Adios, Senator Macaca!

The dust has settled from the 2006 mid-term elections, and the Democrats have control of both houses of Congress, as George Allen conceded the Virginia senatorial election to his opponent James Webb yesterday. The freefall by Allen was quite shocking, given that earlier this year he was on a short list of favorites for the 2008 Republican presidential nomination, and now he is in the political wilderness. His fall, and the Republicans loss of the Senate, can be traced to one moment--when Allen spotted a Webb operative at one of his rallies, an operative who happened to a dark-skinned man of Indian heritage, and called him "macaca." Such are the vagaries of history.

Allen, it should be pointed out, has a history of racial insensitivity. Several of his ex-teammates from the University of Virginia football team have said that Allen was a frequent user of the "N" word, and Allen has not hidden a bizarre fascination with the Confederate flag. He saw himself as an heir to the George W. Bush mantle--the good 'ol boy who wasn't too bright but was a natural at campaign events like picnics, where he could show off his cowboy boots and football skills. Hopefully the pendulum will swing the other way and Americans will actually want someone with above average intelligence to occupy the White House.

It's also been interesting to read the Republican reaction to this bloodbath. Of course there is a lot spin. Ann Coulter has dug into the numbers and says that since this isn't as big a loss for Republicans as some of the mid-term elections during the Roosevelt and Clinton presidencies, then Americans really must be for the war. Others have pointed out that many of the Democrats are conservative, which is real denial. Some of them may be against gun control, and a few are pro-life, but they are a lot better than those they replaced. The most consistent statement seems to be that this Republican majority wasn't true to conservatism, and this will be a wakeup call to the party. I think this is a truer-to-the-mark attitude, for this Congress did inflate the government and spending(best typied by Ted Stevens pushing for a 220 million dollar bridge in Alaska that would be used by fewer than 100 people). We Democrats should keep an eye on Republicans now--they will head up into the hills and regroup, and come back with zealous fire in their eyes.

As for what the Democrats should do, one thing they should not do is talk about impeachment. Look, no one would like to see Bush and Cheney on a chain gang breaking rocks more than me, but it would be a mistake to take this course, and Nancy Pelosi is right to say it is off the table. The mistake the Republicans made after the 1994 revolution was to go too far, culminating in the bizarre and wasteful attempt to remove Bill Clinton from office because of a blowjob. The Democrats should let W. wither on the vine, and go about making lives better for Americans, and concentrating on taking the White House in '08.