Has I go to bed tonight it's after 5am Eastern Standard time. Yes we lost the election. Yes we will have Obama as our President for the next four years, but it looks as we still have one weapon left the filibuster. As of the time I've gone to bed the Dems have 56 seats with four still up for grabs according to CNN. Let's go through these. First there's Georgia, Saxby Chambliss leads 50 to 46 with 99% reporting. The only thing I can figure here is that you must need 50% to prevent a run-off otherwise this is just a mistake by CNN. Next there's Minnesota. Norm Coleman is leading Al Frankin by about 2,500 votes with 99% reporting. Coleman was up by around 500 votes a few minutes ago so it looks like we will hold this seat by the smallest of margains. In Alaska convicted Felon Ted Stevens leads by
3,600 votes with 96% reporting. If Ted can hold on he may not be able to serve, but Sarah Palin will be choosing his replacement. Finally in Oregon Gordon Smith leads by 5,309 votes with 72% reporting. If we could somehow win all four of these seats it would be huge. It would stop the Dems from being able to end a filibuster by prevent them from getting to sixty votes. I expect they might be able to get one or two republicans to vote with them to end a filibuster, but I don't think they can convince four. 2010 Conservatism strikes back.
Waking Up From Woke
13 hours ago
It's going to be a while before the MN race gets called. Regardless of who's ahead after the last precincts come in, it's pretty much a guaranteed re-count at this point.
ReplyDeleteAnd yes, in GA, you have to top 50% to avoid a run-off. There are still 600,000 early votes (mainly from Democratic strongholds) yet to be reported, so we'll probably be seeing another election in Georgia.
Alaska is the real surprise of the night. It really looks like they're going to elect a convicted felon. It's pretty embarrassing. But for the record, the governor doesn't choose the replacement in Alaska. They recently passed a new law which calls for a special election should a senator not be able to complete his term. So it seems likely we'll be seeing another election there sometime in the next year (whenever Stevens runs out of appeals).
Hopefully Oregon will be called sometime tomorrow, but it looks like there might end up being a recount there as well.
O.K., we lost. Now we have to go forward and learn from what has happened. Having hope in the Democrats not achieving a super majority is not the way. The overwhelming voter turnout and the conversion of so many Red states to Blue is sending us a message. We need to STOP the exclusivity of the Republican Party and figure out how to appeal to the WORLD, The world celebrated last night and it does speak so well about the freedoms we have here in the US. We should be proud of this and now work to find a Republican candidate of the future.
ReplyDeleteHere is the thing, there is opportunity here, we can finally rebuild our brand and be the loyal opposition once again. When we act like conservatives, we win, and we will win again if we stick to those principles. Last night was disappointing, but it was also a call to arms, it was a wakeup call that let Republicans know that if you are going to act like tax and spend liberals there will be punishment. Now we can get back to basics and retake the majority in 2010.
ReplyDeleteGottogripe: I'd love to know what your Republican candidate of the future would be. I was told McCain was that candidate during the primaries.
ReplyDelete