The Morning After

The 2010 mid-term election is over, for better or for worse, depending on your viewpoint. Personally I’m glad it’s done with, as I’m getting almighty tired of trying to write about team Obama and the Democrats without excessively elevating my blood pressure (which my Doctor seems to think is a bad thing). So, until we see what the current Congress is going to do to us in their Lame Duck session, and just how much devilment the new Congress can get into when they take over, I think I’ll just kick back and discuss some political generalities for a change.

Two years ago, the democrats pretty well seized the reins of government in this nation. They grabbed the white house, the senate, and the house, in what they mistakenly assumed was a “mandate” to change our government to something resembling Mr. Obama’s version of a democratic-socialist government. That democratic majority started hitting us with changes well enough, by driving us to the verge of national bankruptcy, cramming “ObamaCare” down our protesting throats, expanding the size of the federal government, and stripping us of many cherished freedoms, all in the name of “the common good”. In reality their 2008 win was more of a voters knee jerk reaction to the faltering policies of the Bush administration than a demand for any massive change. Now, two years later, commentators are speaking of the 2010 “tsunami” (or “landslide”) being a repudiation of those democratic efforts, and I note that many sitting politicians are agreeing with that descriptor. Nothing could be further from the truth! If the Republicans had received a mandate from Tuesday’s midterms, they’d have won a lot more than the House majority! I would hope that they understand this.

The election of 2010, momentous as it was, marks the beginning of a bigger battle — not the end. It presents, in the words of Florida's winning new Senator Rubio, "a second chance for Republicans to be what they said they were going to be not so long ago." That is, the party of smaller solutions and less spending rather than some sort of lynch mob angrily cleaning up in Washington. Certainly we need some cleaning, but going at it like the proverbial bull in the china shop isn’t the answer either.

The American voter reset our politics on Tuesday. Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi is no more, nor is one-party control of the Federal Government. Mr. Obama’s landslide doesn’t exist either, and I rather hope he realizes that simple fact. "Yes, we can" collided head-on with "Oh, no you don't", and the days of shoving things down our throats are about over. Well, if they aren’t over, the new crop of Republicans can be replaced as well, as every one of them had better remember. America woke up this morning with all the same problems we had yesterday, but now we have a good many more possible solutions on deck. And the 2012 presidential election campaign starts today. The voters who flocked to Obama two years ago have turned against his bright ideas, and have elected a wave of new Republicans to Congress, along with trimming the Democratic majority in the Senate to a minimum. As the House seats captured by the GOP climbed toward 60, Democrats could wonder why, but the historic loss of seats captured by the GOP suggests that anger over the government's handling of the economy fed the firestorm. That tsunami was a wave of discontent, nothing more or less than a vote of no confidence in the Democratic powers that be, with their loss in the House being the largest since 1948. Not only did the Republicans seize the House, they also moved it much further to the right, pushed by the anti-tax, anti big government, and certainly anti-compromise members of the Tea Party movement. A leader of the movement, Rand Paul delivered the message in his acceptance speech as the new Kentucky Senator, saying that "I have a message ... that is loud and clear, that does not mince words: We've come to take our government back," Paul promised his supporters "fiscal sanity," and a limited constitutional government, along with balanced budgets. I hope Paul, and our new House can deliver, because the American people are real unhappy with what's been going on in Washington of late. The Tea movement may not have won as spectacularly as many of us had hoped, but the politicians, all of them, had best remember that the movement is still there, still angry, and still quite capable of replacing everybody in Washington if they don’t see a whole lot of improvement in the immediate future. Lord high mucky-muck of the Senate Harry Reid is already indicating that he’s not going to cooperate with a Republican House, or abide with the will of the American people. If that’s the case, Harry, and Mr. O as well, might want to remember that the House controls the purse strings… and yet another group of those democratic senators come up for re-election in two years. (Not a threat Harry, just a promise.)

Exit polls pretty much confirm what we already knew, that eighty-six percent of the voters say they're worried about the direction of the economy, and forty percent say they're worse off financially than they were two years ago. About forty percent also say they support the Tea Party movement. And guess what, they voted overwhelmingly for the GOP. Twenty-six percent of those surveyed say they're angry, while another forty-seven percent are “merely” dissatisfied. As expected, about half the voters think democratic policies are hurting the country, while fifty-six percent say the government is doing too much interfering in our lives. Those are not promising numbers Mr. Reid. When John Boehner takes the speakers gavel it will seriously change the face of Congress, and result in either gridlock or a somewhat grudging cooperation. Well, at least Mr. O will have will have someone to blame when things skid to a halt! But the activist phase of Mr. Obama's term is over at any rate, and he’ll soon be fighting to preserve his health care plan.

As for the self proclaimed Democratic “majority” in this country, Tom Jefferson said: “The majority, oppressing an individual, is guilty of a crime, abuses its strength, and by acting on the law of the strongest, [which] breaks up the foundations of society.” John Adams told us: “Remember democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself. There never was a democracy yet that did not commit suicide.” Our nations founders envisioned us with a republic, but as Benjamin Franklin warned, “When the people find they can vote themselves money, that will herald the end of the republic.” None of this bodes well for the Peoples Socialist Republic of Amerika, as it’s envisioned by the “progressive” left.