Tim Kaine (D) is the next governor of Virginia. While Mark Warner won. Kaine will likely have to spend much of his time as governor continuing to focus his concerns on Southwest Virginia, and hope that in the next governor's race, the popularity of Democrats finally sticks.
Jon Corzine (D) is the next governor of New Jersey. Now, if Jersey Dems would stop being afraid of the ghost of Thomas Kean, Jr., and nominate Bob Mendendez for the Senate, that would be great. I mean, Richard Codey is a good guy, and frankly I would have just left him to stay as governor, since he seems to have high approval ratings because he started cleaning up the state's business, and it'd be nice to reward him with a Senate seat. So, while my personal preference is to see Mendendez in the Senate, I'll defer to the powers that be without much of a fuss.
Virginia Democrats had a net gain of one seat in the House of Delegates, and defeated a Republican with a Warner-endorsed independent, moving the House from 60-38-2 to 58-39-4. Budgeting will still require lots of bipartisan cooperation, but it will be a tad easier.
In California, all of the Schwarzenegger-backed ballot initatives are going down in flames. With only 30% of Alameda County and 14% of Los Angeles County reporting, all five initatives are below 50%. Those numbers will only get worse as the night wears on.
Referendum C passed in Colorado, allowing the state to return to reality-based budgeting.
Initiative 912 lost here in Washington, meaning we can afford to fix our creaky road system.
Closer to home, Dwight Pelz appears to be headed to a loss in his race for City Council.
Neither of the "blue-green" alliance candidates for Port Commission -- Jack Jolley and Lawrence Malloy -- won their races. Malloy's loss is particularly disheartening, considering he had the endorsement of everyone you might care about if you are a Democrat.
Texas passed a state constitutional amendment making gay marriage extra doubleplus illegal with hot fudge sauce (marriage was already defined as the union of one man and one woman before the amendment passed, but apparently that's not enough). Eventually they're going to run out of these lets-get-the-conservative-churchgoers-out-to-vote amendments, right? Right?
The Ugly:
Manchester, NH Mayor Bob Baines (D) lost, despite having help from three senators who are thinking about running for President: Evan Bayh, Joe Biden, and John Kerry all campaign for him. [okay, folks, I set it on a tee for you, go ahead with the wisecracks about how all of these guys are duller than a sack of bricks].
Tim Eyman is at it again, as initiative 900 passed, which will force the state to raise the sales tax to pay for performance audits, Eyman's latest pet rock.
And on that note, it's time to go to bed. On balance, it was a good night -- it could have been better, but all things considered most of the important races went very well.
