of dollars in capital investments alone — but could also put pressure on the region’s already steep housing prices, congested roads, and yawning divide between wealthy and low-income residents.

It also would represent a victory for New York Mayor Bill de Blasio (D) and Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D), who had joked that he would change his name to “Amazon Cuomo” if necessary to land the project.

Will Southern Suburbs Abandon the GOP?

One of the keys to turning Virginia blue in statewide elections has been growing support for Democrats in suburban areas, particularly Northern Virginia.  The reality has become that if a Democrat carries the so-called "urban crescent" from Northern Virginia southward to Richmond and then southeaster to Hampton Roads, there simply are not enough votes in the rural, reactionary regions of the state to overcome the deficit.  One aspect of this change has been the flight of college educated whites from the GOP, a party that now is overtly racist, panders to Christian extremists, and embraces ignorance - all thing deemed offensive by a majority of college educated whites (and I would argue, decent, truly moral people). As the 2018 midterms approach (and 2020 two years from now), one of the questions of the day is whether the flight from the GOP in other southern suburbs can propel Democrats to statewide victories and flipping congressional districts.  A piece in CNN looks at the phenomenon.  Here are excerpts:

One key measure of any Democratic wave in the midterm elections will be whether it crests high enough to overcome the formidable Republican defenses in the growing suburbs across the South. The answer will have implications that extend far beyond 2018.

While Democrats have notched significant gains since the 1990s among white-collar suburban voters in most parts of the country, they have until recently made very little progress at loosening the Republican hold on affluent and increasingly racially diverse suburbs around such Southern metro areas as Atlanta, Houston and Dallas. But suburban unease with Donald Trump's turbulent presidency may finally provide Democrats an opening to establish a beachhead in such places -- a development that would rattle the electoral map. Although the recoil from Trump among white-collar suburbanites inside the South is not as great as outside of it, both public and private polls signal that enough suburban voters are pulling away from him to create much greater opportunity than usual for Democrats this fall in the governor's race in Georgia, Senate races in Tennessee and Texas, and several suburban House seats across the region.
 [W]e are also definitely making inroads first and foremost with college-educated white women, but also college-educated white men." Many of the most vulnerable Republican House seats around the country are centered on white-collar suburbs. Democrats have strong opportunities in suburban seats from New York, New Jersey and Philadelphia through Northern Virginia, Chicago, Minneapolis, Detroit, Denver and Los Angeles. That vulnerability is rooted in the unusual resistance Trump faces among well-educated white voters: Three national polls last week each found that around 60 percent of whites holding at least a four-year college degree disapproved of his performance.
 In addition, gains in white-collar suburbs will be critical to Democratic prospects in the Georgia governor's race between African-American Democrat Stacey Abrams and Republican Secretary of State Brian Kemp; the highly competitive Tennessee Senate contest between former Democratic Governor Phil Bredesen and Republican Rep. Marsha Blackburn; and the more uphill, but still competitive, challenge by Democratic Rep. Beto O'Rourke against Republican Sen. Ted Cruz in Texas.
 Even if Democrats fall short in some or all of these races, a significantly improved performance in white-collar suburbs could offer them a roadmap for seriously contesting North Carolina, Georgia and perhaps even Texas against Trump in 2020 -- when African-Americans, Latinos and other minority voters, who mostly lean Democratic, will likely comprise a bigger share of the electorate than this fall. But in virtually every state in which Democrats have grown more competitive since the early 1990s, increased minority participation has been only part of the equation -- it has been necessary, but not sufficient. Whether in California, Illinois and New Jersey, which tilted toward Democrats in the 1990s, or Colorado, Virginia and (more equivocally) North Carolina, where the party strengthened its position in the 2000s, the winning Democratic formula has combined both an increase in minority participation and improved performance among college-educated white voters. In the states where Democrats have gained ground in recent decades, those two changes have offset lackluster, and an often deteriorating, performance with evangelical, rural and non-college educated white voters. [Wendy] Davis pointed to two principal reasons Southern suburbs have remained so difficult for Democrats.  "One is that we've had a booming economy and it's the economy stupid as the saying goes, so people have felt pretty satisfied with where things are," Davis said. "We also suffer the problem of being absolutely ignored in presidential election contests which means that we haven't built the infrastructure that's necessary to communicate with a lot of the voters that are needed."
 The Democratic improvement in white-collar suburbs in other regions has been keyed largely by cultural affinity, since many college-educated voters, especially women, take more liberal positions on social issues from abortion and gay rights to gun control. But fewer Southern suburbanites are social liberals, probably because more of them than elsewhere are evangelical Christians or otherwise religiously traditional. Democrats still confront all of these barriers this year. But Trump's rise has provided them a new opening. With his racially infused nationalism and belligerent personal style, Trump conspicuously lost ground across many Southern suburbs in his 2016 race against Hillary Clinton when compared to Mitt Romney's performance in the same places in 2012. . . . in key suburbs around the major metropolitan areas, such as Gwinnett and Cobb counties outside of Atlanta, the shift away from the GOP was undeniable and ominous for Republican strategists. . . . Basically we've traded the smaller, slower growing more rural counties for larger fast growing suburban counties." In last November's Virginia governor's race, Democrat Ralph Northam posted big advances not only in suburbs outside of Washington DC, which politically behave more like Northern suburbs, but also the suburban communities around Richmond, which have tilted more reliably Republican. A more immediate problem for Texas Democrats, he said, may be improving their performance among Latino voters, among whom Republicans have retained a significant minority of support even under Trump. Still, the most recent statewide poll conducted by the University of Texas and the Texas Tribune in June shows some clear openings for Democrats among well-educated white voters who have previously resisted them.
 [N]ow in Georgia, he adds, "If you are the business community, you have to think twice about do you get behind a Republican as you normally would, or would Kemp scare away business?" . . . Whether or not Abrams makes history as the nation's first female African-American governor, November's results in suburban Atlanta will provide one revealing measure of whether Democrats can truly pressure Trump in 2020 in Georgia -- and perhaps elsewhere across the South.

