The Right State

Tonight’s election results are not looking good for the Republican Party. The night started out with the Democrats needing 15 seats to win the House and 6 to win the Senate. It looks like the Democrats may win both with Virginia the only holdout. The Montana and Missouri seats are also undecided but leaning Democrat. If the Democrats win, they will have won mainly by calling for change. Now, since they have won, the Dems are going to have to say more than things need to ‘change.’ Its time to put up or shut up.

There are two things that stand out from this election. First is the number of Democrats who are running as conservatives. Some of the candidates seem to be true conservative Democrats like Heath Shuler. Others, like Harold Ford of Tennessee, are not conservative at all. Either way, Democrats have to run as closet Republicans in order to win elections.

Secondly is the number of Republicans who had to cross over and vote for the Democrats. In states which should have been solidly Republican, people voted for the Democrat, especially in the South. This is surprising since a bad Republican is still better than a good Democrat. This is no longer ‘hold your nose and vote.’ It is more like close your eyes, hold your nose, and plug up your ears and then vote.

The Democrats now say they want to work across the aisles and work with Republicans now that they have won both. The only problem is they have not tried to work with anyone in the past. They have continually blocked every effort of Republicans to get anything done and then blamed the lack of action on Republicans.

Leadership is doing, not just talking. Soon we will see if the Democratic Party is good at leading Congress. Hopefully the President will veto any of their more ‘progressive’ legislation. I for one do not hold out much hope for Congress being able to get anything worthwhile done.

Right now, I am still trying to get used to hearing ‘Speaker of the House–Nancy Pelosi.’ (gag)

Tags: Democrats, Politics //