Virginia Governor Election Results

        My prediction of Terry McAuliffe winning the Virginia Governor's race over Ken Cuccinelli was correct. However, McAuliffe only won by only two percentage points which is less than I and many others thought it would be. There were many factors that led to McAuliffe winning the election. One is that there is a larger population of African Americans in Virginia than there was during the last election. Since African Americans overwhelmingly support democrats, this helped McAuliffe gain voters. He also had the majority of support from women voters due to his pro-choice views regarding abortion. Cuccinelli may have been at a disadvantage against his democratic opponent because of the recent negative views towards Tea Party members due to the government shut down. The reason that the race was closer than what may have been predicted is because of the money spent on the campaign. Cuccinelli spent $34.4 million compared to McAuliffe's $19.7 million during the campaign. This could have given Cuccinelli some advantages and led to a closer election.

Election Day

        Republican Ken Cuccinelli and democrat Terry McAuliffe are the two candidates in the Virginia governor election this year. Virginia is a battleground state which means that the election could go either democratic or republican because there are almost equal levels of support for each party. My prediction is that the democratic candidate will win this election which is supported by most of the polls thus far. Cuccinelli is backed heavily by Tea Party members, which could work against him. There is nationwide distrust and anger towards the Tea Party because of the recent government shutdown which is leading to less support for Cuccinelli. Obama and other democrats have been attempting to exploit these feelings to back McAuliffe. However, the recent shortcomings of the Obamacare website have not made supporters of the Affordable Health Care Act look good, and McAuliffe is one of these supporters. Despite this, I feel that Virginia is leaning more towards the democratic side. This could be because of McAuliffe's support from women. In regards to abortion, McAuliffe supports the pro choice view which women tend to strongly agree with. Because abortion laws a created state by state, women in Virginia have greater support for McAuliffe.

On September 27th, Barack Obama and Iranian president, Hassan Rouhani, contacted one another through a phone call. It was the first direct contact the a U.S. president has had with an Iranian leader since the 1970s. This phone call revolved around reaching an agreement about Iran's nuclear program. I think that this phone call was a step in the right direction. I also know that Iran would like to lift economic sanctions that have been put against it, and one way they could do that is by limiting Iran's nuclear program. I am wondering if Iran's willingness to work towards a compromise with the U.S. is genuine because they could only be trying to create better relations for the trade sanctions to be lifted.


The government is facing a complete shutdown because of the conflict in congress surrounding Obamacare and the national debt ceiling. The republican majority in the House will only raise the debt ceiling to fund the government if they get their way regarding the Affordable Health Care Act. Republicans want to connect these issues by defunding Obamacare to then resolve the debt ceiling crisis at the same time, while democrats would rather deal with them separately. I feel as though this conflict is mainly a power struggle between the democrats and republicans. I think it would be fairly simple to resolve this conflict, but neither side wants to lessen their influence in the government. It is frustrating to me that the republicans are more willing to shut down the government than to keep the Affordable Health Care Act, which is something that benefits many people across the United States.