I truly hope that Democrats replicate Northam's ground game which resulted in a surge of Democrat turn out across demographic groups.  Of course, Gillespie's decision to tie himself to Trump made that all the easier.  

Will Virginia GOP Cause Northern Virginia to be Disqualified from Amazon’s HQ2 Selection?

The other day I noted how Indian Republicans seemly blew Indianapolis from consideration for Amazon's new Headquarters by refusing to approve protections for LGBT Indianans.   Seemly, prostituting themselves to the Christofascists in their state was deemed more important than landing 50,000 new jobs for the state.  Virginia Republicans have largely followed the wrongheaded behavior of their Indiana partmates so far in the 2018 by  session of the Virginia General Assembly.  Now, a number of activists are arguing that none of the 9 cities under consideration by Amazon in states without LGBT non-discrimination protections should be eliminated form consideration.  The activists' demand is, in fact, in keeping with Amazon's statement that it values "diversity and equality."  If Virginia loses out because of the GOP's love affair with bigots and bigotry, voters need to send them a message in both November 2018 and November 2019: vote Republicans at all levels out of office.  Meanwhile, call your representatives and state senators in the General Assembly and demand that the vote for passage of non-discrimination bills.  Here are story highlights on the issue: 

Should cities in states that don’t protect LGBT people from discrimination still be considered for Amazon’s second headquarters? Activists from across the nation are coming together to send a clear message to the e-retailer as they consider the options: “No Gay? No Way.”

The tech giant has been a leader in using corporate influence to benefit the LGBT community and has had a queer employee resource group for over a decade. So why are they considering locations that would take away the civil rights of any employees transferred out of the Seattle office?

