1.) GOP young guns float into office on river of John Boehner’s tears — “Across the country right now, we are witnessing a repudiation of Washington, a repudiation of Big Government, and a repudiation of politicians who refuse to listen to the people,” said Rep. John Boehner at a Tuesday night election party. That’s something you can say, of course, when your party flips an unprecedented number of seats in a midterm election. “The GOP House gains were the biggest swing for either party since 1948, when Democrats gained 75 seats on the back of President Truman’s campaign against a “do-nothing” GOP Congress,” writes The Daily Caller’s Jon Ward. The new numbers, according to Ward: “The House currently has 255 Democrats and 178 Republicans. The new reality will be a Republican majority of more than 240, and a Democratic minority below 190.” Will this be the last time Boehner cries in public? Let’s hope so! House Speakers don’t cry.
2.) Reid, Boxer, Murkowski emerge from the wreckage of their lives only mildly scathed — Thanks to the fine folks at Harrah’s Casino, with whom a Reid staffer coordinated a possibly illegal effort to force Harrah’s union employees to vote for Reid, the Democrat’s still have their Senate majority leader. Thanks to the bumbling of Joe Miller–from manhandling an obnoxious reporter to abusing his lawyer-man privileges in a past life–Sen. Lisa Murkowski is leading with a write-in bid (and yes: all of Alaska will probably die of old age and homeless polar bear attacks before anyone knows anything for sure). And thanks to the fact that California is full of socialist dweebs, Barbara Boxer’s disembodied head beat former HP CEO Carly Fiorina. Excuse us: Senator Barbara Boxer’s disembodied head.
3.) Tea Party fails to T-P the Senate — Kentucky’s Rand Paul won his race to be a thorn in Mitch McConnell’s side and Florida’s Marco Rubio has emerged victorious from a really messy three-way with Gov. Charlie Crist and Bill Clinton-assault survivor Kendrick Meek. But the other Tea Party Senate candidates that the traditional media spent so much time covering? They didn’t fare so well. “When the blame game begins over why Republicans lost several Senate seats they probably should have won, expect the Tea Party Express to receive its fair share,” reports TheDC’s Alex Pappas. “The California-based PAC earlier this year pulled off remarkable feats — and made a name for themselves in the process— by helping Nevada’s Sharron Angle, Alaska’s Joe Miller and Delaware’s Christine O’Donnell win their primaries. If Republicans win in the still undecided races in Colorado and Alaska, Republicans will hold 48 seats in the Senate. So it’s hard not to think that had the Tea Party Express not helped Angle and O’Donnell, the GOP would’ve come closer to that majority.”
4.) Nancy Pelosi waves white flag — Just eight months after former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi told a California crowd that Republicans have nothing to sell the American people but fear, the most hated woman in Washington wants to make nice. “The outcome of the election does not diminish the work we have done for the American people,” Pelosi said in a statement released Wednesday. “We must all strive to find common ground to support the middle class, create jobs, reduce the deficit and move our nation forward.” Being back in the minority will no doubt take some getting used to for the former speaker. Step one: Stop using the word “must.” Just as coffee is for closers, imperative sentences are for winners.
5.) Obamacare sycophant loses to Taliban candidate — After calling GOP challenger Dan Webster a Taliban-sympathizer and declaring during the health-care debate that Republicans want old people to die quickly, Democratic Rep. Alan Grayson is out on his ass. According to the Polk County Ledger, “Grayson’s brash defense of liberal policies and harsh criticism of the opposition put him in the national limelight. It also made him a favorite of Democrats, who showered him with cash, and anathema to Republicans.” But Grayson wasn’t the only once-safe Obamacare nutter to go home, hat in hand. Just four days after a visit from Pres. Obama, Virginia Democrat Tom Perriello also lost his job robbing taxpayers.
6.) Potheads do some crying of their own — Rep. John Boehner was not the only person who cried last night. In Arizona, South Dakota, Oregon, and California, marijuana reformers sparked, then cried, as the residents of the aforementioned states made it clear that they are not quite ready to scale back the war on fun. On the bright side, not every referendum everywhere was a reminder that freedom is just a word. In Arizona, for instance, voters did away with affirmative action: “Arizona voters on Tuesday approved Proposition 107 to ban the consideration of race, ethnicity or gender by units of state government, including public colleges and universities,” reports Inside Higher Ed. “With 2,075 of 2,239 precincts reporting as of early Wednesday morning, unofficial results from the state had the measure passing with just under 60 percent support.”
VIDEO: Bachmann asks Chris Matthews about the tingle in his leg
