I didn't really follow the results last night and admit that I am shocked this morning that we didn't do better in the Senate.  I would almost say we underperformed given political tailwind that we enjoyed.  

I never thought we would get 60 in the Senate.  But I would have said 56 was way on the low side.  

It doesn't look like we overperformed in the House either.

On a happy note Liddy Dole doesn't have to bother to visit us in NC anymore.  

55 seats in the senate, Jerome... Lieberman is going to get kicked out of the caucus, although maybe he'll beg and plead to stay in....

This is a real disappointment... losing every single one of the close races, although there is still a chance with possibly provisionals in MN maybe carrying over Franken, and people saying that the AP totals for Merkeley are incorrect and he has a good chance of winning...  and some reports that say that early voting in AK hasn't been counted...

I hope that we can at least pull out one of those races, especially MN and OR....

Alaskans have shown themselves incapable of the responsibilities of statehood. By electing a convicted felon back to the Senate, the US Senate should not only expel Ted Stevens but should reject every alternative put forth by Governor Palin.

Alaska is every bit the embarrassment that DC was when it re-elected Marion Barry.

I made was that the universal commentary about McCain being toast would depress the Republican vote.

Instead Republicans seem to have turned out in large numbers to prevent one-party rule in Washington, and perhaps also a lot of independents voted for gridlock (Obama plus GOP down-ticket).

I had very high hopes for Merkley and am not giving up on that yet. I always wondered whether Franken was the right guy to take out Coleman, and I'm going to be crushed if Coleman survives this wave. He never should have been in the Senate in the first place.

I still hope that Al Franken gets a seat in the Senate. I am ecstatic about the results, in any event. Obama is not a radical leftist Democrat who needs a veto-proof majority to dictate from, such a majority would actually undermine his stated goal of developing and proving a new Post-Partisan paradigm of rational governance.

I suspect that as he does so, he shall piss off people on both fringes, and he will do so to my eternal delight.

Glad we won a House majority!  I,too, really hoped Dems could do better in the Senate and the down-ticket races.  It will make it difficult to get really good legislation passed. Don't expect to see too many GOP'ers willing to work on a bipartisan basis, at least not on good bills.

I'm also holding out hope that Clinton takes over for Reid.  He will continue to perform disastrously in that job. With Clinton, there might be hope for getting a good agenda through Congress.

ID-01 isn't state wide, we've got two congressional districts. But yes, I'm thrilled; Sali was an idiot yet I didn't think we'd beat him in a year with a GOP presidential candidate on the top of the ballot. Go Idaho Dems!

Who are these new voters ... young, old, black or white ... that gave Obama such big margains in states like MN or OR?   I mean blow out wins for Obama and yet we didn't breeze to victory in the Senate races.   Granted, running against incumbants is tough, but if connecting McCain to Bush was so effective, why didn't it work down ticket as well?

I really wonder about these voters.  It appears that many will not be solid Democrats moving forward.   They didn't vote for progressive policies, they voted against Bush or for Obama, policies aside.  

After all how can you vote for Obama, and vote for Norm Coleman, if you are weighing policies?

One this is for sure, these races tell me the Republican Party is far from dead.   It will be interesting to watch how they choose to move forward over the next couple of years heading in the next midterms.  

I think they also tell us that Americans may well reject any drastic new policy directions.  

but with some heartbreaking losses.  The Senate outcome is disappointing and some of our good candidates did not make it.   I worked in Virginia during the election and I was happy to see what will hopefully end up as two new Democratic members of Congress in Virginia.  I hope that Kratovil ekes out a win in Maryland's first district.

We all did...

On the bright side, in 2010 the GOP AGAIN has more seats to defend than we do... The last time that will be the case.   I think we have the chance to make it above 60 at that point.

Maybe if Obama wants to put a GOP in the cabinet, he can pick a GOP Senator from a state with a Dem governor?   That would be awesome.

Oh I just want to say...

FUCK ALASKA.... You guys elected a fucking criminal?  Really?   That's messed up.  I am officially a member of the Alaskan Independence Party.  Let them leave the Union, bring in Puerto Rico as a replacement and they can have palin as their Queen.

Stupidest.State.Ever.

It was the Obama ground game that grinded out the narrow wins in VA, FL, NC, IN and maybe MO.  Warner could have been VP and in my opinion, he made a career mistake (though not a fatal  one) - if he wants to be President.

Palin won't appoint herself to the Senate.  She can't do anything in the Senate but she can continue to throw her weight around in the insular Alaska as top dog.  I hope the Anchorage Daily News continues to keep her (somewhat) honest.  I'm hoping that sometime in the next six months, McCain will say that Palin was the biggest mistake of his career - that will help to marginalize her as a future national force.  

Although Obama came up a hair short in Montana (those NRA ads killed him), Schweitzer won his relection bid: 65% to 33%.  Montana is one of the few States that is relatively economically healthy and a solid second term for Schweitzer is likely.  Obama can appoint him as Secretary of Agriculture in 2012 and then he will be setup for a national run in 2016.  

Progressives (whatever that means) are probably going to be disappointed by Obama.  Not only will the economic hole cause him to delay health care (except for maybe mandatory coverage of children), look for in 2009: a clear plan for withdrwal from Iraq, a Mideast Peace Plan push (with Colin Powell as envoy?), immigration reform, the first part of a comprehensive 21st Century energy plan, putting more of the government on the internet, a specific plan for national service by (mostly) Millennials and modest tax cuts for those making under $200,000.  All that would be a pretty good first year.