“We were frankly just stunned that a company with such a great track record of equality and diversity had put all these states into the mix,” Conor Gaughan, the ad-hoc campaign’s manager told USA Today.

Nine out of the twenty finalists for Amazon’s HQ2 are in states that offer no protections for LGBT people. Some of the states are actively hostile to civil rights.

Austin and Dallas, Nashville, Atlanta, Columbus, Ohio, Indianapolis, Miami, Raleigh, N.C., and the D.C. suburbs of northern Virginia do not protect LGBT people from discrimination.

Indiana voted down a proposed hate crimes law this week because it included sexual orientation and gender identity.

Public schools in Texas are required to teach students that homosexuality is unnatural and unacceptable. Tennessee state law prohibits local governments from enacting nondiscrimination laws that include LGBT people.

Amazon’s requirements for the new location were clear, saying it requires “a compatible cultural and community environment” that includes “the presence and support of a diverse population.” Now advocates want them to comply with their own standards.

The coalition of activists plan a protest outside of Amazon’s headquarters in Seattle today, complete with a plane waving a “No Gay? No Way.” banner behind it. They will also be placing billboards on trucks to drive through Seattle streets with the logo emblazoned on them.

Call your senator and member of the House of Delegates today!

How Virginia Ceased to Be a "Red State"

Virginia population change - the areas in blue are the GOP strongholds

Since my early days in the Republican Party there has been a sea change in Virginia politics and elections - at least outside of carefully gerrymandered districts to favor the GOP (for the record, the gerrymandering occurred well after I left the Republican Party).  The new reality is that for Republicans running statewide, especially at the presidential level, Virginia is an increasingly hostile state.  Why?  The rapidly changing demographics of Virginia and the rising voting strength of the so-called "urban crescent" that stretches from the Northern Virginia suburbs of Washington, D.C., south through Richmond and then on to Hampton Roads.  The population of this urban crescent exceeds that of the rest of the state and can, therefore, out vote the GOP strongholds in rural Virginia.  A piece in the Washington Post looks at this major - and in my view, very positive - change.  Here are excerpts:

A little more than a decade ago, President George W. Bush won Virginia with ease for a second time — an eight-point victory that was never in doubt.

Over the subsequent eight years, nearly the opposite happened: Barack Obama won the state twice, becoming the first Democrat to win here since Lyndon B. Johnson’s victory in 1964.

Now, Virginia appears to be drifting out of reach for Republican Donald Trump; he trailed Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton by 13 percentage points in an NBC-Wall Street Journal-Marist poll released Friday. Analysts are contemplating taking Virginia off the list of presidential battlegrounds entirely and tucking it neatly in the column of safely blue states.
 Where uncertainty remains is whether that status applies only this year, because of the steady decline of Trump’s campaign, or whether it is a sign of a longer-term problem for Virginia Republicans that will extend beyond presidential races in years to come.

What is clear is that the demographics of the state have shifted dramatically in the space of a single decade, with populations of educated, high-income professionals as well as immigrants and other minorities — all voters who tend to choose Democrats — growing in urban areas. These shifts reflect national trends, Pew research shows.

[Trump] also has alienated large swaths of the electorate that have become deciding factors in Virginia races: women, minorities and educated professionals.  David Wasserman of the Cook Political Report predicted that Trump is at risk of losing by a landslide in the vote-rich suburbs of Northern Virginia — and that no amount of support in the less-populous rural regions could counteract that.

Even Virginia Republicans acknowledge the challenge. Trump counts few Republican elected officials among his vocal supporters in part due to some of his more inflammatory comments, which have alienated groups including women, Muslim Americans, Hispanics and those with disabilities.

Here’s another way to look at it: From the 1992 to the 2012 presidential elections, the population of Northern Virginia grew from 1.5 million to 2.2 million. And it grew with an influx of a particular kind of voter; in that same time period, in Fairfax County alone, Democrats’ lead over Republicans in Fairfax grew from three points to 15 points, according to election returns, with Obama garnering nearly 6 in 10 votes.

