The filibuster-proof Democratic majority -- always a chimera anyway -- is gone, and gone for good. Why it happened will be debated endlessly, and mostly uselessly, until the next election plasters yet another narrative on the wall.
Obama betrayed his liberal base and tried to govern from the right; he got what's coming to him. That's the left's story.
Obama promised bipartisanship and tried to govern like a socialist; he got what's coming to him. That's the right's story.
I think we're a pack of fickle children with hurt feelings because our puppy love didn't work out the way we'd hoped. That's my story.
It's been a whole year! Where is that prom dress he promised me? I hate him, hate him, hate him!
The people are angry; I've heard that so much I'm getting angry myself. Mostly at the people.
I wasn't surprised when Virginia turned right. New Jersey is New Jersey, "nuff said. But Tuesday night Massachusetts, home of the Kennedys, Harvard, and universal health care -- the birthplace of democracy and the Massachusetts Liberal -- went red in a big way.
That's not a political choice, that's going against nature. Electing a dude who shares basically none of your values, beliefs or interests, to express your anger -- that's quite the hissy fit.
You know who must be angry now? The predominantly African American voters of Washington DC. It has to be infuriating to see your champion dissed this hard, this fast. Which, by current political logic, means their next mayor will be the Grand High Imperial Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan.
Yes, I'm blaming the victim here. Sue me. I've blamed the right wing and their fellow backward travelers plenty. But they don't listen. They want us -- and by us I mean anyone on the liberal, progressive, or even rational side of the spectrum -- to fail. They relish both my complaints and yours, because that makes them feel noticed, and when they are noticed they can win.
The American people are going to get what they deserve. That's the bottom line. If they think -- one year into a new administration -- that the change they crave is going to come from changing back to the party of the Big Fail that dug this ditch, then maybe King George the Third was right. We're not ready for self-government.
Oh sure, Congress deserves some of the blame. They spent most of a year coming up with a heath care proposal that nobody likes. But the merits of that bill aren't the big problem.
Making law is like making sausage, they say over and over again, as if that's supposed to make us feel better about the ugly process.
But the Congressional Democrats have forgotten why you make sausage in the first place -- so you will have something to eat. Give the people a nice, fat Brat of health care and they just might forgive you for being so skank ugly.
Or not. Maybe the problem is us.
Keep it up, my fellow Americans. The vultures are circling. One just swept down and dragged away another carcass in Massachusetts. Soon the dreaded Obama administration will be swept away, its transgressions to its progressive base will be paid back in full with its demise.
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