This morning I woke up, showered, and drove to work. It seemed like any other day. The convenience store where I always stop to pick up vitamin fortified water had a familiar song playing on the radio:
I logged on, checked email – yep, tons as always. Then I logged in to Chicago Boyz to organize some pixels with some personal thoughts this day after the election. I look forward to checking out this post in four years.
I am no political expert and don’t typically post about things political; a lot of the thoughts I will put forth are probably stone wrong, but you can let me have it in the comments – I have thick skin. I think it is the harsh Midwest winters that steel me.
You see, today is a little different. “President elect” Obama they say on the radio. The Democrats are dominating the House and are very near a filibuster proof majority in the Senate, although it doesn’t look like they will get it. Thank God for Mitch McConnell.
I honestly don’t think that Obama will enact all of his ruinous policies. He won many states by the thinnest of margins. In fact, McCain did better than I thought he would both in the electoral college and the popular vote. No Reaganesque landslide here. It gives me hope for the next election. I don’t think it can get too much worse for the Republicans. Can it?
In fact this might have been a good wake up call. When we see a lot of the things that will be heading down the pike the next couple of years, hopefully a good campaign can be waged by some of the R front runners. I have one in mind that I think would fit the bill quite nicely.
So I fully expect a pretty good tax hike coming, and this will for sure hurt my employees. You can repeat that scenario a zillion times across the nation. Some businesses will do better with the new President and Congress, some will do worse. My business? Time will tell.
I hope that Obama at least fills his conference rooms with clear thinking adults. We are still at war with radical Islam, have major issues with our economy and have a lot of other important things to deal with. Even if their ideology isn’t the same as mine, I hope that whoever is in Obama’s cabinet will have at least some inkling of how their policies will affect the real world. Clinton retreads wouldn’t be the worst thing – not optimal, of course, but better than total loons.
I was fully prepared for last night’s results – not too much surprised me, except the fact that the people of Minnesota may have elected that clown Al Franken to the Senate – as of this writing the race is still undecided. That is the one race that would make me tear out what little hair I have remaining on my head. But so be it. We get what we deserve.
There will be no blame on black helicopter conspiracies for this loss. As the typical adults in the room, we conservatives will take our lumps and point the finger at ourselves. No stealing of elections, hopefully no tearing down of the victors.
One bonus of the Republicans losing is that I won’t have to see anyone wearing “McHitler” or “Muck FcCain” t-shirts – although according to this video, that industry is typically one third of the US economic output:
Economists Warn Anti-Bush Merchandise Market Close To Collapse
I highly doubt that you will see our side going to the sorry depths of folks like at Kos. That site lost what little credibility they had when they challenged the authenticity of the parentage of Sarah Palin’s baby. Creeps.
One other benefit of Obama winning for me personally will be the hopeful sinking of the ship that people like Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton ride on. If anyone ever asks me or challenges me to a debate about racism or “whitey” keeping anyone down, I will simply refer them to whitehouse.org.
Ah, the phone rings. Customers are coming in. It is a day like any other, but I will go through it thinking about the future – my business, my family, my right to bear arms, my tax burden. A future that looks like it will hurt for a while, until we find the next Reagan. Will there be one in my lifetime? Don’t know. Hope so. Actually, I hope it is the next Thatcher.
The (Mpls) Star-Tribune has an interesting graphic for the vote distributions for the Senate race. The people of MN didn’t elect Franken (assuming he wins), Mpls, St Paul and the first ring suburbs did.
In fact, in those House districts that skim the Cities (as we out here call ’em), Republicans (Bachman, Paulsen) did fine.
I should note, however, the usual collection of knuckleheads from “da Range”, my home county, Mower, and an odd area out in southwest MN, will also always go Democrat.
Interesting point. I just looked at the county map of the US – the vast majority of the rural areas, except for in the northeast and here in Wisconsin and Minnesota and parts of Iowa went for McCain.
Kid Rock ripped of the immortal Warren Zevon
Gosh, I miss Maggie, pretty much all the time. I am hanging a lot of hope on Palin too.
Jdm, so I don’t count as a Minnesotan because I live in The Cities?
