Well its the day after the election and as expected..well hoped..All the democrats in Mass won. We have our first female governor ever. Yes she's a open lesbian but that really none of my business. I don't care. I think what's more is she is our first female governor. All the usual people won with a majority unopposed...or barely opposed. Being a strong democratic state its not surprising. In RI Seth Magaziner won a hard fought victory keeping the seat from flipping. The slate of Democrats also did extremely well from the Governor on down.
The title of this was "Now what"...the picture will be a little clearer over the next few days as the last of the votes are counted. There apparently will be a runoff in Georgia for control of the Senate. Will we have coalition building and bi-partisanship? if our history is any clue the answer is NO. we will spend the next two years watching gridlock as nothing is done , legislation is blocked and brinkmanship will be the order of the day. It takes a solid majority to get anything substantial done.This has been true since the days of FDR and his alphabet agencies.
well its now 10 days after:..the Dems somehow held onto the senate while the Reps nudged over the finish line to gain a small majority. True to form they immediately forgot all the things they ran on and began to attack Joe Biden. I can fully expect NOTHING will get done in the next two years. The house blocks the senate, the senate blocks the house and if that fails Biden veto's knowing there are not enough of a majority to override. the perfect recipe for gridlock.
The only way our system works goes back to a Ted Kennedy analogy regarding a loaf of bread. The first time you introduce something new you ask for the loaf but settle for a slice. That gets your foot in the door so to speak. The next time you ask for a second slice then a third..If the idea is sound and successful, the trips back become easier. You may not end up with an entire loaf but there is enough to do good for our citizens which is and always should be the goal. We have forgotten that. The minority is a stop legislation at all costs scenario which gets us nowhere. Mcconnell stating on the day after the election in 2008 is a picture of this. "We will work to make Obama a one term president". This is a limited and frankly short sighted and dangerous philosophy since if you remember we were in the midst of a recession triggered by the previous republican president. They often do not have our best interests at heart.
