If recent history is any guide, Democratic triumphs in last night's gubernatorial races portend a tax-and-spend revival in a host of states, after years of comparative taxing discipline. We might be restarting a cycle that began a decade ago.
Shortly after Barack Obama moved into the White House in 2009, a red tide began sweeping through state capitals amid a sluggish national economy and a wave of federal and state tax increases. Over eight years, voters installed Republicans as governors in 33 states, up from 22 in 2008, and turned control of 31 state legislatures over to the GOP, a sharp increase from only 14 in the year that Obama won office. Today, the national economy is much stronger than when the red wave started, but there's a controversial Republican in the White House, and of the 36 governor's races this year, Republicans had to defend their turf in 26 of them. The result yesterday wasn't quite a blue wave, but it did amount to a net pickup of seven governor's positions for Democrats, though several of the victories may have had as much to do with historical voting patterns as with President Trump.
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