Now, Democrats rely on what may be fast becoming a fail-safe formula: Focus on turning out voters in the “urban crescent” of Northern Virginia, Richmond and Hampton Roads and the college towns of Charlottesville and Blacksburg, and it becomes really hard to lose. Gov. Terry McAuliffe (D) used this playbook to defeat Republican Ken Cuccinelli II in the 2013 governor’s race — and Clinton is on track to do the same this year.

Even with the relatively high turnout of a presidential year, there simply aren’t enough Trump voters to overtake Democrats’ edge in the north. 

While things are looking more and more positive in Virginia, the same trend is happening in states like North Carolina - and even in Texas.   The demographics that favor Democrats are steadily growing and the GOP has done nothing but alienate these voters. 

A Silver Lining in Virginia's Election Results

While Republicans maintained their hold on the Virginia Senate and thus will likely block Medicaid expansion and other progressive measures proposed by Governor McAuliffe, they did not increase their overall seat count and saw loses in the House of Delegates and in other lower tier elections.  It also must be noted that since 2015 is an off year with low voter turnout, the GOP's ability to largely hold back losses does not mean that things will be rosy in the GOP bubble come next year, especially of the GOP nominates a lunatic as its standard bearer.  Over at Bearing Drift, Brian Schoeneman, one of the few sane Republicans left looks at the dark spots - that Democrats need to capitalize on - in the GOP's election results.  Here are highlights:

One of the reasons why your average voter has a tendency to hate politicians is that we often do our best to bring out the silver lining in even the darkest of storm clouds.  We will find the one or two good outcomes in a sea of bad ones and focus on those rather than on the big picture.  That’s a human tendency, especially when anybody’s job is on the line.

On the other hand, I’ve always been of the opinion that the truth is better than spin, and that as adults we should be willing to accept the bad with the good, because an unwillingness to confront things that didn’t go so well is an inherent obstacle to fixing those things the next time around.  Given that we’ve got a presidential cycle just around the corner, we need to look objectively at what happened last night in Virginia and have a long conversation about what it actually means.  So let’s throw away the posturing and be honest.

By any objective measurement, the GOP had a bad night  The only news story that most of America saw last night – the one that was blasted out by Politico, CNN and the non-Virginia news outlets – was that we held the State Senate, which threw a wrench into Governor McAuliffe’s long-term legislative plans.  Medicaid expansion is dead, as are his misguided attempts at turning guns into a political issue in a staunchly pro-gun Commonwealth. 

But what did the wins in the State Senate mean?  We maintained the status quo.  That’s it.

Maintaining the status quo in the Senate was a must win, and we won it.  But we gained no ground, and the millions poured into the Commonwealth by outside groups didn’t have an overall impact on the final outcome.  In the two races they targeted, they went 1-1.  The only people really pleased with that outcome should be the TV stations in Richmond and Northern Virginia.  On the House of Delegates side, we lost ground overall. 

Northern Virginia, however, should be concerned – our power in the House just dropped considerably.  We lost control of the House Transportation Committee and we lost two Republican seats that are now in Democratic hands, and thus marginalized.  And losing GOP incumbents in Northern Virginia before a presidential election is a bad thing – we lose the network, the lists, the activist contact with an incumbent.  All those things matter.  And now they’re gone.  

On the local level, the constant in-fighting and back-biting among different sectors of the Republican Party tore up areas that had previously been considered Republican strongholds.  . . .  Despite the feeling that this was a Republican year on the ground in Fairfax, all of our challenger candidates for Board of Supervisors lost and the open seat race in my home Sully District was a GOP loss, flipping that seat to the Democrats. 

