There's a minor vestige of comfort to be found today by reading the spectrum of reactions to yesterday's election results. I'm fascinated and heartened by these "couldn't-have said-it-better-myself" outpourings that range from cautious optimism...

I would have wanted a Kerry victory no matter how small the margin, but there might be some long-term good from a second Bush term. The Democrats have an opportunity to learn from this defeat and come back stronger in 2008. A win this year would have been awesome, but maybe it was too much to expect. Maybe it's just meant to be a two-part, 8 year mission to take back our government and reverse the reactionary trend. I guess I would take a decisive, pivotal win in 2008 over a temporary reprieve in 2004. [comment by B2]

...to increasing anger...

A lot of commentary...is about how moral values was the most important issue to voters [Election Day] -- and of course moral values is really a gloss for gay marriage. I don't doubt that the issue was decisive -- in Ohio, for example -- but it's just not fair to say that it was the most important issue to voters. By presenting the war in Iraq and the war on terror as two separate issues, the polling data misses the point that there are two very different notions out there of how America's foreign policy should work. This was the most important issue to voters -- but it was an issue on which they split evenly. The poll hid that split on what's really one issue in two different categories.

MORE: This is really starting to piss me off, this idea that somehow there's a new cultural mandate because of the election results. Exit polls showed only about one fifth of voters felt that moral values were the most important issue in this election, and that's clearly a minority. Yes, it is likely that the presense of these voters (due to the ballot initiatives concerning gay marriage and/or the strong evangelical get out the vote effort) pushed the president over the top in Ohio and therefore won him the election. But that doesn't mean it was the most important issue to Americans in this election, and it sure as hell doesn't represent a statement of American will. [more by Paul at Locussolus]

...to sadness and fear for the future...

...And now I'm afraid. What will the consequences of this national disaster be? I keep hearing that the Christian Conservatives buoyed him into office -- but where will these people be when my daughters are denied equal rights because they are female? When gays and lesbians can't embrace their loves wholly? When other countries are looking at us the way we look at other countries run by idiotic religious fanatics?

Two Americas. Red America. Blue America. I have no understanding of Red America. How can we surrender to the loss of our precious rights? Today, I mourn.

Tomorrow, I fight. There is more than one kind of insurgency -- there is the kind that uses legal, safe ways to fight every little erosion of our rights. The kind that speaks up when public monies are used to fund religious charities. The kind that reminds everybody that there is more than one "Moral" vote -- and one values honesty, accountability, and basic humanity to other humans. The one that works for free speech -- even that offensive speech that embraces the deviant -- because we must remember that the definition of deviant is ever fluid, and means basically one in opposition to the status quo.

Because I have children, damn it. And if we surrender to Red America, and George Bush's crazy cronies, they will have no freedom. The Supreme Court appointments ... The Newly Conservative Congress... What future will they have? [continue reading "My Heart is Heavy" on EclecticEveryday]

...to calls for a paradigm shift...

Let me admit this right up front: this sucks. It's depressing. And it makes things harder for the immediate future.

The big mistake the Democrats, and most of the left, made was to believe that by winning elections we will change the country.

Just the opposite is true. It is only by changing the country that we will win elections.

We need to stop thinking in terms of winning elections, and start thinking about persuading more of the country to believe our ideas. If we do that, elections will follow.

What does that mean for the left? We still lack an effective left counterpart to the Heritage Foundation and the Fox News Network; by which I mean, we lack effective institutions dedicated not to pushing our candidates but instead to pushing our ideas. And that's killing us.

Some lefty blogger just sent me an email saying that we should say "We're preparing for 2006 and 2008 and 2010 and 2012 now." To which I say, stop thinking in terms of even-numbered years. We need to build institutions that change the way our society thinks, and if that program doesn't fit into a two-year electoral cycle, then throw away the cycle. [continue reading "Measure in Generations, Not Elections" by Ampersand on Alas, A Blog]

I'm feeling all of these things, and I thank the bloggers here and many others I hadn't mentioned for their passionate, articulate words.

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