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Susan Estrich: The day after the elections (Spinning it like a Harlem Globetrotter!)
The York County Coast Star ^ | November 7, 2010 | Susan Estrich

Posted on 11/07/2010 1:12:35 AM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet

1994 was much worse. Much. So was 1980, but of course, that was also a presidential election. Within days, there were makeshift unemployment offices in all the congressional office buildings.

Actually, to be a little Pollyanna-ish here, what's striking is that for Democrats, it could have been so much worse. California and New York were, for starters, exempt. Also Massachusetts. A whole slew of people who could very well have lost — from Harry Reid in Nevada to Chris Coons in Delaware — didn't. The Senate remained Democratic. People were much more into throwing the bums out when it came to House races than gubernatorial races.

For all the talk about the tea party movement generating enthusiasm, that enthusiasm came at a price, for which Christine O'Donnell will always be the poster girl. You nominated her for a Senate seat you would have otherwise won? Are you crazy? People were still asking these questions on election night.

This is what Republicans have to "manage" for the next two years, along with the fact that their best-known and most magnetic star, Sarah Palin, also has the highest negatives. I'd take Barack Obama's political problems over hers any day. And so, I think, would any professional.

No one speaks for "the American people" — notwithstanding the many who claimed to on Tuesday night. At best, candidates who won really "big" could claim to speak for about 60 percent of the 50-some percent of us who even bothered to vote. Most people, it bears remembering, didn't say anything at all on Tuesday, one way or the other.

But the message that comes out of the results is not revolutionary at all. The Republicans got the keys, but they didn't get the car.

Cynics will tell you that paralysis is the most likely result, and they're probably right. Still, among all the "voter" interviews I've heard in the past 24 hours, it is hard to remember anyone saying they were voting so that Washington could become even more divided and partisan and unproductive than it already is. Voters, we should not be shocked to hear, are a whole lot less partisan than the leaders of partisan politics. If paralysis cometh, he or she who is seen as being responsible for it will pay.

The other possibility is some balance. At least some Republicans were sounding a more practical theme. They recognize that they have to do some things that actually pass and become law. They can't spend the next two years solely focused on making sure that Obama doesn't get re-elected, or they will assure that he does. That was 1996. Whatever the talking heads say, once they get to D.C., even the biggest tea drinkers will discover that a revolutionary who comes home empty-handed isn't going to be welcomed.

The best thing about midterms is that they provide an occasion for midterm corrections. I don't think America rejected Obama's presidency last night. But they rejected the experience they've had of it in the first two years: unemployment; huge bills being passed that most people don't yet understand; bailouts for those too big to fail but not for those too small to matter; a president who is without question smart, but whose ability to "feel our pain" much less motivate his base has yet to be established.

It's how you play your hand that matters in the end. The president has been dealt a new hand — not the one he wanted, certainly, and not the easiest hand to play, but it has possibilities. If politics works at all like it's supposed to, in the playing of it, he'll show himself.


TOPICS: Issues; Parties; U.S. Congress; U.S. Senate
KEYWORDS: 2010; 2012; bho44; congress; democrats; obama; palin; teaparty
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To: ari-freedom

LOL

You are just anti anyone who didn’t win and a contrarian.

No problem.

Miller hasn’t been defeated yet. They are still counting.

Gotta go to bed.

Manana.


21 posted on 11/07/2010 2:21:50 AM PST by Vendome (Don't take life so seriously... You'll never live through it.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet
huge bills being passed that most people non-Tea Party members don't yet understand;

Fixed.

PS What a friggin tool.


Frowning takes 68 muscles.
Smiling takes 6.
Pulling this trigger takes 2.
I'm lazy.

22 posted on 11/07/2010 3:08:20 AM PST by The Comedian (I really missed you. Next time, I'll adjust for windage.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet
Actually, to be a little Pollyanna-ish here, what's striking is that for Democrats, it could have been so much worse.

Yes. It could have. Except for no GOP ground game, no RNC help and no GOP leadership help (and the case of COD active opposition).

23 posted on 11/07/2010 3:19:48 AM PST by sauropod (The truth shall make you free but first it will make you miserable.)
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To: ari-freedom

Have you seen this?

