I could say "good riddance" to the Republican congress, save for the certainty that I'll be saying the same thing when the wheel turns again.
It's practically a cliche now, but I'm of the mind that while the Republicans certainly deserved to lose, no one, not the Democrats or any of the U.S.'s numerous and ineffectual third parties, deserved to win. I guess I'm rather young to be so politically alienated, but, then again, this blog is named Political Outsider. Maybe that should be updated to plural form...
In the meantime, I'll caution a number of young-ish Democrats whom I know and know of against celebrating their victory as a sea-change in U.S. political dynamics. As of the writing of this post, Democrats have won the lower house and a more or less evenly-split Senate. You've managed to inflict on a sitting president in six years what most sitting presidents endure in their first mid-term election.
To the incoming Democratic leadership: Be careful so as not to create a public perception of power, responsibility and mandate over a situation you really can't affect in a gridlocked government.
To Harry Reid: Please try to avoid statements like this... " Americans "have come to the conclusion, as we did some time ago, that a one-party town simply doesn’t work," Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., told party workers early Wednesday.
...
I'm sure the next Karl Rove will keep it in mind when Democrats are campaigning in '08 for both the congress and White House.
5 comments:
I find it interesting that the new crop of Democrats stressed that they were more "centrist" than the party leaders. Given that the Republicans were often reduced to threatening people with the prospect of senior democrats in committee chairs, it's as if the greatest threat to the Democrats is not the Republican alternative, but the Congressional seniority system.
Another observation: the Party of Bush has so antagonized the libertarian and fiscal-conservative elements of the GOP that a lot of them stayed home (the conservatives)or bolted (the libertarians). Lots of libertarians appear to have been holding their noses while voting to kick the GOP out. It makes sense to me. If the choice is between Big Government with a "liberal" agenda and Big Government with an agenda to ignore basic civil liberties, give me the "liberals". Raising the minimum wage is a mistake; building a police state is a horror.
They had antogonized me enough by early this year with their insane levels of spending, absurdy irrelevant causes such as banning online gambling, silly crusades such as McCain's inquest into professional sports ethics, and a disturbing rising tide of protectionism that I decided by then it was high time they go.
Meanwhile, I couldn't bring myself to hope for a Democratic Congress, as they'll most likely maintain and eventually increase the insane levels of spending, have absurd causes and crusades of different stripes, and an even stronger momentum toward protectionism, with higher taxes to go along with it all.
As much as I'd like to, I can't take the Libertarian Party seriously with their idealized isolationism and insistance on remaining electorally irrelevant by fielding the most far-out candidates they can find, and ignoring state and local races.
It came down to me not voting at all this year, I first since I was old enough.
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