There are a few tea leaves I noticed going unread after Tuesday's loss. And you can't really blame people for over looking them, there are a lot of tea leaves to read after a loss like that!
Cantor's loss is a foreshadow to the House's fate. Loss of power from poor management and inability to recognize reality of conditions from desired/expected outcome. If you are traveling from Dallas to St Louis, and you notice a sign for Albuquerque, you've probably taken a wrong turn and should pull over to recalibrate...
The tea leaves: The Republican Party is having a huge problem with their moderate members, i.e, the bulk of their party. Cantor's loss could very well be indicative of the outcome this fall. Moderate Republicans either do not bother to show at the polls to vote, or worse, they vote for someone else for spite.
Either way, it's a loss for Republican power post Nov 4th.
More below, maybe less snark. Maybe. No promises in battle.
The problem with loses out of your largest voting block.
Simple, larger population samples have larger numerical quantities of people in each percentage point.
You lose 3% of the fringe, and that's a small population.
You lose 3% of the majority block, and that could mean the difference in an election. The kind of difference where your candidate was up in the polls by double digit margins a week before the election, and ends up losing by just as many points.
Sometimes reducing numbers for the sake of easier reading on reports is not helpful. 3 million or 3%. They both can be big or small numbers in context, but when you see the number 3 million, it looks big regardless of context.
What the results of loss would mean.
Simple. Less power regardless of loss of majority in House, or not.
If the Republican's power in the House comes from their majority, then the strength of that power is based on the delta between the number of seats they do and do not control.
Currently, that delta of 51 seats (ignoring vacant seats), gives the Repubs a healthy margin over the Dems. And the larger Repub party as a whole can pressure individual members. The large margin gives them security and anonymity in voting with the herd.
As the delta shrinks, so does the ability of the herd to pressure it's members to fall in line.
If the best the democrats can do this election cycle is to close the gap by maybe 50%, suddenly, it becomes harder for individual Republican members to hind amongst their herd.
Power is neutered without having to take away control. It is exceedingly easier to get 26 Repubs to vote with the Dems, than it is to move 52.
The Democrats no longer have to fight to win if this is the case. More important, all the benefits go to the underdog because there is no longer an overwhelming need to exhaust energy in the effort to win. Energy can be used for thought and planning instead of execution.
Last takeaway. Loss across the board
When you take a loss, and you are going to take a loss in life at some point, the best hope for that loss is that it is spread out, thinned by smaller losses across a larger scale.
Direct hits hurt.
If the Republicans are taking losses to their moderates, -and the moderates again are the largest block- then these hits are right in the gizzard. Areas of their demographs that are the most dense. Collateral will be the highest.
The moderate Republican districts are going to be districts of greater overall value since they are mainly located closer to urban areas. Urban areas have greater concentration of constituents and wealth.
Less energy is needed to interact in the denser districts.
The Tea Party and other fringe groups probably won't want to spend all their time and energy driving across the state to gather together to bitch. You want to drive down the street, gather at a local park or other location, bitch, whine and then head home for dinner. Maybe stop by the store to pick up some additional groceries than you forgot this morning. Convenience is worth it's weight in gold.
Leadership power also requires convenience.
And convenience is what the Republicans are really destroying for themselves.