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Evening After, 2006
There is a lot being written and said about yesterday’s elections and what the next two years will bring. It doesn’t take a crystal ball to determine some of what the next few years will be like. Higher taxes.
With the Democrats in control of the House of Representatives, and the time I am writing this piece, possibly the Senate as well, many Americans are asking themselves, "what happened?"
Good question. Lot’s of speculation out there, some of which I agree with.
The Democrats ran on the platform of "hate Bush," which resonates well with the hard-left (Coleen Rowley, Nancy Pelosi, Cindy Sheehan, Michael Moore crowd). They didn’t field candidates willing to share their ideas on a number of issues, from winning the War in Iraq (and the Global War on Terror), to reforming and salvaging the Social Security System. Okay, some did say they wanted to raise our taxes.
Republicans used fear, their mantra: "Think what will happen with Nancy Pelosi as speaker of the House!" Looks like we’re going to find out. And many tried to distance them from President Bush and the War in Iraq. End result: power shift on Capitol Hill.
In Minnesota, it looks as though Mark Kennedy’s campaign was poorly handled, as it focused on the shortcomings of his opponent, Amy Klobuchar, and not focusing enough on what Kennedy will do as a Senator. End result: Klobuchar won the open seat hands-down. As I mentioned earlier, none of Kennedy’s radio spots did anything to inspire me to vote for him. Others I know, specifically in my Townhall Meetup group, felt the same way. Kennedy botched his run for the Senate. Maybe the Minnesota GOP would have been better supporting Harold Shudlick instead of Kennedy. 20/20 hindsight doesn’t help.
I have no idea what happened to Rick Santorum, one of the finest leaders in the U.S. Senate. It is interesting to note that several GOP incumbents to the House were also voted out of office.
At this point, it is still questionable whether or not George Allen will continue in the Senate, or if Virginia has truly elected Jim Webb to represent them instead.
There were also several uncontested seats that the Dems won because the GOP was a "no show" party. That didn’t help matters. Unless you wanted Pelosi as Speaker of the House, in which case it did.
What is in store for the future? A few easy predictions:
Higher taxes combined with increases in the minimum wage will result in greater unemployment and possibly a recession.
Abandon Iraq to civil war, al-Qaeda will view as a renewed sign of American weakness, and spur new attacks on America.
Iran will become a nuclear armed nation.
More and new gun control laws, combined with amnesty for illegal aliens, will spur an increased crime rate.
That’s just a start. It could be worse.
On the flip side, it looks like I will have plenty of inspiration to write.
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