Anyway, I have to say that if Franken loses (or actually even if he doesn’t since this race is so tight) it really speaks to how much of a crappy candidate Franken was. You’d think the DFL could do better. I mean, Norm Coleman is so slimely and such a Bush lackey, how could he pull off a win in a state that heavily favored Obama and had huge voter turnout? My opinion — it’s only possible if the opposing candidate was a poor, poor choice.
This loss will be good for the Republicans. In Illinois you can see the utter destruction of the Republican party, as we elect bona-fide crooks like Ryan and his ilk, raise taxes, and open the gates to death row.
We need to just take stock, start over, and think about what republicans stand for. I don’t mind losing in a principled manner. Winning while acting like Democrats only worked for a while. Now it doesn’t work at all.
But I am VERY HAPPY not to have to think about it for a while.
Commiserations, guys. But you are still better off than we are. You just have to rebuild the Republican party not the whole of the conservative/right-wing movement. We have been so badly served by the Conservatives that we must start from scratch without them. I wrote about it here: http://eureferendum2.blogspot.com/2008/11/well-what-now.html
I am not a happy bunny but what can one do. At least I shall enjoy being as rude as possible to Tory Socialists.
Thanks Helen, I think in a place like Illinois they have to go from the ground up, but in other places such as here in Wisconsin there isn’t as much work to do as far as rebuilding goes. And it isn’t like Obama completely destroyed McCain – several states were very, very close – I think with the right candidate (cough, PALIN) things could turn around very quickly. Also, if the Dems overplay their hand, which a lot of people think they will, we may start to see some things happen in 2010. We can only hope.
Again, while some people seem to expect the Republicans to reorganize effectively I see no reason why this should be the case. If the Republicans knew what to do they would have won Tuesday’s elections. There may now be a period of reorganization and experimentation by Republicans, but it’s possible that they will go in the wrong direction, perhaps multiple times. Some of the leaders may even move Left, because from their POV it may have been Obama’s leftist platform that won the election. Again, the experience of the British Conservatives is cautionary.
(The experience of Illinois Republicans presents another set of ugly possibilities. The Illinois Republican Party has been flatlining for decades, a Party of empty husks despite ample opportunity for thoughtful opposition to a corrupt and incompetent Democratic establishment.)
A pro-freedom/markets/defense political resurgence in this country will take a combination of good ideas, good leadership and a favorable political environment. Right now the political environment is unfavorable, as a plurality of Americans is invested in high hopes for an Obama administration. Obama will now get a chance to do his best for good or ill, and this will probably take a while. At the same time it isn’t clear that Republicans (assuming that any classical-liberal resurgence will be a Republican effort) have leaders who are up to the task of challenging him. There is no Gingrich much less a Reagan, and who knows when the next one will emerge. Finally, the Republican Party needs to reevaluate its ideas, and probably to cull some of the dross of “compassionate conservatism.” That’s a minimum requirement. It’s possible that Republicans will go through a long period of internal struggle between competing ideological sub-groups (libertarian, populist, nativist, religious-conservative, etc.) before a coherent framework for challenging the Democrats nationally emerges.
And throughout this period the Democrats and the Left will be reworking the system to lock in their own advantages. They may overreach and create an opportunity for their non-statist political opponents, but I wouldn’t count on it.
I wouldn’t count on the dems holding it together for long. Agreed that the Illinois Republicans can’t organize a tea party, though.
Can’t see the future but in my lifetime the dems have always imploded early on. History says we have a decent shot.
It wouldn’t matter if Lincoln himself came back from the dead and choose Reagan as his V.P. Has any cabinet-level department ever been abolished in the USA or anywhere else following a campaign promise to do the same? Any expansion of the government enacted under Obama is permanent. I doubt even a 100% electoral college sweep by the Libertarian party would result in the reduction of cabinet departments to State, War, and Treasury.
Republicans reduce taxes, not spending, like Reagan. They reduce taxes, not the size of government, like Reagan.
Conservatives conserve. What ever is enacted by the Democrats will be conserved by Republicans. The Republicans had their chance to repeal the New Deal and Great Society. Instead they conserved them.
That government should be smaller is contrary to the entire history of the 20th century. That expansion began when ‘Progressives’ (then Republicans) instituted an income tax. It will never be repealed, which would take a constitutional amendment. The state governments will never vote to terminate the federal income tax or their own.
Short of mass conversions to Islam, the future is clear and has been for decades: more bureaucracy, more regulation by self-appointed experts, more government.