They discuss Feingold in the end

http://www.therightscoop.com/glenn-beck-happy-days-are-here-again


24 posted on 11/07/2010 3:24:44 AM PST by netmilsmom (Happiness is a choice.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Once again, we get more than we could have hoped for. From the President on down, the liberal side is in denial, which will cause them to stay the course toward complete political annihilation.

The only reason the other two-thirds of the Senate didn’t suffer a similar fate, is they weren’t on the ballot. In the south, we call what Susan has written, as “picking the pepper out of the fly s#*t.”


25 posted on 11/07/2010 3:47:43 AM PST by wayoverontheright
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To: ari-freedom

>>Rubio deserved to win but O’Donnell and Angle deserved to lose. <<

Sorry to disagree, but Christine O’Donnell didn’t deserve to lose. No state should have a Communist senator. No candidate should ever have to fight their own party for support. No woman candidate should have to face the kind of attacks that all Republican women faced.

Chtistine O’Donnelll was right on the issues, so they attacked her on personal issues. Comments made in high school, her non-sex life, her family, even made-up stories did her in. Not to mention the open hostility by the Delaware RINO Party that it is so in bed with the RATs that they collude on which races each will contest.

BTW, Castle would have lost to Coons, according to exit polls.


26 posted on 11/07/2010 4:02:15 AM PST by NTHockey (Rules of engagement #1: Take no prisoners)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

She’s one of those people that you never know how she’s gonna look - I mean sometimes she looks really awful, like last week ... she looked like she’d been on steroid therapy because her face looked so round and puffy.


27 posted on 11/07/2010 4:20:24 AM PST by nuconvert ( Khomeini promised change too // Hail, Chairman O)
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To: Yaelle
Susie says. "I'd take Barack Obama's political problems over hers (Sarah Palin's) any day. And so, I think, would any professional".

I'll say that she is something that starts PRO, but it ends with stitute.

28 posted on 11/07/2010 4:50:50 AM PST by 1raider1
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

She’s right. It could have been much worse. But that just shows that there is more to be done in 2012, and there will be a whole lot more Dems on the hot seat in 2012.


29 posted on 11/07/2010 4:56:31 AM PST by Brilliant
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To: Brilliant

The despised Reid, Pelosi and Obama team will be around in 2012, thus ensuring that the Democrats will take another bath. That being said, if the Republicans want a landslide then they must choose their candidate from fresh blood. No Huckabee, Romney, Newt, and even no Sarah Palin.


30 posted on 11/07/2010 5:05:36 AM PST by Melchior
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Susan, get thee into rehab.


31 posted on 11/07/2010 5:09:08 AM PST by Carley (WE SAW NOVEMBER FROM OUR HOUSE)
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To: Melchior

Couldn’t agree more. Hard to see who’d be best though. I’m supporting Pence. I’m open to suggestions though.


32 posted on 11/07/2010 5:28:46 AM PST by Brilliant
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To: ari-freedom

“You nominated her for a Senate seat you would have otherwise won? Are you crazy?”

No. We’re just not partisan like you, Susan. We could care less about whether the GOP wins. What we care about is whether conservatives win. Electing a liberal Republican because he’s a sure bet doesn’t appeal to us as much as nominating a conservative who has only a remote chance of winning.


33 posted on 11/07/2010 5:31:00 AM PST by Brilliant
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Is she high? Dems lost at least 4 out of their 6 House seats in NY.


34 posted on 11/07/2010 5:43:33 AM PST by ez ("Abashed the devil stood and felt how awful goodness is." - Milton, Paradise Lost)
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To: Brilliant

I think the best that Conservatives could do for the next year is to marginalize the 2008 wannabees, and that includes Palin. The search for young blood should be an ongoing process. Give the young’uns a chance to speak out at every opportunity. Forget Rubio, his day will come in 2016, if he has shown promise. Same holds true for the New Jersey giant-killer; however, close scrutiny should be given the governors. For the time being, forget the Senators (where elephants go to die). Rush, Savage, Miller and Ingraham favor the rise of the young conservatives. People like Hannity, Hewitt, Rove and the old dog Conservative journalists will have to be dragged along. (Beck is immaterial, he plays his own game.) Let the Games begin.


35 posted on 11/07/2010 6:05:23 AM PST by Melchior
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To: Melchior

That’s a pretty good analysis.


36 posted on 11/07/2010 6:16:54 AM PST by Brilliant
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