Midday open thread

• The aftermath:

  It has now been about 36 hours since the most definitive victory for conservatism ever, yet according to my sources, Obama is still President, the Senate still has 60 Democrats, and the House gained a Democrat.

  I guess you have to live in the beltway or work for a cable network to truly understand election results.

  Or be David Broder.

• Keep this in mind as Mark Kirk runs to Sarah Palin:

  Keep in mind, the two Republican statewide candidates who won this week -- Christie in New Jersey and McDonnell and Virginia -- wanted nothing to do with Palin, while the high profile conservative candidate who embraced Palin -- Doug Hoffman in NY23 -- lost in a district that hadn't elected a Democrat since the 19th century.

• Republican Party's web guy getting his cues from Al Qaida. Also:

  His blog says he's a former talk radio host. And that he took the job, earlier this year, because "Speaker Pelosi, Majority Leader Reid and President Obama's professional political staff show alarming signs of being hard-core authoritarian elitists convinced of their own might, wisdom and infallibility and their Neitzchian [sic] belief that if I only gave my daughter over to The State she'd be better for it." I don't know what that means either, or what he thinks Nancy Pelosi and Nietzsche want to do to his daughter. But the animation of Michael Steele dancing, the decision to name the RNC chairman's blog 'What Up?' and the general strangeness on the site make more sense now.

• Politifact grades Michelle Bachmann's truthfullness. She's never gotten anything right. Literally.

  Of seven graded statements, she has three "false", and four "pants on fire".

• Former NY Gov. George Pataki thinks he's running for president. The teabaggers will eat him alive the way they ate Dede Scozzafava alive.
• Shocking evidence of media conspiracy to black out Michelle Bachmann's teabagger rally with 2.5 trillion attendees.
• Adam Bink, who spent a lot of time with the No on 1 effort up in Maine, has the first part of his post-mortem up. I noticed this as well, and it was very unfortunate:

  [W]orking in Portland running on no sleep on Monday, the following infuriated me:

  (a) A moneybomb for Alan Grayson was launched on Monday, the day before the election (yes, I'm aware OpenLeft participated). Not only was over $500,000 raised for it at the same time as we were frantically raising to counter an opposition media buy, it took up space on other blogs where others could have urged people to GOTV in Maine, and clogged inboxes while we were trying to ask for GOTV help in Maine. Folks will say that they also posted asks for Maine or other races, but they know full well people do not have time to read every single blog post or devote time or money towards every single e-mail blast, and this was not timed well.

  (b) Also on Monday, I got an e-mail from the DSCC asking me to give money to "support our Democratic majority". Last I checked, our Democratic majority is being voted on in 365 days. My election was the next day. Which is a higher priority?

  (c) Also on Monday, Organizing For America clogged my inbox on Monday with an e-mail titled "Remember" asking me to- get this- "share a brief story about your best memory of the final days of the campaign" in some sort of one-year anniversary celebration. This is the best use of activists' time and attention the day before an election?

  Neither of these cost us equality in Maine, but in the future, it'd be nice if allied organizations could focus on the election at hand on the eve of that election.

• And really, what the fuck is the DSCC doing begging for money to protect a majority that hasn't done shit? We're supposed to give to protect Joe Lieberman's ability to continue killing everything we stand for? Here's an idea -- pass good legislation, THEN ask for money to "protect the gains we've made". Right now, the DSCC and the Senate Dems can go fuck themselves -- a sentiment I will quickly and happily revise if and when they actually DO something good.
• Conservatives fess up -- the problem with America is that there's too much insurance.
• Atrios:

  Reading through the Hill article, these centrists are actually making the case that voters, in the Change election, actually elected them with the hopes that they would do nothing. Interesting way to see things.