Reaction Roundup on the Republican Rubicon

End of an Error: Right wingnut Rick Santorum concedes defeat

A VOTE FOR CHECKS AND BALANCES

Dick Polman at American Debate:

"So much for the purported genius of Karl Rove and his vaunted plans for a permanent Republican majority.

"Americans have voted tonight for checks and balances. By turning the House over to the Democrats, and by putting the Senate within reach . . . the voters have basically honored James Madison's dictum that it is wise to divide power between 'opposite and rival interests,' in order to 'control the abuses of government.'

Americans have put the breaks on one-party rule. They have judged the GOP to be guilty of hubris - a vice that typically afflicts those who wield clout without accountability - and so they have decided on the punishment, which is that now President Bush, in his lame duck years, must share power with those whom he only recently demonized as bad for America. He has basically spent the political capital that he boasted about in November of 2004, and now the bill has come due."

'IS THIS THE FATE THAT AWAITS AMERICA?'

Wretchard at The Belmont Club:

"Now that the Democratic Party has taken the House and has an extremely good prospect of taking the Senate it's possible to speculate about its consequences. The Israeli experience probbly provides a good comparison. Faced with the difficulty of a security threat they retreated, some would say, into pacifist fantasy. But the enemy eventually brought parts of Israel under threat and the response, when it came, was still half-hearted. Olmert temporized and another war in Lebanon is expected presently. Is this the fate that awaits America?

"Maybe. Not in particulars but in structure. There is now a much smaller chance that the terrorist problem can be resolved at a low level of conflict. There is a greater likelihood that it will be allowed by neglect or paralysis to metastize into a canker which will develop into a catastrophic confrontation in five or ten years time. A likelihood, but not a certainty."

THE REPUBLICAN MELTDOWN

Kevin Drum at The Political Animal:

"So what caused the Republican meltdown? This is just off the top of my head, but here are my guesses:

"Iraq, of course. There's not much to add to the conventional wisdom here. As Kenneth Adelman said, George Bush's national security crew 'turned out to be among the most incompetent teams in the post-war era.' The voters pretty clearly agree.

"Terry Sciavo and Katrina. This is sort of a gut feeling on my part, but I think it was the combination of these two things within a couple of months of each other that really hurt Republicans last year, not either one alone. The contrast was deadly: the Republican Party (and George Bush) showed that they were capable of generating a tremendous amount of action very quickly when the issue was something important to the most extreme elements of the Christian right, but were palpably bored and indifferent when the issue was the destruction of an American city. It's hard to think of any two successive issues painting a clearer and less flattering picture of just what's wrong with the Republican Party leadership these days.

"The economy. The media is so focused on GDP and gasoline prices as economic bellwethers that I think they've badly missed the real story of the past six years: the deteriorating fortunes of the working and middle classes. This is more than just Democratic spin, and in this dismal atmosphere Democrats won a lot of support by holding the line against Social Security privatization, supporting increases in the minimum wage, and fighting for lower prescription drug prices. These aren't explicitly economic issues as much as they are values issues, and Republicans were on the wrong side.

"Sleazy campaigning. This might be wishful thinking on my part, but I wonder if this year's campaign finally got a little too negative? Is it possible that the Lee Atwater-ization of the Republican Party has reached its limit, turning off more voters than it attracts?

"Extremism. Did Republicans lose because they weren't conservative enough? . . . I doubt it. The American public has shown over and over that it's operationally moderate, and I suspect that George Bush has actually pushed conservatism about as far as it can go. If you take a look at the exit polls, Republicans lost because they lost the center, not because they lost their base."

'COMEUPPANCE WAS THE ORDER OF THE DAY'

David Corn at The Nation:

"There is no way to spin the election results. They were a repudiation of George W. Bush, his party, his agenda, and his war. The commander in chief argues that he is fighting a war in Iraq that is essential to the survival of the United States. The electorate sent a message: we don't buy it. Political genius Karl Rove and GOP chieftain Ken Mehlman, with their scare tactics (defeatist Democrats will surrender to the terrorists; Nancy Pelosi will destroy the nation) and below-the-belt ads, were not able to defy popular sentiment. Comeuppance was the order of the day. Because of Bush, R became a scarlet letter."

FIRE RUMSFELD AND REACH OUT

Andrew Sullivan at The Daily Dish:

"This election doesn't mean America has given up on the war in Iraq. It means, at a minimum, that the president must be forced to realize he cannot keep his defense secretary. If this election was a referendum on the war and its execution, the will of the people is clear. No one can have confidence in Rumsfeld as defense secretary at this point. He has to go. I know the president said he'd keep him for two more years regardless. (It was one of the dumbest things he has ever said.) But any president wishing to form a sustainable middle ground on Iraq now has to abandon Rumsfeld. It's that simple. Fire him; and reach out to the Democrats and moderate Republicans in order to form a strategy for victory or stability in Iraq. And have the good sense to be graceful about it."

'WE LOST OUR WAY'

Republican Representative Mike Pence of Indiana delivered this eulogy, which NRO's The Corner reprinted:

"Some will argue that we lost our majority because of scandals at home and challenges abroad. I say, we did not just lose our majority, we lost our way.

"While the scandals of the 109th Congress harmed our cause, the greatest scandal in Washington, D.C. is runaway federal spending. . . .

"Our opponents will say that the American people rejected our Republican vision. I say the American people didn't quit on the Contract with America, we did. And in so doing, we severed the bonds of trust between our party and millions of our most ardent supporters."

Incidentally, Pence was re-elected.

MODERATE VOTERS DESERT THE GOP

Joe Gandelman at The Moderate Voice:

"So welcome to the new political era: an era in which for the first time a woman will become speaker of the House, many Democrats who were elected are somewhat more more centrist, where the concept of divided government . . . will be the norm. . . .

"When the detailed analyses are made, and the lawyers have finished their scrutiny of the votes and any recounts are concluded, the key fact will remain: parts of the Reagan coalition came apart on election day 2006 — and independent and moderate voters overwhelmingly deserted the GOP."

'THE AMERICAN PEOPLE HAVE SPOKEN'

Captain Ed Morrisey at Captain's Quarters:

"I don't think anyone can honestly look at the results tonight and say that we saw anything less than a trip to the woodshed for the Republicans. . . .

"This is a big loss, and it will hurt the GOP and the Bush administration. Even if we do hold the Senate, we will have to find compromise candidates for the federal bench, and also look forward to more taxes and regulation. Free trade is a goner. The prosecution of the war on terror will get limited by a probable repeal of the Patriot Act, or at least an attempt to do so, and I'm very sure the Democrats will move to defund the operations in Iraq by a date certain in order to force a 'phased redeployment.'

"And that's not even counting the myriad investigations that Democrats will launch against the Bush administration. Republicans will keep it from getting out of hand, but the Democrats will want to build enough damaging allegations to win again in 2008. However, in terms of policy at least, the American people have spoken."