Red Letter Day

Wednesday, November 08, 2006

Big night for Democrats

Glad to see my predictions were way too pessimistic.

Looking around the nation, a couple interesting things caught my eye...

Wisconsin has a strange reputation for being liberal. I think that is a relic of history, based on the gay marriage numbers. Wisconsinites voted 59-41 to in favor of a big "fuck you" to gays and lesbians, which is a higher percentage then Virginia (57-43) and South Dakota (South Dakota?!?!) which narrowly passed such a ban 52-48. And then there's Arizona. We finally actually won (well, we are leading by 30,000 votes with 99% counted, so victory appears really, really likely) one of these things, 51-49...after 27 losses in a row, I will take it, and it is proof that victory is possible, which bodes well for the much bigger challenges ahead in California and possibly Massachusetts.

In Virginia, the race between Webb and Allen is too close to call. Only a couple thousand votes out of over two million separates the candidates. The Green candidate got about 25,000 votes. If the recount gives Republican Allen a narrow win, he should send flowers to the Green Party...and the "liberal" Greens can add another feather in their cap, although swinging the Senate to the Republicans isn't nearly as dramatic as them helping Bush become President six years ago.

Santurum is gone! All Americans should rejoice. Even if the rest of the night had universally sucked (which it didn't) the fact that Santorum was not just defeated but creamed like a steak at a retirement home is cause for celebration!

Locally here in Kansas, it was very nice seeing two nasty, right-wing Republicans get tossed out on their asses. Phill Kline will finally cease to be an embarassment to this state. Now, if he wants to troll through trash bins at abortion clinics, he will do it on his own dime rather then forcing taxpayers to chip in. And Jim Ryun, famed distance runner and right wing nutcase, finally ran out of gas. He's still in great shape for a man his age, but I guess dragging Bush behind him slowed him up enough to lose.

No one will mistake Kansas for Vermont any time soon, but half the state congressional delegation is Democratic, the Governor and Attorney General are Democrats, and the state school board is finally once again controlled by pro-science moderates (although the moderates failed to add to their numbers last night)

All in all, a pretty good night.

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