On a fundamental level, voters -- particularly those of the middle class -- who are pro-Bush tax cuts for the rich but anti-organized labor; who favor an unregulated, OSHA-less free-market but are against qualified support for the trial bar; or who endear themselves to the U.S. constitution but want the government to shut down the ACLU, are essentially voters in opposition to their own self-interest. Yet, these are among the mindless array of faux populist ideals held sacred and pushed hard by many candidates who eventually attracted enough support among women,independents, and grassroots conservatives to not only earn some a spot in the general election, but a victory as well.
Progressives in congress and elsewhere are now tasked with the stupefying challenge of working with, if not around these proponents who now hold state governorships and seats in Congress. For better or, most likely, for worse, Americans have just given an electoral thumbs-up to a political philosophy that appears contemptuous of any reality that has the potential to offset that philosophy's narrow, corrosive, and regressive view of how the world works.
Those who found success this November 2 running under such an audaciously primal philosophical banner pulled it off in part by successfully appealing to an unenlightened base of Americans for whom the social status quo has by-and-large remained motionless since the mid-1950s. It's the pleasant delusion that justifies their refusal to accept the forward-moving, evolutionary features of any contemporary society, and the alleviating fantasy that stands as a bulwark against changes in demographics and social mores that have materialized in America over the past half-century. These changes include a new enlightenment that helped produce this country's first African-American president, but which in turn, has sparked the thoughtless emotion fueling a movement among the less-enlightened to "take back our country."
Well, wherever it is they intend to take it, as of November 2, they are nearly half-way there.
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