Obama's likely Presidential leadership style and agenda seems clear to me and was summarized by Republican Bradford Berenson of Obama's tenure at The Harvard Law Review:

"I think Barack took 10 times as much grief from those on the left on the Review as from those of us on the right. And the reason was, I think there was an expectation among those editors on the left that he would affirmatively use the modest powers of his position to advance the cause, whatever that was. They thought, you know, finally there's an African American president of the Harvard Law Review; it's our turn, and he should aggressively use this position, and his authority and his bully pulpit to advance the political or philosophical causes that we all believe in.

And Barack was reluctant to do that. It's not that he was out of sympathy with their views, but his first and foremost goal, it always seemed to me, was to put out a first-rate publication. And he was not going to let politics or ideology get in the way of doing that..."

Stil, you have to wonder - if Obama +did+ sidetrack to GA on his way down to Florida, what effect it would have had. Clearly, we saw that Arizona was affected by New Mexico and other border states.

The 50 state strategy is a HUGE SUCCESS

Arcuri should have been re-elected rather easily, but it ended up a nail biter. He had 50.1% with 80% counted, for instance. Curently he's up just over 5,000 votes. In the NY Times list of NY House Districts where "Democrats expected to win easily", most of the winners Upstate has 70 to 80%. What was wrong here? The opponent wasn't that impressive.

I attribute the closeness of the race in part to a weak Democratic Party organization in the district. The Obama campaign and the DNC have done great infrastructure development in many places, but not here. The Arcuri campaign has not been up to the huge task of organizing. (They seemed to have trouble managing to get a recognizable picture of the candidate on the lawn signs!)

The Democratic Party now has a lot of people who are good at local organizing. (I remember all the complaining Here on MYDD about the lack of it during the 2006 election!) I really hope that the state Democratic Party can get the county-level organizations functional again. That can include ditching the dedicated fossils who have been county chairs for decades in which there were no expectations. A measure of success would be to get candidates for county offices, State Assembly and State Senate who have a lot to offer. In some cases the main qualification of the Democratic challenger seems to be that they are too naive to realize they are just cannon fodder.

So please, Howard Dean, take note that there is some low hanging fruit for good organizers here in the bluer part of the country.

You, Todd, Jonathan, Chris Bowers, Markos and so many others have helped move the power of this democracy from the smoke-filled rooms of corrupt bargaining to the sunshine of the blogosphere.

You did it with books like "Crashing the Gates" and blogs like MyDD and Daily Kos. You did it in spite of criticism that was often unfair and sometimes nasty. You persevered in supporting ALL Democratic candidates in spite of your personal desire to see Hillary Clinton become president.

So thanks, Jerome. You and the rest of the MyDD crew are a big part of creating real, positive change in America.

Let's see...in 2 years, we've won 11 (or, maybe, just possibly, more) Senate seats, and 36 (or more) house seats, and a presidency.

Okay, I can be as greedy as anyone...but I'll take it.

is anyone else feeling this incredible sense of relief like a horrible storm has finally passed, the sun has come out and we can now move on with rebuilding our country?  As hard I worked for Al Gore in 2000, I never in a million years imagined how horrible GW Bush would be as President.  There is not one thing on his watch that has not turned to disaster.  What a mess President Obama is inheriting but he is up to the job.

Incidentally, I tear up everytime I see President Obama out of relief and the promise that his election brings.

The size of Obama's victory, the states he won, the reception his victory is getting, and his historic speech were all incredible highs last night.  I went to bed with a sense of joy and relief.

I woke up to sadness.  I guess Obama's victory was completely expected.  I had no doubt he would win.  But what I learned this morning was unexpected.  I went to bed thinking we would win Senate seats in Minnesota, Oregon, and Alaska, and force a run-off in Georgia.  I can't believe that that a-hole Chambliss escaped a run-off by one-tenth of one percent, and that Franklin lost by a few hundred votes, and that even Stevens won.  I think with 58-59 seats, as I was expecting, it would have been much easier to peel off a couple of moderate Republicans and thus defeat any filibuster attempts, but with 56 seats it will be more difficult to get groundbreaking progressive legislation through.

As for Proposition 8, I am absolutely crushed.  Words can't describe how I feel about that.  I feel like the battle for equal rights in this country in the face of religious bigotry has been dealt a serious setback, and my heart is deeply saddened for my gay and lesbian friends.

I guess, on balance, with Obama's victory and with picking up seats in the Senate and House, it was a great night, but my feelings are bittersweet.

Burner loses by 1%.  CA-04 may come down to late absentees.

Huge night downballot here in Clark County. Dina Titus wins NV-03 by about 6 points, and we win BOTH contested state senate seats to take a 12-9 majority in that body (for the first time since 1992), plus pick up an Assembly seat to give our caucus a 2/3 supermajority.

And the Democrats won both contested countyc ommission seats so that teh entire commission (the most powerful body in the state) is all blue -- and with a heavy influence of CtW (SIEU first and foremost)

And not much commented on, up at the top, Obama won this county by greater than 20%! Kerry won it by about 52-47.