And that is a very good thing as the long forged tradition of keeping the familiar around just because of familiarity might finally being shown the door, and the easy access to information web technology and 24 hour news cycles has produced, has been a big help.
Leadership on important public issues is specifically what the public wants and voting around that basic want is to be earnestly desired.
Looks like a good night for everyone.
An excerpt.
Editorial: A call for change
Voters to House Democrats: Get to work
- Published 12:00 am PST Wednesday, November 8, 2006
In an era when House incumbents get re-elected at rates of 98 percent, voters Tuesday dramatically changed the dynamic. Voters defeated enough incumbents to hand the reins of power in the House of Representatives to Democrats. (The outcome in the Senate was still undecided as of this writing.) Most tellingly, the Republican Party failed to pick up a single House or Senate seat from the opposing Democratic Party. It was a devastating indictment of the party in power.
This election was about two things: corruption in the nation's capital and the war in Iraq. On Tuesday, voters said they want big changes on both fronts.
For the new Democratic majority in the House, this means setting two major priorities.
Lesson No. 1 is that the Democratic leadership must purge the House of corruption. They literally have to clean House. Their top priority has to be to end the unsavory connections between lobbyists providing a torrential stream of things of value to members of Congress, their spouses and staff in pursuit of official acts and influence. The new majority in the House doesn't need the cooperation of President Bush or the Senate to do that. The House can and should act on its own.
On Iraq, of course, the House cannot solve things on its own and will have to avoid the temptation to grandstand, making symbolic gestures that get the country nowhere. A major reason we're in the current mess is because of the near total disappearance of congressional oversight of the executive branch. Congress has been supine. Bush is unlikely to change course -- it's not his style. But the House can hold the executive branch accountable. Voters have made it clear they want no more blind deference to the president.
