Election review

Alright, its a new day and things just keep getting better.

Nationally, Democrats did fantastic. Historically fantastic. Not one Democrat on the national level lost their seat. On the other side, the Republicans seem to have lost 28 to 30 seats in the House, and the magic number 6 in the Senate, locking down the transfer of both houses to Democratic control. Not quite the 54-8 gains Republicans got in 94,' but certainly enough.

Not as talked about, the Dems picked up 6 governorships bringing the total to 28/22. On the legislature side, Dems control both houses of 23 states now, 9 are split, and 15 are both Republican and 2 are undecided still. (that equals 49, Nebraska is non-partisan/unicameral). That is a gain so far of 4 full control Dems, a loss of 5 full control Republican. Why is this important? Because these are the people who draw district lines and do the grass roots work to solidify national majorities. The Republicans have done a really good job at this for the past decade.

Locally, I think the Dems did just as good. Of course Amy won. Sure Hatch lost by an inch, but lets not forget that he was against an incumbent and that Dems took the MN house too! And further solidified their control of the senate. Thats a lot of power. Locally, the Northfield state Senate candidate David Bly, who has run for the past six years, won!

...By 57 votes. (insert 'every vote counts' here!)

And sure Wetterling lost to Bachman, but who cares because six term incumbent Gil Gutknecht lost to upstart Tim Walz! No one saw that coming.

In the fall out, Rumsfield has resigned and has been replaced by Bob Gates, a 26 year career spook for the CIA and G.H.W Bush's CIA director. Hmm...

I predict that Leberman will get what ever chairmanship he wants this time around. Democrats are too afraid he could possibly bolt. Ironic, that which did not kill him only made him stronger. Isn't there a saying like that? The good news is that we know Bush did not offer (or Leberman did not take) Rumsfield's old job as was rumored thus allowing the Republican Gov. to appoint a new (Republican) senator.

My predictions were pretty good this year and much better than two years ago! I was too pessimistic this time, guessing +28/5 when it looks like it will be +29/6. But I guess things could still change. Kathlene Harris lost by only 22% in FL and Rick Santorum lost by 18%. To his credit, he gave a really nice concession speech, and those are hard to give. Also keep an eye on Harold Ford Jr. from TN. His concession speech was certainly the best of the night, and could do for him a bit like Obama's "audacity of hope" speech did for him.

Long post for an amazing election. We will see how all this plays out in the coming months and years, but we know for sure things are going to be a lot different. (P.S. if you want to see my alternative headline picture click here)