Tuesday, November 07, 2006

Bloggin' the Mid-Terms


Very early on all cable news networks started claiming a Democratic landslide with victories in Senate and House races thus giving the “fighting” dems, as Nancy Pelosi calls ‘em, a majority in both congressional bodies . Well not Fox – they just look sad, but MSNBC talking heads start expounding on glittering generalities (one of my favorite alliterations) about why and what. CNN is looking for some magic number to put the Dems in the majority tonight. Hmmm – I wonder who’s side they’re on. This is around 7:00 PM PST.

Trying to kill time why they await more results, Chris Mathews floats a hypothesis about how the Republicans actually ran several black candidates but lost – “I guess that’s a failed strategy”. Someone points out that all of them ran against incumbents in a year that everyone is pissed at Republicans because of the war. It doesn’t really mean anything. Besides Harold Ford, a black democrat is losing also. Of course in that Tennessee race they blame race for the loss. In the Republican situations its because they are Republican.

Oh by the way, former Democrat Joe Lieberman of Connecticut wins as an Independent against the guy who beat him in the Democratic primary earlier this year! Guess who said he could win anyway as an Independent.

I always find it hilarious how a bunch of people can sit around and yak and come up with one-liners about why people voted. It’s not much different than your after football game sports talk. After a closely fought football game won on a last minute field goals set up by a fumble, the talking sports heads will go on and on explaining “keys of the game”. Finally someone will blurt out –“well it really came down to Bill Parcell’s aggressive game plan”. Yeah, I bet he really planned on winning on a last minute field goal.

CNN blurts out something similar. Paula Zahn looking like she’s at a Cinco de Mayo Fiesta in her red bolero dress says “It must because of the war”. Duh. But I’d like to pour her a margurita, por favor. After some more pandering about how wonderful the Democrats are someone on MSNBC says all of these early Democratic wins on this night all occurred in “blue” (Democratic) states and no one will know anything until the “red” (Republican) races come in. Most intelligent thing said all night.

Chris Mathews asks John McCain if Enron caused the potential Republican downfall. Wha? That’s right - and it would have been worse if Ken Lay hadn’t died. Chris Mathews says everyone hates conceding Senator Rick Santorum in Pennsylvania because he’s pro-life and against gay marriage. Someone finally says that most of America feels that way.

Basic election fact – in mid-term campaigns the controlling body and with usually its incumbent President always give up a number of seats to the opposing party – it’s commonplace for Congress to give up 20 seats either way. Remember the Republicans taking over during the Clinton years? It’s sort of normal – so this result is not shocking in the House. The Senate would be a bit different – but remember the GOP has Joe Lieberman as an Independent anyway.

MSNBC’s Keith Olbermann cannot believe his teleprompter when it still shows that Republican George Allen (son of former NFL coaching great George Allen) is still ahead in a tight race from the Senate in Virginia. He’s dismayed because the vaunted exit polls said that everyone is still against the war! How could this b e.

Oh god Hillary is on. I got to go throw up. Be back in a minute.

Hillary beat some guy named John Spencer. Waitaminute, wasn’t that the appealing character actor that was on the West Wing and LA Law? And died last year? No wonder she won. Hmm I wonder who that striking man is by her side at the podium? There’s a stain on his jacket. Hillary is wearing some yellow coat jacket number which makes her look like the Morton Salt Girl.

Keith Olberman still can’t believe that John Allen is still winning with 94% of the vote. What in blazes is going on here? Criss Mathews ask some Republican if they will ever win again in the Northeast. His inane questions are driving me batty. Let’s go to CNN.

CNN projects former Tennessee Vol and Washington Redskin QB blowout Heath Shuler as a winner in North Carolina as a fighting Dem. Man this is like SportsCenter! Unfortunately former Pittsburgh Steeler Lynn Swan loses in his Governor bid in Pennsylvania. CNN’s Anderson Cooper, you know of the 360, is interviewing three pundits who are standing at bar-like structure and they all have lap-tops in front of them. I guess they are all working on their fantasy football lineups during the slow times. Anderson Cooper’s mom is someone famous but I can’t remember right now. CNN runs a tagline that the Dems needs 8 seats to capture the House. Of course everyone knows they will capture the House. That’s a done deal.

Actually the big news of the night that keeps streaming along the bottom of the TV screen that Britney Spears has filed for divorce from that no-good scum K-Fed. I really can’t believe they haven’t broke in with a special report. Waitaminute Heath Shuler lobs a TD pass to Lynn Swan. Juggernauts win! Wow. George Allen must have had a great game plan.

Chris Mathews is stunned that incumbent Republican Senator John Kyl is projected to win in Arizona – almost a half hour after he projected the other guy to win. Keith Olberman is wearing a baby pink tie – in fact every MSNBC’er is wearing a peculiarly distinctively different solid color tie. It’s almost like they are playing Risk! with their ties during Election Night. “the Ukraine is weak, Newman!”. All networks project the Dems will take the House. Okay already, now tell us about Britney!