The biggest loser of the night – by far – was the Republican Party of Virginia.  Early this morning, RPV sent out a self-congratulatory email that was long on self-praise but short on facts.  It was, if anything, an obvious attempt (and clearly pre-election results written) at turd polishing by Chairman John Whitbeck, going into this reelection campaign next year.  Despite the fact that we maintained the status quo and our messaging didn’t really work  . . . .

Whatever GOP momentum we may have built up was just released last night with a resounding “meh,” after losing a lot of races that folks thought we would do well in.  Let’s be honest – not flipping a single Senate seat Blue to Red is not momentum. As for RPV’s vaunted “Faces of the GOP” campaign – straight out of 2007’s Corporate Public Relations playbook – it was a disaster.  Of the 20 Republican races profiled, 14 of the candidates lost. 

Last night must be viewed by every Republican in Virginia as a wake up call.  The idea that we can win “base,” low-turnout off-year elections just by turning out Republicans should have died last night.  Wherever we nominated a candidate who didn’t reflect their district, we lost.  We lost two critical seats in Northern Virginia that will make next year’s presidential race harder to run.  And, most important, we saw obvious examples in Loudoun that the constant in-fighting between sections of the GOP has real world implications – and those implications are bad.  Bottom line – we had a bad night and we have a lot of work to do.

Will the Virginia GOP accept this message?  I doubt it since the Party more and more lives in an alternate universe dominated by the Christofascists, white supremacists and ignorance embracing elements  of the party base.

Northern VA "Conservative" Parents Upset Over School Curriculum that Admits Gays and Transgender Exist

Having had three children go through the Virginia public schools over the course of the last 25+ years, one thing that never changes is the way in which Christofascists ALWAYS want the school curriculum to reflect their ignorance embracing beliefs that exclude the existence of gays and transgender individuals.  They are self-centered and truly care nothing for the rights of beliefs of others and demand that their darling children be forever sheltered from the realities of real life and the real world.  Now, the Fairfax County School Board has committed the cardinal sin of (i) voting to implement a non-discrimination policy to protect trans students and staff, and (ii) amending the curriculum to include lessons on gender identity and being transgender.  The hate-filled "godly folk" are going ballistic.  Here are highlights from Gay Star News:

Conservative parents are furious about proposed changes to the curriculum for grades 7 to 12 at some schools in Virginia..

Last week, the Fairfax County School Board voted to include gender identity in their non-discrimination policy to expand protection for trans students and staff.

Parents and students opposing the policy change claimed children could choose which bathroom or locker room to use, heightening the danger of sexual harassment.

Now the school board is reportedly planning to extend the curriculum to include lessons on gender identity and being transgender.

‘Students will be provided definitions for sexual orientation terms heterosexuality, homosexuality and bisexuality; and the gender identity term transgender,’ the district’s recommendations state.

‘Emphasis will be placed on recognizing that everyone is experiencing changes and the role of respectful, inclusive language in promoting an environment free of bias and discrimination.‘

Parents have been said to be ‘irate’ over the recommended changes; Fox News columnist Todd Starnes expressed his disagreement, calling the update ‘unadulterated sex indoctrination’.

Peter Sprigg, of the Family Research Council, called it ‘an attack on nature itself’, saying children would be taught they could choose their gender.

‘It’s only going to create more confusion in the minds of young people who don’t need any further confusion about sexual identity,’ he said.

The changes are set to be formally announced on 21 May; because lessons need to be planned, the schools are planning to implement the changes later next year.

 

The Asian Vote - Another Lost Battlefield for the GOP?

Something has happened which should have been easily predicted: by embracing the far Christian Right - which basically hates everyone who isn't an American born white, far right Christian - and most recently the white supremacist crowd, the Republican Party has driven away other demographic groups who either are (i) non-white, (ii) non-Christian, or (iii) who don't want the likes of Tony Perkins setting policy positions.  And it's not just the Pacific rim Asians who have been alienated.  South Asians - as many of Indian descent describe themselves - also find the hate and religious extremism of the GOP base abhorrent.  Stated another way, my many Hindu clients have easily figured out that the GOP base hates them just as much as they hate gays, notwithstanding Bobby Jindal's willingness to prostitute himself to Christofascists.  A piece in Politico looks at this other demographic that the GOP has lost.  Here are excerpts:

Even in a national election shadowed by geopolitical instability and a heated debate over immigration, it’s a rare campaign that has voters hearing about the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 and maritime disputes between Japan and the Republic of Korea.

