The nation was always more conservative than the Dem Party as a whole. The Democrat Party moved more to the Left in the 1960s with the disaffection of the Southern Democrats who comprised the conservative wing of the party. Many became Reps.
That is why the Democrats had to run to our right.
The Dems did not run to our right, they just mirrored many of the Rep positions on value issues. The Dems also recruited many candidates with military backgrounds to change their image.
During those 40 years we were far away from retaking the House, but now we are much closer, maybe just 15-20 seats.
LOL. We had the House for 12 years. We are not much closer to taking it over now. Who is to say that we will not fall even further behind in 2008? We not only must hold on to the seats we have, but also, try to gain new ones. We need to come up with some stong candidates to challenge the Dems district by district. The Dems did not lose one incumbent.
Many of those Democrats elected were elected as moderate Republicans and are going to have vote as such. If they start voting for tax hikes, gun control and anti-military, their majority status will be shortlived.
For the next two years, the Dems will control the agenda in Congress. They will make sure that tax hikes, gun control, and anti-military issues are not on the agenda. One of the big issues they say they will now tackle is AMT, which will mean less taxes. They will increase the minimum wage. I see the Dems trying to consolidate their gains while at the same time detailing the "corruption" and missteps of the Administation using investigations and press leaks. The Dems are used to weilding power and not bashful about using it.
And that is where they are going to run into problems with their own base.
They are not going to waste time on investigations.
They have two years to prove they can lead and they must bring out some substantive legislation.
If not, many of their own base will become disenchanted with them.
Yes, they did not lose an incumbent, but we can do the same thing in 08 and regain about 20 seats which will give us the Majority.
It is just as bad to underestimate your enemy as it is to overestimate him.
We underestimated him this election cycle, lets not overestimate him on the next one.