The Democrats have taken back the Congress. But Republican Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has won big in California, the largest Democratic stronghold in the nation. That bodes well for Barak Obama's bid for the White House.
Clearly, the country as a whole voted against the blunder of the Iraq war, Republican misrule, corruption and moral hypocrisy. Surely, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld will be dragged before sundry investigations and, ultimately, sacrificed by Bush to the new powershift.
But in California, the Republican governor enhanced his power by exploiting the wisdom of non-organized public opinion that all politicians are opportunists, the only question is which opportunity they take. Arnold drove his scaled-down Hummer right up the center of the road, which is where the resonant opportunities lie. His platform was ecologically progressive, socially liberal and fiscally conservative, fitting California to a tee.
The meaning of Arnold's victory in the midst of Republican debacle is that the public wants its leadership in the center.
This bodes well for Barak Obama, who is seen as a uniter, over Hillary, who, whether justified or not, is saddled with the baggage of the very partisan antipathy so demonstrably loathed by the public, if only because she was the overt symbol of the other side during the long years of disastrously incompetent one-party rule by Republican radicals. Hillary is fated with the label of "divider in chief."
The whole country wants to get over it and get back to the America we once knew. Shrill partisanship is passe. John McCain has tried to hedge his bets by circling Schwarzenegger, but this moth has had his wings badly singed by the implosion of Bush's Iraq policy, the solution to which, for him, is more troops! Not even Barney would buy that. So, not Hillary nor McCain. Barak Obama is the man.