This election wasn't a vote against a "liberal Massachusetts Senator." On Tuesday, the American people voted in favor of conservative change, almost across the board. If this victory was caused by Rove's "4 million new evangelical voters" strategy and the failure of the Democratic GOTV operation to overwhelm it, then things don't look good for Democrats for a long, long time.
In Senate races in Oklahoma, North Carolina, and Kentucky, when voters had the option of voting for a moderate-to-conservative Democrat against a radically right-wing conservative Republican, they chose the Republican. Why did this happen, and how can we recover from it?
I was counting on the "natural conservatism" of the American people to pull Kerry through. Given the choice between a candidate, such as Bush, who was advocating for radical change, and Kerry, who was campaigning on a moderate platform that claimed to restore America's strength and respect in the world, Americans would go for the choice that seemed familiar to them-- ironically, John Kerry, rather than the incumbent. However, based on the results in the Senate, it seems to me that Americans
want radical changes in favor of conservatism.
What the election proved is that these forces for radical right-wing change cannot be confronted directly. This election was competition to see who was better at turning out their respective bases. It looks like the Republicans cleaned up, big time. The Democrats are never going to be able to compete with the Republicans when it comes to attracting the religious right that turned out for Bush, and Tuesday proved that the religious right can't be overwhelmed in the polls by a combination of young and minority voters.
So what's the answer? In the short term, there is no answer. If Rove was right, and those 4 million evangelicals are what put it over the top for Bush, then the Republicans now have a voting block as loyal and as impenetrable as the African-American voters are for Democrats. In the long term, trends in the electorate select for voters that are not pro-life, favor gay marriage, and generally are not in line with the social conservatives that put Bush over the top. Make no mistake-- America did not vote for the "safety and security" of a steadfast leader, last night. They voted for a radical shift in America's direction in favor of right-wing Republican policies.