The Day After
Despite the Senate remaining unresolved it's clear that the public has solidly repudiated the Republicans. And yet, despite all the wonderful talk from Pelosi, Dean, Emanuel, et. al., about reaching out and having a spirit of bipartisanship, Rove's cancer remains the driving force in the body politic: the idea of a permanent majority, far from being killed off, has now merely switched sides. It would be naive in the extreme to think that the Democrats, having seized the Gerrymander machinery, would fail to deploy it before the 2008 elections, starting as of now. "A spirit of bipartisanship" may indeed prevail on certain issues, like immigration reform, but the baseline relationship between the two parties cannot but be determined by their respective efforts to find the Rovian grail. Which means that progressive reformers will have to redouble their efforts for systemic, possibly even constitutional changes.
Posted by George Kenney on November 8, 2006 8:53 AM 
« Hacking Democracy | Main | Beltway Bromo-Seltzer »
Comments
... the view from London.
The Glorious 7th — start of the Subpoena Season... it's payback time!
I believe Dubya's talk of 'common ground' and 'moving ahead' about as much as I believe the non-interventionist and 'compassionate conservatism' stuff he used to spout when first elected president.
Things, I think, are going to get down and dirty quite quickly. I'm guessing there will be a deadlock between Congress and the White House inside 6 months. There's going to be a huge amount of muckraking once people like John Conyers get stuck in on the House committees.
The situation in the Senate looks fascinating — a dead heat between the major parties with the balance of power held by a socialist jewish guy from New York via Vermont (!), Bernie Sanders, who's (as far as I can tell) squeaky clean and always going to vote with his conscience, and Joe Lieberman, opportunist, who will vote for whoever cuts him the best deal — so long as it's OK with the Israelis.
...and a little bird tells me that the Reps have, as expected, just conceded in Virginia.
... it's all as good as it could be. Now let's hope the Democrats can stop Dubya starting World War 3.
Posted by: David | November 9, 2006 6:09 AM