Election postmortem

No spinning here, my friends. The GOP lost both chambers because of a variety of factors: illegal immigration, Iraq, federal spending, ethics problems, etc. Some of the damage was MSM-inflicted, as the MSM abandoned any pretense of objectivity and entered full-fledged campaign mode for the DNC. However, the overwhelming amount of the damage wasn't MSM-inflicted, but self-inflicted.

And yes, I said that they lost BOTH houses. While Montana is still counting as of now (7:15 a.m. EST), it will go for the Democrat, Jon Tester. Virginia brought a ton of votes from out of nowhere to put Webb in the lead by about 8,000 votes (as of 7:00 a.m.), and while Allen will likely request a recount, the fact is that recounts don't move votes in any direction more than at most 500 - 800.

All in all, my Senate prognostication about three weeks back was solid, in that I predicted 50-50. The only one where I was wrong was VA, where I honestly didn't expect Virginians to be depraved enough to give Webb the "Cambodian boy" treatment and reward a kiddie porn author with the Senate seat. But it is what it is, and Senator "Macaca the Jew" can forget about those Oval Office plans in '08.

So, was right-of-centerism slain? I don't think so, and neither does Malkin, for many of the same reasons that I noticed:

I'm hanging it up for the night, er, morning. Unlike Michael Moore in 2004, however, I will not be staying in bed for three days in a catatonic state. I will not need PEST shock therapy. I will not move to Australia.
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The GOP lost. Conservatism prevailed. "San Francisco values" may control the gavels in Congress, but they do not control America. Property rights initiatives limiting eminent domain won big. MCRI, the anti-racial preference measure (in Michigan - Ed.), passed resoundingly. Congressman Tom Tancredo, the GOP's leading warrior against illegal immigration--opposed by both the open-borders Left and the open-borders White House--won a fifth term handily. Gay marriage bans won approval in 3 states. And as of this writing, the oil tax initiative, Prop. 87--backed by deep-pocketed Hollywood libs, is trailing badly in California.

In other words, the message itself is still fine, but it needs competent and principled messengers...which have been sorely missing.

Consider, too, that the most vulnerable Republicans who ultimately did get beat were defeated by Democratic candidates who portrayed themselves as "conservative" or "moderate" Dems (with the exception of Ohio, where certifiable moonbat Sherrod Brown defeated the inept Mike DeWine). They have yet to cast a vote, so only time will tell whether or not they truly are not liberal. Kudos to Rahm Emmanuel for coming up with that winning strategy. I've frequently said that the way for Dems to win is by pretending not to be liberal, and ol' Rahm finally figured it out. So did liberalism finally win, or did Democrats win and liberalism didn't? You tell me.

I hate to rain on anyone's parade who may be thinking "Well, maybe two years in the wilderness will bring the party back to its roots!" Only two years? Considering that the GOP redrew districts in such a way as to purportedly favor themselves, and yet these districts went Democrat (again, purportedly semi-right-of-center Dems) who will benefit from incumbency in two years...what makes you think that this will only be two years? The Dems lost in 1994, and said "We learned our lesson! Give us our House & Senate back!" It took them 12 years to get them back. Yes, the GOP needed an attitude adjustment to get back to its roots, but it's naive to think this is a one-cycle attitude adjustment.

In three of the stranger developments:

The nutroots' biggest coup of the cycle was deposing Joe Lieberman in CT because he supported the war. Their savior, Ned Lamont, was then subsequently thrashed by Lieberman in the general election where Joe won as an Independent. How strange, that in an atmosphere of anti-Iraq sentiment, the most vocal anti-Iraq critic in CT was trounced by the pro-Iraq candidate, once the electorate (and not just CT nutbars) got their say-so.

As I watched CNN last night, they showed that Lincoln Chafee (RINO-RI) was liked by 62% of Rhode Islanders. It's incredibly rare that a politician with that kind of approval rating ends up getting beat. Chafee voted against Bush on Iraq, the tax cuts, and even voted against Bush in the 2004 election. However, in the end, R.I. didn't want to enable the Senate to remain in GOP hands, so they couldn't vote for the guy they liked.

In MO, the folks there were asked to vote on a measure to allow funding for embryonic stem-cell research, though the initiative was worded so vaguely as to imply that human cloning would be funded as well. The incumbent, Jim Talent, was against the initiative, while the challenger, Claire McCaskill, supported the initiative. The initiative failed...but so did the guy who voted with his statesmen!

Hey, at least we Floridians got it right in the governor's race, and Tennesseeans got it right in the Senate race. Two Senate race losers who we likely will see more of in the future are Harold Ford, Jr., in TN and Michael Steele in MD. They ran great races, but couldn't overcome their respective state's political makeup.

In the end, I did notice a few things: the sun still came up this morning; I'm still alive and gainfully employed; the Memphis Grizzlies lost yet another NBA game; and Jacksonville traffic still sucks. In other words, nothing has changed (yet) in day-to-day life, and life seems to be continuing after all.