I predict a rise in Newt Gingrich's stock.
Posted on 11/08/2006 2:10:38 PM PST by KMAJ2
Anyone who cannot admit it was a good day for democrats and a bad one for republicans is not admitting reality.
It appears the democrats picked up 30 seats in the House, giving them a 29 seat majority, most of the new seats are moderate democrats.
While the Senate has two seats undeclared, an initial assessment would be that democrats will take both and control of the Senate, as they have the lead in both Virginia (down 8000) and Montana (down 4000). AP has declared Tester as the winner in Montana.
This was the democratic process in action. So why did it happen ? The republicans were too smug and have moved away from the ideas that put them in the majority, smaller government and accountability. The conservative base became too combative among themselves fighting over their own pet issues, the democrats used these conflicts to their advantage, highlighting the in-fighting to prop up their own arguments, effectively saying "See, even some conservatives/republicans disagree with that policy" and, by implication, agree with them. And while at the end, conservatives managed to mobilize, the months of in-fighting turned the independants away. Make no mistake, in the close races, the difference was the independant voters turned off by the scandals and in-fighting.
They republicans left themselves open to a three pronged attack, an unpopular war, scandals and a left biased media. Their responses to all three were woefully inadequate and totally misgaged the attitude and frustration of the electorate. Much of how the democrats won was based on manipulation of the facts and was aided by a biased media propaganda campaign. It cannot be denied that the democrats were handed a bludgeon with the Abramof Scandal and, especially, the Foley Scandal, a well timed democrat attack that should have broken much earlier, as a major factor. The republicans reacted very poorly to both scandals, and with an adversary biased media that was a fatal flaw. Those scandals were the tipping point that determined the outcome of many of the close races that went to democrats. Without the scandals, I think, you would have seen a far different result on election day, Iraq alone would not have been enough.
So what now ? It should be an interesting next two years.
Here are some thoughts/opinions, if the democrats think this election was over anything more than the war and scandals, and try to move the country to the far left on other policies and raise taxes or pursue impeachment against the president, they will suffer a backlash. The one thing this election wasn't, was a mandate for left wing ideas because they did not campaign on any ideas, they ran against the war (even there democrats are divided - see Lieberman/Lamont results) and scandal on Capitol Hill. Many of the victories the democrats gained were with moderate/conservative democrats, not those on the far left.
Personally, I fear the decisions on the War on Terror and Iraq, if not well thought out by democrats, will severely endanger us and embolden terrorists. Anything that terrorists could perceive as being able to claim victory will heighten the terrorist threat.
The democrats will no longer be able to simply obstruct and say no, they now have power and will be creating a record that can be used against them in 2008. The republicans must return to the policies and ideas that delivered the majority to them in 1994, and it will be much easier to attack the democrats now that they are the majority.
To repeat myself, we are in for some interesting times in these next two years. Will the democrats further polarize this country ? I have very serious doubts that they can do anything to unite this country. Too many harsh words and too many attacks have made the climate an unsuitable atmosphere for there to be any trust that is necessary for bipartisanship. Will they misread what this election tells them ? Are we in for two years of gridlock ? Stay tuned, time will tell.
And that is precisely why we got creamed yesterday:
The Democrats convinced people to vote for them; the Republicans *expected* everyone to vote for them.
Conservatives just got tired of being to the Republican Party what Blacks are to the Democrat Party. Abandon the base, lose the race.
This reminds me of 1992 when pocketbook issues dominated and voters chose pennies over principles.
The MSM has had a relentless series of features on health care cost, insurance gaps, etc, in recent weeks. People know they are being squeezed, and at this point many are ready for Hilary-care.
Far too easy to blame it all on Iraq...but that is what the majority did.
don't forget the high gas prices coupled with the record oil company profits.......my sister is still po'd about that and blames Bush and his buddies....
Are you saying that you do not approve of the American people?
I fail to see how a Dem-run congress has made us better off. I agree with you totally that Republicans need to work on being more appealing and so forth, but we are in a middle of a war. Now is not the time to "teach lessons" by voting in an anti-war party. Maybe they do need a wake-up call, but the timing is bad.
