Donald is gone...

Why did Donald Rumsfeld wait until now to resign? Why not do so 6 months ago? Perhaps he and Bush want it to appear as if they are in control and his leaving was not due to criticism from Republicans and Democrats. But had he left earlier, it might have saved several seats in Congress.

Well, the voters have spoken in yesterday's midterm election. It looks like the Democrats will control the house by a 232-203 margin and will control the Senate by a 51-49 margin. There were some surprising upsets as well as some races where an upset appeared likely and the incumbent held on.

I calculated these numbers assuming that the candidate currently with the most votes will win. CNN still has not called 11 races yet. I think 7 of those are callable, but I will admit that these 4 are still very close....
Connecticut 2 - Courtney (D) leads incumbent Simmons (R) by about 170 votes.
North Carolina 8 - Hayes (R) leads his opponent by about 450 votes.
Wyoming 1 - Cubin (R) leads her opponent by about 900 votes.
Pennsylvania 8 - Murphy (D) leads incumbent Fitzpatrick (R) by about 1,500 votes.

At this time, it looks like the GOP will win OH-2 Schmidt (+2,300), WA-8 Reichert (+2,700), PA-6 Gerlach (+3,000), OH-15 Pryce (+11,300), and TX-23 where Congressman Bonilla faces a December runoff. He received 48% yesterday. I think Democrats will win GA-12 Barrow (+3,300) and the winner of LA-2's runoff in December. Scandal-plagued William Jefferson received the most votes yesterday, but it will be interesting to see if he can survive the runoff.

Other interesting news....in Michigan, voters approved restrictions on affirmative action, basically reversing the Supreme Court's 2003 ruling. And in Arizona...voters rejected a ban on gay marriage (the first state to do so), while making English the official language in its state. The funniest of all ballot initiatives? Arizona proposed giving a random voter $1 million for voting in future elections. That failed.


I hope to comment more later when I have time.