Lots of folks are going to try and explain what the special election in Massachusetts means. Let me tell you right now: The American people are not going to stand for the Democratic schmucks in Congress who aren't willing to govern on the mandate that came with Barack Obama's election.
So the Democrats have lost their super majority of 60 seats in the senate, and everyone is going to be freaking out about it. Democrats are going to be scared shitless. Republicans are going to rejoice and call this a referendum on the Obama presidency. The media is going to fuel the fires with pointless babble.
Let me lay out a few ground concepts before we get too far into this: I despise the Republican Party, but I'm open to conservative concepts. I despise the Democratic Party, and I'm more liberal than most people.
All that being said, I'm glad Scott Brown won in Massachusetts. A lot of hot air is going to be spewed about “what this means” for the state of politics, and almost all of them are going to get it wrong. Liberals have already been throwing Martha Coakley under the bus for days, and probably rightfully so. Evan Bayh (Barely D-Ind) sums up what I think is going to be the main talking point.
"The only we (sic) are able to govern successfully in this country is by liberals and progressives making common cause with independents and moderates. Whenever you have just the furthest left elements of the Dem party attempting to impose their will on the rest of the country -- that's not going to work too well."
Far-left Democrats imposing their will on the country? Stop me, I'm having a wet dream.
Stupid remarks like Bayh's leave me frothing at the mouth. Apparently the furthest left this country can get is some bullshit corporate handout disguised as health care reform. This isn't a case of “far left elements” imposing their will on the people, it is a case of spineless Democrats being too afraid to take even a step towards progressive actions.
This special election was a wake-up call: Americans aren't going to stand for insulting shilling like the Democrats have been doing in the last year since Barack Obama took office. Obama was able to create a diverse electorate by offering something fresh. Yeah, yeah. I realize he ran for office as a centrist, and now he's governing as a centrist.
I'd hate to use this line, but the American people really DID drink the kool-aid during the 2008 election, myself included. Instead of getting a progressive, transparent and honest president, we ended up with a man who was more than willing to sit on the sidelines and let Congress hammer out a health care plan. Too bad Congress is filled with shmucks.
What this election shows is that the American people don't want schmucks. In fact, they hate them. Especially schmucks who are in charge, they are the schmuckiest of all. Harry Reid is a shmuck. Evan Bayh is a shmuck. Coakley and Brown are both shmucks.
The Massachusetts election is a referendum against shmucks. If the Democrats can't act in a liberal, progressive fashion, people aren't going to support them. If Democrats work FOR the health care giants, FOR Wall Street, the American people will throw them all under the bus and we'll end up with Republicans back in control.
My friend Nick thinks the Republicans could get 70 seats in the House and a majority in the senate. He might be right, who knows? Probably no one at this point. November is a long ways off. Democrats could rent some spines and start listening to the mandate that was issued in the 2008 election.
Oh, who am I kidding? They spent so much time pissing and moaning over that valuable 60 seat 'super majority' and look how super it ended up being: it lost them a senate seat.
And wouldn't ya know it? As I'm writing this, the poll data is starting to come out.
A majority of Obama voters who switched to Brown said that "Democratic policies were doing more to help Wall Street than Main Street."
A full 95 percent said the economy was important or very important when it came to deciding their vote.
A plurality of voters who switched to the Republican -- 37 percent -- said that Democrats were not being "hard enough" in challenging Republican policies.
For voters who stayed home and opposed health care, a full 53 percent said they opposed the Senate health care bill because it didn't go far enough; 39 percent weren't sure and only eight percent thought it didn't go far enough.
If Democrats want to keep their 59 seats, they are going to have to start working for the people that put Obama in office. They are going to have to start moving to the left, a direction that apparently scares Evan Bayh. What's the worst that could happen? They weren't exactly putting their super majority to good use. They'd better learn to deal with a regular majority (sans Joe Lieberman)