November 8th, 2006, 18:44
And the loser is George Bush.
It's an almost beautiful morning after in America.
Democrats picked up 24 seats in the House, knocking off Republican incumbents from New Hampshire to Florida and will take control of the House. The final results of the Senate races are too close to call. But it looks like Bush may have saved the Republicans at least a one-seat majority in the Senate in rallying right wing voters to the polls in the cause of banning gay marriage and denying committed couples with basic legal rights. In the very very end, power in the Seante may hang in the balance of one seat in Virginia, which also passed a ban on gay marriage, in a race too close to call which may go to a recount.
In the seemingly anti-gay state of Colorado, voters rejected both gay marriage and a proposition that would grant same-sex couples basic legal rights. Gay rights also failed in 4 other states.
Other highlights:
Hillary Clinton trounced her Republican challenger and Elliot Spitzer will be the first NY Governor in more than a decade.
Ohio may be swinging back to blue with Democratic Governor and Senate victories.
Democrats won the count of State Governors.
In Massachussets, the only state where gay marriage is legal, voters elected a black Democrat governor over a Republican woman candidate.
Few Republican decisive Governor victories include California, Florida and Texas.
... and the loser
President Bush wasn't on the ballot, but the election was a referendum on his divisiveness. Voters don't like it.
November 8, 2006
LA Times Opinion
ON THIS MORNING AFTER, the Republican base seems less impregnable and the genius of Karl Rove less radiant. The president and his surrogates in recent weeks tried to emulate past successes by calling Democrats tax-raising, gay-marriage-loving, terrorist-appeasing clones of John Kerry. But their dog-eared playbook — bequeathed by Lee Atwater to "the architect" Rove — failed them. The center still matters.
So George W. Bush, the "divided we win" president, emerges as the day's biggest loser.
Midterm elections are always perilous for presidents, and this year's vote amounted to a cost-free referendum on Bush's failing occupation of Iraq. It was cost free because the midterm provided voters with an opportunity to express their displeasure with the war without actually handing over control of national security to Democrats — a prospect many voters remain queasy about.
So what does it all mean? A classically earnest editorial would argue that Bush should be chastened by the Democrats' gains, that he should heed his inner bipartisanship and reposition himself as the moderate candidate he was in 2000. But it's too late for that. Bush is who he is, and any tactical adjustments he makes will be just that — tactical adjustments.
That isn't to say that he will "stay the course." The need for both parties to cater to the revitalized center in the run-up to the 2008 presidential election will force change. No matter how defiant Vice President Dick Cheney and Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld want to be, Bush will be forced to find a face-saving, gradual exit from Iraq, not so much to placate Democrats but to placate his own potential GOP successors. Fixer James A. Baker III conveniently stands waiting in the wings with his bipartisan Iraq Study Group to provide cover for the orderly retreat.
The president will no doubt continue to press for the extension of his temporary tax cuts. Stay tuned for a tiresome and disingenuous semantic debate about whether failing to extend short-term relief amounts to a tax increase. At the risk of being classically earnest, we hope that the president, with an eye toward his legacy, will shift some fiscal policymaking away from his political advisors and empower Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson Jr. to propose and pursue some meaningful budgetary reforms. But we won't hold our breath.
The Democrats have captured the House, but the most intriguing power shift in the aftermath of this election may not be from Republicans to Democrats but from Rove's socially conservative base to more centrist GOP leaders. One of the ironies of Tuesday's results is that it increases the leverage of moderate Republicans such as Sen. John McCain of Arizona, Sen. Chuck Hagel of Nebraska and former New York Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani. Even as this election claimed so many of their kind, such moderates have the upper hand heading into 2008.
It's an almost beautiful morning after in America.
Democrats picked up 24 seats in the House, knocking off Republican incumbents from New Hampshire to Florida and will take control of the House. The final results of the Senate races are too close to call. But it looks like Bush may have saved the Republicans at least a one-seat majority in the Senate in rallying right wing voters to the polls in the cause of banning gay marriage and denying committed couples with basic legal rights. In the very very end, power in the Seante may hang in the balance of one seat in Virginia, which also passed a ban on gay marriage, in a race too close to call which may go to a recount.
In the seemingly anti-gay state of Colorado, voters rejected both gay marriage and a proposition that would grant same-sex couples basic legal rights. Gay rights also failed in 4 other states.
Other highlights:
Hillary Clinton trounced her Republican challenger and Elliot Spitzer will be the first NY Governor in more than a decade.
Ohio may be swinging back to blue with Democratic Governor and Senate victories.
Democrats won the count of State Governors.
In Massachussets, the only state where gay marriage is legal, voters elected a black Democrat governor over a Republican woman candidate.
Few Republican decisive Governor victories include California, Florida and Texas.
... and the loser
President Bush wasn't on the ballot, but the election was a referendum on his divisiveness. Voters don't like it.
November 8, 2006
LA Times Opinion
ON THIS MORNING AFTER, the Republican base seems less impregnable and the genius of Karl Rove less radiant. The president and his surrogates in recent weeks tried to emulate past successes by calling Democrats tax-raising, gay-marriage-loving, terrorist-appeasing clones of John Kerry. But their dog-eared playbook — bequeathed by Lee Atwater to "the architect" Rove — failed them. The center still matters.
So George W. Bush, the "divided we win" president, emerges as the day's biggest loser.
Midterm elections are always perilous for presidents, and this year's vote amounted to a cost-free referendum on Bush's failing occupation of Iraq. It was cost free because the midterm provided voters with an opportunity to express their displeasure with the war without actually handing over control of national security to Democrats — a prospect many voters remain queasy about.
So what does it all mean? A classically earnest editorial would argue that Bush should be chastened by the Democrats' gains, that he should heed his inner bipartisanship and reposition himself as the moderate candidate he was in 2000. But it's too late for that. Bush is who he is, and any tactical adjustments he makes will be just that — tactical adjustments.
That isn't to say that he will "stay the course." The need for both parties to cater to the revitalized center in the run-up to the 2008 presidential election will force change. No matter how defiant Vice President Dick Cheney and Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld want to be, Bush will be forced to find a face-saving, gradual exit from Iraq, not so much to placate Democrats but to placate his own potential GOP successors. Fixer James A. Baker III conveniently stands waiting in the wings with his bipartisan Iraq Study Group to provide cover for the orderly retreat.
The president will no doubt continue to press for the extension of his temporary tax cuts. Stay tuned for a tiresome and disingenuous semantic debate about whether failing to extend short-term relief amounts to a tax increase. At the risk of being classically earnest, we hope that the president, with an eye toward his legacy, will shift some fiscal policymaking away from his political advisors and empower Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson Jr. to propose and pursue some meaningful budgetary reforms. But we won't hold our breath.
The Democrats have captured the House, but the most intriguing power shift in the aftermath of this election may not be from Republicans to Democrats but from Rove's socially conservative base to more centrist GOP leaders. One of the ironies of Tuesday's results is that it increases the leverage of moderate Republicans such as Sen. John McCain of Arizona, Sen. Chuck Hagel of Nebraska and former New York Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani. Even as this election claimed so many of their kind, such moderates have the upper hand heading into 2008.