what unfolded last night, resulted in the most political irony i've seen at one time. obviously things look bad when the uber liberal cove known as massachusetts votes for a republican to take over the recently vacated seat formerly occupied by the two prime-movers of the kennedy dynasty. everything the kennedys accomplished started in this seat in 1952. with the exception of two years, these two brothers had this seat for nearly 60 years. that is unprecedented.
this election is unprecedented... and deeply ironic. democrats are not only suffering the blast of defeat, but they are also experiencing shock at the end of this dynasty, and why the people voted this way... and why the turnout was so high, and why they didn't see it coming, etc. there seems to be no way to escape the reality that this is a symbolic, mathematical, strategic, and philosophical loss for the democrats.
even in their assessment of their losses, they are delusional. the people didn't change. the leadership changed. the focus changed, and the voters, in spite of the symbolic power of the seat, voted their response.
since the great turn around last year, our country has gone from being run by an erratic hybrid of conservative philosophy, imperialist foreign policy and a liberal budget allocation agenda, to what we have now: one of the most left of center, program oriented administrations ever.
you cannot implement massive scale spending increases during the largest recession in american history, and expect it to translate to the voters as a positive. what obama, and the rest of the democrats should have done: focus on jobs and spend only when you have to. it remains to be seen if obama's stimulus programs will have a lasting positive effect. this issue is ultimately mute, being that both bush and obama pulled out the checkbook in order to stop the economic meltdown(s).
obama should have stopped with the stimulus. instead of trying to overhaul health care, implement cap & trade tax mandates, etc., he should have focused on the winding down of one war and the expansion of another. this is the real picture:
jobs should have been the top issue. we are still lingering at 10% unemployment.
expanding spending on top of the bailout and stimulus programs is financial suicide.
his policies are weakening the dollar. this has horrible implications.
back door deals, buying of votes (and voters) is bad practice.
attempting to frame the opposition as extremists, only energizes them.
more losses will come in 2012.
if democrats can lose here, they can lose anywhere.
the democrats need to look closely at their core philosophy.
the super majority made democrats reckless and over confident, in the same way the bush administration acted during the first term.
the high turn out that led to the brown victory implies that independents as well as democrats, deliberately voted for a republican, in one of the bluest states. this was a rejection of the proposed health care bills. this was no accident.