But in these suburbs a few miles from the nation’s capital, these are only a few of the unconventional issues rearing up in the battle for control of Congress. Candidates up and down the ballot have hurled themselves into winning over the area’s swiftly growing Asian-American population, striving to sell themselves as champions of small business and public education, and as masters of even the narrowest ethnic preoccupations.

Fairfax is only one of a lengthening list of urban and suburban battlegrounds – from northern New Jersey to the greater Atlanta area, to the streets of Minneapolis and Las Vegas and up and down the West Coast – where the two national parties have focused with new intensity this year on wooing this expansive and diverse immigrant population.

Spurred by President Barack Obama’s landslide victory among Asian-American voters in 2012 and new government data showing Asians outstripping Latinos as the fastest-growing immigrant population, prominent elected officials on both sides of the aisle have called for a stepped-up focus on Americans of Asian descent.

Texas Sen. John Cornyn . . . . called it essential that the GOP start “showing up” before these communities’ distrust of Republicans gets cemented in place.  “That is a trajectory for permanent minority status and we have to do something about it,” said Cornyn, the number-two Republican in the Senate. “I’m astonished to hear what our opponents tell people about Republicans, to some groups, when we’re not there.”

California Rep. Judy Chu, the Democrat who leads the Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus, said both parties increasingly see Asian Americans as a “margin of victory” population in some especially challenging races. 

Pollsters warn that it’s difficult to generalize about Asian-American voters, mainly because it’s a vastly diverse population. Indian Americans, Thai immigrants and voters of Korean descent may share an ancestral continent, but it’s hard to say they represent a cohesive electoral bloc.

Yet partisan strategists and Asian-American activists say that even across culturally disparate immigrant groups, there are common preoccupations – an intense focus on education, for instance, and concern about the economic environment for small, family-owned businesses.

Increasingly, there is also a broad affinity for the Democratic Party – seen overwhelmingly as the party that stands for racial and ethnic diversity, and a more inclusive federal immigration policy.

In 2012, Asian Americans voted for the president by a larger margin – 47 points – even than Latinos. In swing-state Virginia, where Asian Americans made up 3 percent of the electorate, they supported Democratic Sen. Tim Kaine by 32 points.

Here in Fairfax, local leaders call Northern Virginia a snapshot of the whole country’s political and demographic future, with both elected officials and ethnic community leaders a few big steps ahead of other swing-state colleagues when it comes to political engagement and community outreach.

Even here, however, the change has come swiftly enough to transform the politics of the region in less than one political generation. Beyer, who will easily capture a safe Democratic House seat next week, recalled his early campaigns for public office: “My first race was 25 years ago and I don’t even remember [Asian American outreach] being in my list of 24 campaign priorities.”

“Now, increasingly, the Asian American vote, along with the Latino vote and the Muslim vote – which of course is kind of pan-Asian – they’re very important,” said Beyer, who emphasized just how heterogeneous the ethnic groups of his future district are. “The Chinese are different from the Filipinos, who are different from the Japanese. I don’t find any one theme works – except for economic opportunity and inclusion.”

The GOP can talk all it wants about economic opportunity, but as long as it remains the party of exclusion, white supremacy, and hatred towards non-Christians, the Asians I know are not going to fall for the disingenuous out reach.  The saying goes that you are known by the company you keep, and the GOP keeps some pretty ugly and racist company.  Here in Virginia, the Republican Party is owned by the white supremacist religious extremists at The Family Foundation.  That's not how one wins the Asian vote - or Hispanics or progressives either. 

