Yesterday's election brought the Republicans a coup of four net Senate seats, including that of Tom Daschle, which puts the count at 55 R, 44 D, and 1 Independent. There are two things about this that bode well for Bush's agenda.
First is that it will now be much more difficult for the Democrats to stonewall Bush's judicial appointments, most importantly to the Supreme Court, on which there may be as many as four vacancies over the next four years. This will reverberate through our polity for the next two generations. Secondly, some Democrats may well lose enthusiasm for serving in the minority for the foreseeable future and may soon choose to retire (or even switch). This could well produce an even larger Republican majority in 2006 and 2008.
Eleven states had a referendum on the ballot yesterday that would amend their constitutions to ban gay marriage. The measure won in all eleven states bringing to seventeen the number of states whose constitutions prohibit legal recognition of such unions.
Californians approved a $3 billion measure to fund stem cell research. How a state which teetered on the brink of insolvency a year or two ago will pay for this is not yet clear.
George W. Bush received the highest vote total ever awarded to a winner. He is the first candidate to win over 50% of the vote since his father did it in 1988. The Clinton years are looking more and more like an aberrational interruption of an otherwise steady march toward a political hegemony of traditional and conservative values that began with Reagan in 1980. The long march through the institutions continues, and there is still a long way to go, but it's conservatives which are doing the marching and it's the left which is finding itself on the wrong side of history. At least we can hope.
