Point 7 is a wonderful reflection

Best commercial ever.

It seemed to go pretty freakin well for the Democrats to me. They didn't even get rid of Murtha for God's sake. Add him to the list with Ray Nagin, for when you start having too much faith in the electorate.

Oh, and throw Ted Stevens on the list too.

I do the same thing with Mario Kart Wii.

Good thing you left Chicago, Dan - otherwise you would be hearing a lot more about Tony Rezko. William Cellini was just indicted. The big question about Blago (our beloved governor Rod Blagojevich) is will he be indicted by July 1, 2009, or sometime later in the year. Also, will he have the nerve (his 13% approval rating is lower than Bush's) to appoint himself to Obama's senate seat.
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/columnists/chi-kass-31-oct31,0,7932244.column

Big local question - will Obama leave Patrick Fitzgerals in place as the US Attorney. He still has plenty of politicians to throw in jail. Most amazing thing that happened this week, on Monday Fast Eddie Vrdolyak plead guilty -
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/chi-vrdolyak-04-nov04,0,4062127.story

How much do we want to bet these will not be Dan's last thoughts about the election?

Here are a few of mine: The Democrats need to invest some thought to how they pick Senate candidates. Losing to a felon is just a half-inch less ingnominious than losing to a corpse, but I watched this Begich guy in his TV debate with Stevens. He looked as if he could lose to a corpse. And couldn't the Democrats in Minnesota come up with a candidate who was not from New York? I don't mean just technically not from New York. It normally works better to try persuading voters to make their Senator someone from their own state.

The map showing counties that voted more for one party or the other this year than they did in 2004 shows a swath of red stretching from Oklahoma and rural Arkansas east and north through Appalachia. Swell. From the party of Ronald Reagan to the Hillbilly Party in a generation.

Speaking of hillbillies, Newsweek online has an amusing tidbit(http://www.newsweek.com/id/167581). Let's just say it involves the Future of the Republican Party pillaging a well-known department store from coast to coast.

African American turnout in the South appears to have increased less than I thought it would, especially in Georgia. This was a real surprise.

For all the criticism of John McCain and the campaign he ran, could any of the candidates he beat in the GOP primaries have done as well as he did yesterday?

For all the praise of Barack Obama and the campaign he ran, could he not have lost this election were it not for the financial markets' collapse in September? Running against an opponent who embraced nearly all the major policies of a Republican President whose approval ratings have been in the 20s for a good year, losing shouldn't have even been in the picture.

Does having picked up seats in the election mean Congressional Democrats will keep all their leaders? Even Harry Reid?

as one of those non-americans mentioned in point 2, I must say that part of his speech was particularly reassuring.

To reproduce msnbc's poll results

In your vote for president today, was mcCain's choice of Sarah Palin

A factor (vote) Obama 43% McCain 56 % 60% of voters
Not a factor (vote) Obama 65% McCain 33% 33% of voters

The most obvious conclusion is that Sarah Palin was a plus for the ticket.

As for better candidates, which one wouldn't have been better? Neither Romney nor Huckabee would have been as tied to 'Bush's failed policy' as much are McCain. And McCain, god love him, just did not look 'presidential' over and against the taller, younger, unbroken by torture -- or indeed any sort of military service or manual labor -- Obama. A lot of folks vote on stuff like that, and Romney would have matched and surpassed Obama in that regard.

Oh, and this one goes out to our grateful host, some analysis from Noam Schreiber

"The upshot was that, despite losing the white working-class by wide margins nationally, Obama came reasonably close in the economically depressed states of the industrial Midwest (down only 8 in Ohio and Indiana, actually up 6 in Michigan). Hence the electoral college landslide."

That is, those hurt most by the Republican mantra of free trade -- of which there was no greater chanter than John McCain -- screwed Daniel Drezner's former party. Thanks, man.

Hey Zathras:

“a swath of red stretching from Oklahoma and rural Arkansas east and north through Appalachia. Swell. From the party of Ronald Reagan to the Hillbilly Party in a generation.”

Painting a third of the country as hillbillies in one swipe seems a bit unsporting to me. Do you belong to some sort of American aristocracy of which I am unaware? Descended from princes perhaps?