How Virginia's Changing Demographics Allow Democrats to Ignore Rural Voters

Click image to enlarge

The last couple of statewide elections in Virginia have underscored the demographic change that has swept the state.  With the growth of the urban crescent from Northern Virginia down through Hampton Roads, increasingly Democrats can win statewide office without courting the rural - and I would say backward/reactionary - areas of the state.  While Virginia Beach remains an anomaly and was found to be one of the most conservative cities in America, most of the urban voters reject the God, guns, homophobia, anti-contraception and racism that are main themes of Republicanism  in Virginia nowadays.  The consequence is that while Republicans still hold sway in the General Assembly thanks to obscenely gerrymandered districts, statewide contests are increasingly theirs to lose for Democrats.  The current contest between Mark Warner and his GOP challenger who continues to embrace reactionary, anti-gay and anti-woman is a case in point.  Here are highlights from a piece in the Washington Post that looks at this new reality:

Turkey hunting, NASCAR and a bluegrass campaign ditty: not the most obvious path to the governor’s mansion for a multimillionaire raised in Connecticut. Yet it worked for Mark R. Warner, running in Virginia in 2001, and still looks like a stroke of genius to many an admiring Democrat.
It’s up to Steve Jarding, manager of that campaign, to set the record straight.

“We weren’t geniuses at all. We were desperate,” Jarding said. “We had to figure out how to get votes in Southside and all of rural Virginia or we weren’t going to win.”

Today, as Warner seeks a second term in the U.S. Senate in a deeply changed Virginia, rural voters are not nearly as receptive to Democrats as they used to be — and Democrats no longer need them.

Explosive population growth in the Washington suburbs and near-stagnant rural numbers have allowed other Democrats — President Obama, U.S. Sen. Timothy M. Kaine and Gov. Terry McAuliffe — to win with little support outside of Northern Virginia and other urban centers.

All of which helps explain how a man who long ago branded himself a “radical centrist” found himself on a debate stage this summer celebrating gay marriage, injecting abortion and birth control into the discussion, and pushing for a higher minimum wage. Warner even went after his opponent, former Republican National Committee chairman Ed Gillespie, for avoiding taking a position on climate change.

In other words, Virginia has changed so much that Mark Warner has changed, too.

[W]hen Warner met Gillespie for their first debate at the Greenbrier resort in West Virginia late last month, the Democrat made his usual overtures toward rural Virginians, with lots of mentions of moderate positions on energy, federal spending and foreign affairs.

But with just three minutes left in the question-and-answer segment, in the middle of a discussion on same-sex marriage (which Gillespie opposes and Warner has publicly supported since early 2013), the Democrat sharply pivoted to abortion and birth control.

Warner said Gillespie, who opposes abortion in most cases, would seek to ban not only abortion but also “certain common forms of contraception.”  Warner’s campaign said those assertions were based on the fact that the Republican platform adopted in 2004, during Gillespie’s tenure as party chairman, called for both a personhood amendment and for overturning Roe v. Wade.

McAuliffe got clobbered last year in Southside and southwest, two regions Warner won 13 years ago. But because Northern Virginia had grown tremendously bigger and bluer, McAuliffe was able to more than make up ground there, winning the Washington area by more than twice the margin that Warner had in 2001.

Those trends might look like pure electoral gravy for Warner, who left the governor’s office with soaring approval ratings and remains the state’s most popular politician. But Warner has probably lost support in what is now bright-red rural Virginia.

What is happening in Virginia is also happening in states like Texas.  In Texas, the tide hasn't turned as much yet, but over time it will.  Does the GOP have a game plan other than trying to disenfranchise blacks and Hispanics?  If it does, it is not apparent.  As time goes by, pandering to aging, angry whites and religious extremists is not a prescription for long term survival of the GOP.