Concerning the result of the 2006 Democrat election victory there is one elephant in the room and its name is George Bush. Not many kossack's seem to be acknowledging it. I believe a significant reason the Democrats did so well was because of George Bush's performance in the last six years.
I think the view of Bush is so detestable to some people that they won't credit him for anything which may be to detriment going forward to 2008 Election.
I see these exit polls saying the main issues were corruption, terrorism, economy , I didn't read any on Bush. The fact was where ever bush went the candidate he was trying to support, dipped in the following days polls. It ended up with the funny situation that when in Florida the only person willing to be seen with Bush was Kathleen Harris.
From the CNN polls it shows 15% of people that voted for bush in 2004 went to Democrats. This number made up 49% of the sample which is reduced from 51% of sample in 2004.
What I could guess is that 2% of bush supporters stayed home and around 7% switched to Democrats for various reasons the main being Bush's performance. The question is will those supporters stay home in the next election and the defectors go back to the Republicans. I am sure the figures may be slightly off but not the meme. This is the elephant in the room.
Other Interesting figures I found in exit polls. The only real majority for the Republic party besides being a republican is if they are a WHITE EVANGELICAL/BORN-AGAIN christian. For democrats its youth votes, union members and African Americans.
One last thing is that it seems the majority of votes (60%) are the ones with incomes greater then $50,000, But the voters with less the $50,000 vote for the democrats (60%) . I can see enabling these voters with an easy way to vote will be a major plus for future democrat candidates, especially progressive candidates