I had wanted to methodically work through the election, but that approach is proving elusive. I can't get my brain to work on it linearly. For the first time ever, I familiarized myself with all of the close national races, and then watched the results unfold on election night. There were only a handfull of close, competititve races, and with only a couple of exceptions, they all went the Republican's way.
The pundits, always looking for an excuse to prop up our feeble president, have ordained that Bush's campaigning made the difference. I find that hard to believe for a couple of reasons. First, the pundits, once they agree on a story, are almost always wrong. Second, during Bush's month of non-stop stumping, tracking showed national trends back and forth in these close races. Bush has the ability to rally those who already agree with him. But middle-of-the-roaders now know his policies are far to their right, and his paternalistic "I know best" attitude is not very persuasive.
Analyzing this election is especially hard, though, because the Voter News Service, while conducting exit polls, lacked the infrastructure to compile the results. By the time they are compiled, the news companies will be on to the next missing girl story. But something happened, on a national level, that tipped all those races in the Republican's favor.
In Minnesota, 20-25% of the voters said they were affected by the reports of the Wellstone memorial service. Wellstone's death was a national story, as was coverage of the service. I did not see the service, but the most trustworthy accounts indicate that there were only a scattering of boos (out of 20,000 people -- think well-attended basketball game) when Senator Trent Lott and Governor Jesse Ventura appeared on the Jumbotron, and that only one of the many speeches became a little partisan, although it fell short of actually naming any candidates outright.
Compare this to the reports of orchestrated boos, of shouting down conservatives who tried to speak, and of blatant electioneering. None of it is true, but that doesn't matter. What matters is the perception of the undecided voters. They were told the Democrats behaved badly, and it is not hard to believe that could have been enough to tip all the close races slightly in the Republican's favor.
We may never know if that theory is true. When the exit polling data finally comes in, my guess is that the Wellstone question probably wasn't asked outside of Minnesota. But it was the last big national political event prior to Election 2002. And coverage unanimously favored the Republicans. If so, then unilateral control of of our nation's government for the next two years was decided by opportunistic lies told in the wake of a great man's funeral. Just when I think the Republicans can't disgust me any further, they find a new way.
6:35:16 AM 
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