I'm not a political pundit, nor am I a historian, just an aging PhD in an arcane discipline that became obsolete forty years ago, preparing to retire from my second career. I have seen many elections, and have dealt with the good and bad. Being born in the final years of FDR's last term, I have seen the political pendulum swing back and fourth more times than I care to count, and although I was disappointed in the results last night, there are some reasons for we conservatives to be encouraged.
First, in our heart of hearts, we knew that this election was going to end this way at some level, which I will discuss later.
Going in, Democrats (and some Republicans) on the hill forecast that we would lose a minimum of 40 House seats, and 9 to 10 Senate seats......That didn't happen. We ended up losing five (possibly six) Senate seats, and the House total may come in at less than 20. An important point to consider is that the Senate seats that we lost were predominately RINOS, leaving the remaining Republican minority stronger and more conservative than it was before........this singular event was not a dismissal on the part of the voters of conservative principles. Mitch McConnell, who was targeted by the DNC with millions in campaign funds retained his seat, and love him or hate him, he has done an effective job in keeping his caucus together, and blocking bad legislation for the past two years. The Dems do not have a "super majority" in the Senate, which they sorely wanted.......
Again, as in 2006, the Democrat gains in the House are mainly centrist "blue dogs", and are not going to go along with a far-left agenda, as speaker Pelosi has already discovered, to her great dismay....... A number of the Republicans that were defeated in the House also were RINOS (Chris Shea, for example). In at least one case (strangely in Minnesota), a House member was replaced by a VERY conservative Republican (female) representative, so the base principles still have appeal to voters in even as weird a state as Minnesota politically. The House has a habit of changing very rapidly, and if the Republican Party plays this correctly, we can be in a good position to regain a majority in 2010.
On many "down ballot" issues, conservative principles have been strongly supported by the voters.....hell, even California voters decided that gay marriage was a bad idea, and here in Missouri, a state Constitutional Amendment to make English the official language of our government passed with an 86% "yes" vote.......therefore we can conclude that social, and fiscal conservatism are strongly supported.....but only if our leaders run on those principles......that is where our focus must be directed in the future....STARTING RIGHT NOW.
This campaign has made Sarah Palin, and the possibility of others like her to become the new leaders of the conservative movement.
Now for the autopsy......we had a truly bad candidate, who ran a lackluster campaign......I commented in a thread at the beginning of the primaries that we ended up with the worst of a mediocre slate of presidential choices, the new Bob Dole, who's only saving grace (other than Sarah Palin) was that he managed to get through the entire campaign without falling off of a stage somewhere.......we have to correct that.
We caught some bad breaks during this campaign........some of which we can attribute to our making a bad choice in 2000. As much as I respect GWB for many reasons, he failed to make an issue of the emerging financial crisis that he not only knew was coming, but he knew who was responsible for it, and failed to use the "bully pulpit" to place the responsibility where it belonged. At the beginning, GWB failed to select a running mate that could become his successor.....a devastating strategic error......although I think that Dick Cheney has done an extraordinary job as VP, If I were in the RNC's position, I would have reversed the ticket in 2000. Next the whole idea of "compassionate conservatism", and "new tone", are basically BS, and we need to make certain that that doesn't happen again.
And to end this discussion on a very high note.......we don't have to hear about the Clinton's any longer.....she's done, and he is history......that in itself, makes my day brighter......
doc
