McDonnell wins in
Governors elect Bob McDonnell and Chris Christie have their work cut out for them. Not unlike Arnold Schwarzenegger, both will have a tough go of the reforms they campaigned on: both states have big fiscal and unemployment problems.
Policy aside, what do these races say about the national political landscape? They point to change, and a monumental one at that. Pundits on the right clearly marked these races as referendums on President Obama; pundits on the left say it isn’t about Obama or his policies, that all politics are local. Of course that might be true but so is the fact that the President stumped several times for Creigh Deeds and even appeared in a campaign commercial; while in New Jersey, the President’s voice went out election-eve to voters on robo-calls, though Press Secretary Gibbs said of the President on election day, "He's not watching returns."
The question one must ask oneself about these election results is why? Why did the voters of
Independents flocked to the GOP and away from tax-and-spend liberals. It’s that simple. Voters don’t want to pay more in taxes when unemployment is at a 10% national average. They don’t want
Both republican candidates kept their issues to the state’s best interest and contrasted it against the national background. Will this strategy work for congressional and senatorial republicans come 2010? That largely depends on two factors: if the democrats keep on their present tone-deaf agenda of raising taxes and creating new government bureaucracies and if the GOP can actually govern and lead, instead of just criticizing.
Candidate Obama promised a lot of things, campaigning as a slightly left-of-center moderate, but President Obama hasn’t delivered on those promises, governing as a left-of-left politician; and those are the lessons from New Jersey and Virginia – if you talk the talk, once you’re elected you better walk the walk.
-- The Editors, Killswitch Politick
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