Ooops we did it again. About an hour ago everyone projected some white guy over black Republican Michael Steele in the Maryland Senate race even though now with 45% of the vote in Steel still leads. Now they’re trying to explain it. James Carville shouts down Anderson Cooper while he still talks on and on about Clinton. Anderson did a 360. Nice dome James. Back at MSNBC, Chris Mathews complements former Congressman Dick Gephardt at not being fat like other older politicians. “My lord when I saw Al Gore the other night I thought I was talking to the Hindenburg!” Let’s play some hardball.

CNN reports from the White House that Karl Rove had just called the President to tell him that the House is now under the control of the Democrats. Wha? Someone had to call him? All he had to do was to watch the friggin’ TV! That chick reporter said this was a colossal change for the White House. Wolf Blitzer said this a “major, major” development. Business talking head Lou Dobbs said this was a shocking sea of change. My god – it has been forecast before the goddamned football season started. For friggin’ Pete’s sakes. No one gives a shit about the House. Except for the fact that someone named Nancy Peolsi gets to shout out her extremely radial leftist krap all day long. She makes Hillary look good.

Now everyone has pulled back their projection of incumbent Democratic Senator over black Republican Michael Steele in Maryland. They are amazed that perhaps black voters in urban Baltimore may have voted for a Republican. Go Orioles. It is also fairly obvious now that Republicans are leading in closely contested and much talked about Senate races in Tennessee and Missouri but all networks don’t want to call them because that would be the end of their show – with the Senate still under Republican control. Boo hoo. I’m sure you realize that everyone on MSNBC and CNN are major Dems and want them to take control desperately. Their contempt for the latest results is written all over their carefully color coordinated ties.

Like I have said before I don’t watch Fox that much but I would have to say they are the more sober of the bunch – they are now even talking about how the Dems may take over the Senate (with some suddenly quick turning numbers) – the other two channels are tripping over their generalites and these guys are really talking turkey without much flag waiving. I’m pretty surprised. Its seems generally fair and balanced – and real. How refreshing.

Arizona voted on one of their Propositions to make English the State’s official language. How sad. MSNBC projects Ahnuld Schwarzenager to be reelected as governor of Califronia. Chris Mathews says it because of the huge nature of “celebrity”. That is amazingly so wrong. Ahnuld tried to change a bunch of stuff last year and got soundly defeated and as deft a politician as I have ever seen he swung back to the center, approved a hike in minimum wage, amongst other things and soundly defeated a guy who was well know to support every tax hike known to man.

Chris Mathews continues to misread graphics on the screen. Webb pulls ahead of Allen but he doesn’t know it. Keith and Chris are now getting excited. More blather about the wicked witch of the west Nancy Pelosi. David Schuster reports from Allen headquarters – he’s a pretty good reporter. But the MSNBC guys are abuzz – I mean its actually sort of exciting. I wonder if Heath Shuler can hang onto the ball.
Chris Mathews says George Bush’s only position as a lame duck President is to keep taxes low. He says this “only helps the rich”. What a myopic little prick. Keeping taxes low helps the entire economy!. After 9/11 Bush rushed into play tax cuts that kept an economy staggered by 9/11 – remember the airlines? – afloat. What political and economic nonsense. This man does not have an economic brain cell in his head. And he’s on fucking TV!

Finally, at 9:29 PST Tennessee is declared for the Republican Bob Corker. Chris Mathews is disappointed. He’s says they won’t project Corker…oh we will…we have all the votes…oh wait we don’t..well let’s see. It’s projected by MSNBC anyway but Mathews too busy pontificating he can’t believe it. Allen trails by 2,000 votes as he signs off at 12:30 AM EST. There is also talk about a disputed count. It will go into a recount. But it now doesn’t look good for Allen. I guess he didn’t have a good game plan.

It’s fairly sad that Chris Mathews keeps saying that black Senator candidate Harold Ford lost in Tennessee because he was black. Frankly, I like Harold Ford. I’ve seen him on TV before and he seems like a sharp guy to me – very candid – fairly in the middle – well spoken and on point – a true gentlemen if you ask me. But apparently he lost in Tennessee because he was black according to Mathews. I mean Gore couldn’t even win as a VP candidate in Tennessee. It’s not the color – it’s the party affiliation. And Ford came really close. He will do well somewhere else.

Hillary Clinton apparently spent $29 million to run for a pretty much uncontested seat. Unbelievable.

No one knows about the Senate yet. The Dems will have a tough time doing anything anyway with Bush waiting with his veto pen.

NO NEW TAXES!

1 Comments:

Blogger Jay said...

OK, I'm a little late with my comment. But, about Harold Ford. He didn't get beat because of race. Sure, race played a big part in that contest, but it isn't what did him in in the end.

The lesson Harold Ford needs to learn from this is "If you are going to go around the state of Tenn. (or just about any other state for that matter) quoting scripture and being "Mr. Morality" don't also be a regular at the Playboy Mansion. Especially if you're a Democrat. Republicans can usually get a pass on their immoral behavior (See: Giuliani, Rudi).

9:24 AM  

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