A lot of news outlets are talking about the GOP “sweep” of yesterday’s scattered elections, how they — in the words I read on the AOL home page — “thumped the Democrats,” how this is a clear repudiation of President Obama’s failed policies, and how this could be a grim portent of things to come for the Democrats in 2010.
Uh…am I still on the same planet as these pundits?
Let’s put this in a clear context: in Virginia and New Jersey (states that supported Barack Obama in the 2008 Presidential elections), Republican candidates bested Democrats for the governorship of those states. More precisely, GOP candidates bested Democrats that were widely considered so grossly inept they probably would have lost to one of those lifesize cardboard cutouts you see at Starbucks pimping Via.
So, to recap: crappy Democratic candidates were beaten by Republicans in two races that have ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to do with the administration of the federal government, and somehow that foreshadows a resurgence in the GOP Congressional power base next November…a “Republican renaissance” as GOP chairman Michael Steele put it.
Yyyyyyeah.
And yet, the historical special election in New York’s 23rd Congressional district is somehow not a factor in this Nostradamian prediction of a looming Dem implosion.
If you’ve not heard about this, it’s a classic case of a hanging yourself with your own rope. Bill Owens, who by all accounts was not what you’d call a campaigning machine, won the election to become the first Democrat in more than a century to hold that seat, after the Republican Party tossed over their own candidate, Dierdre Scozzafava, to support a gent by the name of Doug Hoffman — a third-party candidate who did not even live in the district.
Why? Because Hoffman was more conservative than Scozzafava. She supported evil liberal things like same-sex marriage and abortion rights (which, really, have nothing to do with classic Republican political values like small non-intrusive government and limited taxation and government spending, and everything to do with a morality-based mindset that is often in direct conflict with the core principles of the GOP…but I digress).
Hoffman received lip service from GOP icons like Rush Limbaugh, Newt Gingrich, and Sarah Palin (who is still laboring under the delusion that she’s relevant). Scozzafava responded by dropping out of the race — a gutless move in my estimation, but she semi-redeemed herself by then throwing all her support behind Owens in a big expletive deleted you to her party.
The GOP pot accused the Scozzafava kettle of contemptible blackness and called her a traitor to the party…you know, that same party that turned its collective nose up at her to support a non-Republican (did I mention the GOP are sometimes very contrary people?).
Maybe the GOP is making such a big noise about their two minor victories on the gubernatorial front to mask their insecurity over the New York debacle…I mean, taking certain victory and squandering it through indecision, in-fighting, and feeding your own to the wolves? That’s been the Democrats’ modus operandi for many a year.
Remember, Republicans: those who forget the Democrats’ history are doomed to repeat it, and in next year’s mid-terms, you have so much to gain and very little left to lose — and you’ll have even less to lose in 2012 if you don’t get your act together.
