Well, liberals and all other stripes of Bush Endurers breathed huge sighs of relief this week, as Obama and the Democrats cleaned house on Tuesday night.  The Electoral College was a cakewalk (349 to 163 as of this morning, with North Carolina likely going to Obama eventually), and the popular margin was almost eight million votes.  The Senate stands at 57-40 right now, and there's a slim chance that the Dems will add a seat or two beyond that; while the House will see its largest Democratic majority in 15 years.  Not a good night for the GOP.

There's been a lot of post-election dissection going on, obviously, but I haven't been paying much attention to it.  Pundits seem anxious to bury the old culture war-based Republican party, while the faithful right is grumbling about liberal media bias.  And Republicans are still unsure as to whether Sarah Palin lost the election for McCain or represents the bright future of the party. Since we've been enduring this kind of stuff for a couple years now, I'm honestly all politicked out at the moment.  I'm sure many people are in the same boat, just wanting to sit back and let the rosy glow of a coming Obama administration warm their cockles all through the holidays.

But we really should throw in our two cents here and do a quick post-mortem.  

As mentioned in earlier posts, McCain was just the wrong guy at the wrong time.  He ran a mediocre campaign, with major themes right out of the early 80s.  At times, it seemed as if he was banking that the public was unaware that his party had actually been in power for the previous decade.  Obviously, Obama ran a much better campaign: more disciplined, more boots on the ground, steadier, always on message, and much more eloquent.  Obama also proved the consummate tactician.  There was no staff infighting, no message drift, no overt sliding too far to the left (much to the dismay of progressives everywhere).  Was Obama triangulating and infuriatingly careful?  Absolutely.  Was that necessary to overcome the glaring challenges of race and inexperience?  Most certainly. 

For liberals, there are many things to hope for.  First, we obviously all wish health and safety to the President Elect.  Without doubt, there are a good number of angry/crazy folks out there contemplating violence against him.  Here's hoping that saner heads prevail, and we can get on with the business at hand.  A fair number of us are also considering the possibility that Obama is a Trojan Horse.  He ran a pragmatic, conservative campaign out of necessity; but now that he's in, he can unleash a more radical agenda, which will certainly be necessary in these tough times.

On the conservative side, there is obviously more soul searching to do. But let's be real.  With the economy in shambles, war in Iraq and Afghanistan dragging on, and with the Democratic candidate clearly outclassing his opponent in every conceivable way -- still, over 57 million people voted for McCain.  It may look like a rout in election terms, and it certainly was in Electoral College votes.  But the conservative message still resonated with a helluva lot of people.  Was a lot of that due to racism?  Sure, but not all of it -- and probably less than we might think.

The more interesting thing to me is whether or not the Republican party can really finance serious challenges on the Presidential level, using their old motifs.  As Thomas Frank pointed out in his seminal book "What's the Matter with Kansas?", the modern GOP has existed as an uneasy coalition of culture war rage and corporate elite financing.  In election cycle after election cycle, the Republican leadership promises to deliver the goods for which the Culture Warriors pine: outlawing abortion, banning gay marriage, returning prayer to schools, teaching creation science, etc.  But somehow, despite majorities in Congress, and occasional one-party rule for the GOP, the desires of the faithful are never quite fulfilled.  As Frank asked, how long will the culture war set tolerate being used by the GOP party elite?  How long before they just jump ship and stop voting Republican, maybe by moving to a third party or dropping out altogether?  

But more importantly in this election, maybe that culture war base just didn't have enough financial means to give the Republican a chance.  Obama made this race about money, and he had a lot of it.  McCain was struggling with cash from the beginning.  We all saw the video clips of abandoned McCain offices all across the country, even in swing states, while Obama's machine, flush with cash, powered on.  The cash-poor nature of McCain's campaign certainly added to its erratic, histrionic character.  After all, when you're out of money, you have to get attention in some other way that doesn't require buying ad time.  So you go for the sensational and irresponsible, and hope that the mainstream media runs with it and does your work for you (e.g., Bill Ayers). It didn't work, at least not well enough.  The big money was just not flowing to the GOP this time around, and there was not enough small money amongst the party's base to allow McCain to run on the same scale as Obama.  

So is the Republican Party done?  Of course not.  But if future Presidential campaigns follow the example set down by Obama, huge sums of cash driving massive ground-level machines, then the Republicans better find a way to better tap into the financial wells of more citizens.  There may be a healthy reservoir of conservative rage left out there, but if there aren't enough of those folks opening up their wallets and purses, then the political manifestation of that discontent will suffer.  This is what may drive the GOP to change their game plan: not ideology per se, but sheer financial pragmatism.