Ouch!

Despite campaign rhetoric that tried to paint the GOP as the enemy of minorities and women, despite a palpable bias in media coverage and reporting that continues to this day, despite the canard that the GOP "obstructed" the legislative process, a GOP wave election has occurred.

Bryan Preston summarizes:

The Republicans easily picked up the six U.S. Senate seats that they needed to take control. The GOP candidates picked up West Virginia, Iowa, Colorado, Arkansas, South Dakota, Montana and North Carolina. They needed six; that’s seven. And we don’t know what will happen yet in Louisiana and Alaska. The Republicans could take both. If they do, that exceeds even the most optimistic projections. I had it at +7 for weeks. They beat the spread.

The misery for Democrats by no means ends in the Senate. The Republicans increased their margin in the U.S. House by about 10 seats.

And they wrested three governorships away from Democrats in deep blue states. Republican Bruce Rauner defeated incumbent Democrat Pat Quinn in Illinois, 50-46. Martha Coakley turned in another dismal performance in Massachusetts, losing to Republican Charlie Baker. And in probably the most shocking result of the night, Maryland elected just its second Republican governor since the 1970s. Larry Hogan defeated Gov. Martin O’Malley’s chosen successor, easily, 52-46.

It goes without saying that Illinois, Massachusetts and Maryland are not generally considered to be battleground states. But now they are. The Republicans also held serve in Maine. Republicans came close to winning Senate seats in New Hampshire and Virginia.

Voters have convincingly repudiated the the last six years of Democrat control of the federal goverment—years when the president's worry about "climate change" seemed to trump any meaningful action on our economy or our foreign policy, years when Democrats rubber stamped a series of bad executive decisions and even worse proposals, years when Democrats looked the other way as scandal after scandal sullied the reputation of the executive branch and the government agencies it controls.

Ouch!

But there's no reason to applaud. Significant damage has been done—government has expanded unchecked, debt has grown without bound, taxes have risen mercilessly to feed the maw of big government, and our foreign policy is an unmitigated disaster.  The electorate sensed all of this and responded accordingly. That's a good thing, but it's nothing to celebrate.

Now it's time for the GOP to lead—to propose clear, simple legislation in the following areas: (1) the economy, (2) immigration reform, (3) heathcare reform (including major changes to Obamacare), energy, and maybe a few other things. They should reject the right-wing members of their party and work from the center to achieve results—that would be truly novel in the age of Obama.

I wish I could say that I believed that this president would be chastened by last night's election results, and like Bill Clinton in 1994, work in a bi-partisan manner with the GOP to get important things done. Unfortunately, Barack Obama is no Bill Clinton.

Obama may feign humility and may even say that he'll work with his opponents, but he has demonstrated repeatedly that his words do not dovetail with his actions. If Obama is combative and maintains his left-wing ideological stance, he should be forced to veto legislation that comes to his desk. If he is unreasonable or tries use presidential fiat to make major changes that should be legislative, the Democrats should work internally to moderate his extreme positions, criticize his unconstitutional actions, and if necessary join with the GOP to override his vetos and/or implement legislation that will improve the lot of this country.

Interestingly, it's time for the Democrats to rebuild their brand, but not with class warfare rhetoric, hysteria over a mythical "war on woman," or uncontrolled spending in an effort to buy votes from one or more segments of the electorate. For once, maybe they should actually try to work with the new majority party.

If they do not, if they continue to puppy dog this president, if they follow the most extreme left-wing elements of their party, their prospects for 2016 will be difficult indeed.