Like I explained to my wife during the 2000 elections, elections are my Superbowls. Don't get me wrong I like football, but I do not enjoy it nearly as mush as I do politics. With politics I see the stakes as being higher and actually having an effect upon my life and the life of my family. However, just like any endeavor in life you win some and you lose some. You just need to make sure that you enjoy the process. Winning is great but losing really, really sucks.
The Republican Congress has, in one sense, suffered a significant set back. Did they deserve it? Probably. They became lulled into over confidence by the taste of power and began to believe their on stories. The party became Hollywoodized and began to think that the people liked them because of who they were rather than for what they could produce. The party has failed to produce meaningful changes to the tax code, there has been no immigration reform, and border security hasn't been brought up to snuff. They have failed to relay to people the importance of Iraq and seem to have allowed the GWOT to suffer because of it. The party took its constituents for granted and it has been reminded about a little thing called democracy.
However, conservatism has not been killed. I like the quote from Tony Snow, which was to the effect that now that the Democratic Party has power let's see what they do with it. Essentially, the Democrats have to put up or shut up before 2008. The ball is in their court. They, of course, will have a rather raucous group of Republicans to deal with. Things should start to get interesting again. I think that the conservative agenda needed a shot in the arm and this may do the trick.
The real winner in this election will be the Right Wing Blogosphere. Rush Limbaugh would not have risen to prominence without Bill Clinton. His radio show was a sanctuary where we conservatives could gather and know that there were other creatures like us out there. We had a radio to talk back to and to nod our head with in agreement. The blogosphere, however, is Talk Radio on steroids and it is just starting to get pumped up.
We no longer have to just nod our heads and talk back to the radio. We can participate in the conversation, we can be engaged in it. If one of us goes off the deep end, rather than our only editor being the pitied look of our wives or children, there is an entire world that will quickly bring us to our senses (or join us). The blogosphere is the combination of all three of our traditional modes of communication. It has readership like the print media, it has video like the alphabet networks, and it has easy access like the radio. The next Rush Limbaugh is out there. Will it be Michelle Malkin, Captains Quarters, LGF, Carnivorous Conservative, the American Thinker or some other "rightwingnut" blogger? The "leftwing nutroots" have tried to imitate the success of the right on the airwaves and on the blogosphere but have never quite gotten it right. Well, the professionals are back in town. Being in the majority never really sat well with me anyway. I like to stir the pot and it is hard to do when your friends are making the soup.
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