I believe the voters lost the War on Terror last night. Also remember (those who think we are teaching a lesson to the R's) 12 million illegal immigrants will be citizens soon. Only an ignoramous (sp) would think that we have a snowball's chance in hell of ever winning the congress again. This is all part of the Dem playbook. They know these people will become part of their plantation when they are given amnesty.
Hope so
The Democrats DID NOT convince anyone to vote FOR them. They convinced people to vote AGAINST the Republican incumbents and won by DEFAULT.
Whatever they did or did not do, the GOP had their ass handed to them.
Sour graps are soooo bitter.
Whatever. Truth is, the Republicans have been taking the conservatives for granted for a long time now. A lot of conservatives had enough of being treated by Republicans the same way Blacks are treated by the Dems.
By the way, I did vote straight R yesterday. And, yes, I felt like a chump for doing it, knowing that the Pubbies weren't going to put a brake on spending, secure the borders....
If anything positive has come of this, it's that we won't have to hear again, "We can go as Lib as we want because you conservative chumps have nowhere else to go anyway."
The tax cuts aren't set to expire until 2010. We will recapture both Houses by then and retain the WH. I know it hurts - but I think the country needed to be reminded one last time why the Conservative approach is the right course. I also think Congressional Republicans needed to be reminded. Now, under the leadership of Pelousy, the USA will see what the LEFT is all about.
"Tell me another one, Pinochio."
Nick Lampson. He's anything but a liberal. Not nearly as conservative as Delay, but any democrat politician in Texas (besides the likes of Sheila) has to be fairly moderate.
I do not trust any of them. Zell Miller is the exception.
I wonder how many posters on this site are persuasive in their conversations with others - with family, work, church, community etc? If they come across the way a lot of them write on this site - they are pushing people away rather than positively representing a good and credible philosphy.
Gas prices are down 40%. I guess Bush and his buddies must be total screwups to let gas prices fall that far.
With all due respect to your sister, people who are PO'ed because of oil prices and blame Bush are out of touch with reality and must get their opinions from Entertainment Tonight instead of thinking things through.
I also voted straight 'R', but I was voting on the principles that the Republican party is SUPPOSED to stand for vs. the principles the Democratic Party is SUPPOSED to stand for.
There were no single issues that were more important to me than the basic philosophical differences. I didn't vote FOR any particular candidate and there were only a few Democrats that were actually honest enough about their platform that I voted AGAINST them.
I did not see a single positive forward-looking message from any Democratic candidates. It was negative Monday-morning quarterbacking all the way. I didn't buy into that, but I think a lot of people did. It was foolish to believe nobody could be worse than the incumbent, especially when the challenger gives you no information on what he'd do differently.
I think the timing of this election sucked. There were late-breaking scandals that didn't give the Republicans time to clean their own house before the elections. That was their own fault, though. They ignored and tried to hide the Foley issue, the Delay issue, etc.
Everyone knows politics is a dirty game, but it would be refreshing to see a large caucus of scrupulously honest Congress critters. I still think that group is more like on the Republican side than it is from the Dems.
My guess is yes, at least to the extent that they can still run against Bush and Iraq. But two years hence and with two legislative sessions with them in majority on record that may not be quite so easy as it was this time. I won't go into the laundry list of complaints that seems to have alienated the conservative base, although the size of government and illegal immigration figure large in that. But using those as exemplars of the rest, it turns out that "compassionate" conservatism wasn't really conservatism at all.
But the real problems were Iraq, Iraq, and lastly, Iraq, and the use that was made of it by political opposition both abroad, in the U.S. media, and in the Democratic party. When you're involved in a long-term project such as Iraq the most important thing is to show progress. Even the setting of artificial milestones effects that, and once the obvious real ones - the Iraqi constitution and the vote for the new government - were past, the entire affair appeared to stagnate, full advantage of which was gleefully taken by the media. That's not a problem with the military, it's a problem with communications. IMHO, of course.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.