Hey Chris,

My thought exactly, so I googled him. Seems he is a character from one of the most obscure Star Trek almost Star Trek spin-offs. Kind of figures.

Lousy game + Heidi Klum = me shelling out R500 for GHWT.

And in probably the least surprising development, the market began its crash on the news today...

If you wanted McCain, you should have voted for him .. in 2000.

More like 22% of the country, actually. Don't like the hillbilly label? Believe me, I meant it in the best possible way. I think of hillbillies as the kind of people with tastes so refined and elevated they can blow through tens of thousands of dollars at upscale clothing stores in a matter of days, using other people's money. Or at least who can applaud folks who can do that, because they know those folks share their values. Which they may or may not, but at least they're against the liberals and the elite media.

Just as I don't believe people should vote against anyone BECAUSE of their race, I also don't BELIEVE people should vote for anyone because of their race. This election doesn't demonstrate that racism doesn't exist in this country. It demonstrates that the country has moved to the left on economic and social issues and that certain number of commentators felt that it showed how "tolerant" they are by supporting Barack Obama, a candidate who hasn't even served a full-term in the Senate. And space the Palin experience argument. The VP typically does very little and yes McCain is old but his mother is 96. It really is pretty classless the way many on the left treated: McCain, Bush, and Palin in this election.

It’s a testament to King’s vision that, in 2008, Obama ran a campaign that asked Americans to do just that.

But it was campaign dishonesty. He devoted twenty years to a church that opposed Dr. King's dream. I can't imagine anyone officially joining a church for two decades if one is opposed to that church's central theology.

Skin color - this is common mistake people make and it gets annoying - angst et al concerning another race is all about culture, not skin color - skin color only matters as a marker pointing to a culture which someone may be uncomfortable with - it's all about culture. MLK's sentiments were naive, as are yours referencing them Dan. Electing a black president is good optics for people who like to give fluffy speeches - but virtually meaningless otherwise.

Wright and the boys will be back in 2012 if Obama governs like the ultra liberal his past suggests. Whoever runs against him in 2012 will not make the same mistake McCain made. The whole point of raising Wright and the boys was or should have been about painting Obama as too liberal for America - that is still a valid charge until he proves it isn't.

Zathras:

The proper word for the folks you are describing is "trash", "white trash", "trailer trash", "no go to, no come from", "tacky people". Hillbilly is an epithet, along the lines the KKK would use to describe Obama.

A. M.'s "proper words" sound like epithets to me. I think he's being very insensitive, and elitist also.

I originally stopped by to say thanks for including a link to our Martin Luther King Jr. celebration.

But I decided to join in with conversation.

>The Democrats need to invest some thought to how they pick Senate candidates.

Its true that not everyone the Democratic party ran this time was great. But this year the call was for "more" Democrats in the Senate and House.

Now that we have done fairly well its on to 2010.
Where we will run "better" Democrats. And then on to 2012! With the best. :)

So don't worry about us. We're doing fine.

And thanks for the link too!

Z:

My words have the virtue of specificity. Yours libel a region. (Plus, there isn't a hill in Mississippi to be billy on.)

As for insensitivity -- only when I drink too much and fall asleep.

I was in California writing editorials in 1982 (still doing it)when Tom Bradley (black moderate Democratic mayor of LA) ran for governor and remember another factor other than race for his losing when the polls predicted he would win. There was a gun control measure on the ballot (I've forgotten the details) which the polls also showed to be trailing, but the pro-gun people came out and while they were at it voted against Bradley. Jerry Brown was also running for Senate that same year and lost after leading in the polls. There may have been a tiny race effect, but I suspect the Bradley Effect has been a myth all along.

"I’m hopeful that after this week, the names Bill Ayers, Jeremiah Wright, and Tony Rezko will never be uttered on news shows ever again. "

If Patrick Fitzgerald has anything to say, you will hear a lot about Tony Rezko... Alexi Ginnoulias.. Richard Daley.. Rod Blagojevich.. this list is actually pretty long.

Ayers and Wright can get themselves back into attention when ever they want to.

But our tanning bed media will make sure that anything that shows the true nature of Obama's associates, friends and allies will never see the light of day.

Because,as some one said - "show me your friends and i will tell you who you are" is something that is very very difficult for the MSM to apply to Obama.