Democrats Take Congress

Today I was surprised to discover that the Democrats had, after twelve years of wandering in the wilderness, taken back control of the House of Representatives and effective control of the Senate. The experts thought they might take the Senate, but no one expected them to take the House. Yet the Democrats picked up 28 seats in the house of Representatives.

The Republicans are, of course, in disarray over their losses. They're pointing fingers at one another. They're spinning the election results, trying to say that, if anything, their defeat was a vote against President Bush, not a vote for the Democratics. In today's USA Today, Jonah Goldberg, editor of the Right-Wing National Review Online (and a Neo-Con darling for his role in breaking the Monica Lewinsky scandal), published an angry, barb-filled spin document titled “Conservatism is Alive and Well,” with the subtitle “Don't let the spin fool you: These elections were neither a repudiation of conservative values nor an endorsement of the Democratic Party.” The Right-Wing talk show hosts are spewing forth the only propaganda left to them. Their spin is that GOP losses are due to the fact that President Bush strayed from his Conservative agenda.

Think about that one. The GOP lost Congress because President Bush is not conservative enough? Can you imagine him being any more conservative? Oh, and that makes perfect sense. The president doesn't reflect out conservative values, so let's elect a bunch of liberals.

Right-Wing nutjob Michael Savage suggested that maybe President Bush threw the election on purpose because only a Democratic Congress could help him achieve his liberal socialist agenda.

Geez. Just what do they put in that Kool-Aid the GOP pipes into it's political pod people, anyway?

To paraphrase, don't let the spin fool you. The GOP lost Congress because time after time they proved themselves to be a pack of immoral, divisive, hypocritical assholes who have little in common with the average American. Republicans love to claim that the American culture has been shifting right for decades. But they've just been watching too much Fox News. The average American is moderate in his or her views. Republicans swept to power in 1994 based upon a lot of fear-mongering and the End-Time millennial paranoia among the Religious Right (who vote Republican almost as an extension of their religious worship).

Simply put, it's going on 2007 and the Kool-Aid has finally started wearing off. It can probably be summed up best by an old man I saw in a television interview, explaining why he was voting Democrat this time around. He said, “I'm a conservative. Those people in Washington are Right-Wing Neo-Cons. They don't have the same values as I do.”

However the Conservative propaganda outlets might try to spin this by claiming that what hurt the GOP was that they weren't conservative enough, the facts speak for themselves. What damned the Republicans was the evidence of their immorality, hypocrisy and self-righteousness.

Please reference; Republican Scandals Helped Pave the Way for Democratic Gains

I think one of the most significant defeats in the GOP ranks was that of Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania. Santorum was a poster boy for Right-Wing Neo-Conservative “values” and a darling of the Religious Right. Generally he is probably best known for spearheading the drive for the special Terri Schiavo legislation which attempted to insert the power of Congress into the issue of removing Terry Schiavo's life support. He's also known for being of the opinion that he does not believe a “right to privacy” exists under the Constitution, even within marriage. He was considered one of the GOP's rising stars, and was expected to run for president in 2008. Going into the election, his seat in Congress was not expected to be in danger. And yet he got a pretty good trouncing. Why is that? Anyone?

Long-time readers of this blog and subscribers to The Watch Alert mailing list no doubt know that for the last several months I have been largely silent. Quite simply, I had become overwhelmed. Before I could write something on one Republican scandal or piece of frightening legislation, another one was already surfacing. I couldn't keep up. And I eventually threw up my hand in dismay. Nothing seemed to make a difference anyway. Nothing deterred the Republican pod people from regurgitating their prescribed talking points. And as I watched the scandals and anti-democracy legislation pile up, I wondered to myself; Just what do these people have to do before Americans start seeing them for what they are?

Maybe that's what it took. Instead of a scandal happening every couple of months or so and being forgotten by the time the next one came along, suddenly there was a deluge of them. The Republicans were so arrogant and so convinced of their grip on power that they were no longer even pretending to care. Just last week President Bush was cocky, telling supporters at one rally, “If you think the way to protect this country and to win the war on terror is to criticize your opponents and offer no plan for victory, vote for the Democrats.” And at another, “If the Democrats are so good about being the party of the opposition, let's just keep them in the opposition.”

Now President Bush has been forced into reaching out to Nancy Pelosi, House minority leader and expected Speaker of the House under Democratic control of Congress, by inviting her to dinner at the White House. This is the woman Bush and the GOP have dismissed as “a San Francisco liberal.” It's a wake-up call for the Republicans. The American people may have been willing to give you the reigns for awhile, but they are not prepared to follow you over the cliff.

They were right about one thing. The Iraq War quagmire played a part in the election. But Republicans who think that was the sole issue are fooling themselves. Republicans who think that the outcome of the election was nothing more than a referendum on President Bush are delusional. Any any Republican who believes that GOP losses can be attributed to the GOP not going far enough to the right is simply insane. Take some aspirin and wash it down with a big mug of that Neo-Con Kool-Aid. If nothing else, it will get you through the night. Maybe you'll have nice Neo-Con dreams of a scorched Earth and Jesus returning upon a white steed to save you once every natural resource is depleted.

Anyone who likes to point out that the Democrats' approval ratings are hardly soaring and therefore the elections' results were more of a repudiation of the Republican Party than an endorsement of the Democrats should listen to their own words. Whether or not the American people voted for Democrats, they voted against Republicans. Only the pod people could possibly believe that the GOP lost control of Congress because they were not far enough to the right. My God. If the Republicans went any farther right they would have to appoint Lucifer himself as party chairman.

Now the real fun begins. Now we get to see if the Democrats can govern without the tempting tactics of revenge that might lead to an impeachment of President Bush (who is perhaps the most impeachable president we've ever had) or a lock-out of Republicans from key committees and legislation (like the Republicans did to the Democrats). The Republicans, including the President, governed us as if the only people they served were the people who voted for them. In the end, that, more than anything, is what hurt them. The Democrats will have to govern differently, as if all Americans matter (even Republicans), or America's long nightmare of wandering blind in the desert will continue. If not, the next time Lucifer and his minions may very well be swept back into power.

I jest about Lucifer. But let's face it. If the Republicans truly believe that they lost because they were not far enough to the right, and retreat and regroup with that in mind, when they try to make their comeback, they'll be wearing nicely pressed brown shirts, jackboots and armbands, high-stepping it to some patriotic, double-time Country song.

That's really all that remains farther to the right.