An election lost, but not won

There are several points I'd like to cover about yesterday's election, so I'll try to be as concise as I can...

• On the issue of voter fraud, the Democrats are surprisingly silent. Prior to the election we found that, despite their rhetoric about the Iraq war, the Democrats are in favor of the pre-emptive strike. Democratic pundits and politicians were setting the stage to dispute election results in the event that they lost the elections. Now that they've won, there is no talk about election fraud from the Democrats, despite the fact that Acorn, a liberal activist group is currently under investigation for committing voter fraud in several states. As radio talk-show host Michael Graham so eloquently put it, the Democratic position on voter fraud is, "either we win, or you cheated."

• My honest analysis of this election is that while the Republicans lost, the Democrats didn't win. I know how emptily partisan that sounds, but let me explain. Conservatives have been upset with the Republican party for some time due to their refusal to stand strongly for conservative issues and values. Liberals are trying to spin this election as a referendum on the Iraq war, but if you look at the Democrats who took seats from Republicans in Congress, it's easy to see that this just isn't true. The Democrats who won have more in common with Joe Liberman or Zel Miller than with Nancy Pelosi or Chuck Schumer. They are moderate Democrats who won because of their conservative values. They may not be totally conservative, but they're not flaming liberals, either. If this truly were a referendum on Iraq, Cindy Sheehan would be the new Speaker of the House.

• Much of the campaign was run on the basis of lies and half-truth, whether it be the Michael J. Fox stem-cell adds, Missouri's Amendment 2, or even the Democrats' attempts to run against George W. Bush (despite the fact that Bush wasn't running). Some of the worst political adds I heard came from an incumbent candidate for the State Assembly here in California, where she basically lied about her opponent and said that he could not be trusted. Other examples were shenanigans like this shameful add, again running against Bush, this time telling people to vote against two ballot measures that had nothing to do with President Bush.

• All in all, while the Republian party lost, this election is not a loss for the conservative movement. Conservative ballot measures showed great success across America - not so much here in California, but so much of politics here is controlled by liberal unions and liberal population centers like San Francisco and Los Angeles that it's no surprise. The Democratic candidates that won were conservative Democrats, and the margins in Congress are so slim that this is hardly the "mandate" that Nancy Pelosi was hoping for.

• For years now, the Democrats have been running a "tabula raza" campaign - a blank slate. Time after time after time the Democrats have been challenged to define a platform, whether it be a strategy to win the war in Iraq (the best we've gotten is "strategic redeployment"), a strategy to get health care to those who don't have it (to which they reply "it needs to be done), a strategy to secure the border (race card, anyone?), or a strategy to fix social security ("There's no problem! I don't care what I said under Clinton, it's fine!"). Meanwhile, they continually hammered the Republicans with lies, accusations, and scandals. All in all, a good strategy to win one election, but it won't help the Democrats to sustain power

All in all, this is not the end of the world for Republicans, and it is especially not the end for conservatives. The Democrats have won the majority in the House; they will likely win the majority in the Senate by a very slim margin. My prediction is that in the next two years the Democrats will show their true nature to the American people, and it will be roundly rejected in 2008. This is also a monumental opportunity for Republicans to stand up for conservative values and show the people of America that conservative values are infinitely superior to liberalism. If the Republican party uses this event wisely, they will in 2008 win the mandate that the Democrats were hoping for in this election.