Control of Congress in sight for Democrats

What with the recent scandals, the "Civil Quagmire" in Iraq, high energy prices, and simple boredom with the status quo, it actually looks like the Democrats are within striking distance of taking control of Congress next month. Public sentiment could still turn on a dime and depends on the "Looney Left" wing of the party (including Howard and Ned and the anti-war movement) keeping their mouths shut so that the moderate centrists can "close the deal" over the next month. This election truly does appear to be the Democrats' to lose. Alas, I don't have great confidence that the Looney Left will keep quiet and refrain from shooting the party in both feet as they usually do.

The bad news is that even if the Democrats capture technical majorities in both the House and Senate, that won't be true control of Congress since anything less than a two-thirds majority won't be veto-proof and not all "Democrats" can be counted to stick with the party line.

Still, even a thin margin win will effectively allow the Democrats to veto "extremist" legislation and executive decisions. Unfortunately, not all executive decisions require a review by Congress.

My hope is that the Democrats get either a narrow win or a narrow loss and I personally don't care which, since either will require the Republicans to "deal" with the Democrats rather than simply ramrodding legislation to the President's desk without hardly even consulting the other side. A narrow win would require the Democrats to "cooperate" with moderate Republicans in order to veto-proof votes, and that would be a very good thing as well.

Go Centrists!

... and Independents too!

-- Jack Krupansky