Kasi asked me this last night in the comments:
Fred. Now that… it is all over and done.
How do you take the result? Will that be the post for tom'row?
So I will take a shot at answering that question.
I take the result of yesterday's election as a sign that the demographics of the United States are changing and changing fast. The Latino vote in Florida, Colorado, New Mexico, and Nevada has changed those states from red to blue and maybe permanently.
I also agree with Nate Silver that the President's bailout of the auto industry in 2009 was a huge bet that paid off bigtime yesterday. The blue that ran from Pennsylvania to Wisconsin in the electoral map last night was a sign that the industrial midwest is more comfortable with the President than the private equity guy.
And finally, I think that the war on women that the GOP has been waging for years must stop if they want to be relevant again. It is not OK to include legitimate and rape in the same phrase and it never will be.
But where do we go from here?
The House is in full control of the Republicans and the Tea Party. They will continue the obstructionist politics that have been the dominant theme in Washington for the past four years. But Mitch McConnell's goal of using those obstructionist politics to deny the President another term did not work and probably cost his party a lot of goodwill in the end. He was the big loser last night as his chance at majority leader was slapped back hard. That was nice to see.
I am hopeful we will get the grand bargain on deficit reduction that repeals the Bush tax cuts along with $4.5 trillion in spending cuts. We have to have that deal. Our deficits are killing us and our economy. I know this community is full of folks who think you can't tax your way out of ecoonomic problems. But our country enjoyed a great economic run in the Clinton years and repealing the Bush tax cuts will simply take us back to the tax regime that was in place in those years. I hope and pray we can get that grand bargain done now that the President has been given four more years.
The other thing that yesterday's election makes perfectly clear is the rising power of the Hispanic community in our country. Their signature issue is immigration reform. So hopefully we will get relief on that issue now. The idea that we can and should close our borders to those who want to work hard and make a better life for their families is abhorrent to me. It is downright unamerican. We need to open our borders to those who want to be hard working citizens of our country and we need to legalize those who have been working hard and acting like good citizens in this country for years.
The economy is on the mend. The recovery is the slowest we have had after a recession in many many years. My partner Albert is doing a series of posts on why that is. I highly recommend them. Our economy will continue to expand in the coming years if we take control of the deficit and stop piling debt on top of our economy. We can bring manufacturing jobs back to the US. We can bring service jobs back to the US. We can build on the entrepreneurial spirit of our country and we can compete on a global scale if we just put our heads down and work at it. And it would be best to do that together.
My favorite image of the entire campaign is the one of Gov Chris Christie and the President touring the ravaged Jersey shore together. That was dropping our differences and coming together in a time of need. We must have more of that in America. And after last night, I hope and pray that we will.
