Podhoretz: Election about Dems Not GOP
John Podhoretz writes:
As the electoral wave ap proaches, pundits and news analysts have morphed into meteorologists, reading the complex undercurrents that will merge and swamp Democratic politicians nationwide on Tuesday. They're all concentrating on the Republicans.
One group says the motive force is a school of rich Republican sharks swimming together in secret even though everybody knows who they are. Another says a conservative sleeping giant has been roused like Poseidon from the depths to which it had fallen in despair in 2008. A third says disgruntled moderates are directing the tides, and so Tea Partiers better sit down and stop rocking the boat.
Pointless.
This election isn't about how much money Republicans raised (less than Democrats, actually, but still a huge amount). It's not about Tea Party activism, important though that populist force is proving to be. And it's not about how Republicans succeeded in appealing to moderates.
This is an election about Barack Obama. It's a referendum on him and his party.
It isn't about the Republicans. They're not being anointed.
Obama and the Democrats are being scourged.
In fact, in nearly every state where Democrats have succeeded in concentrating the public's attention on the GOP candidate, the Republican appears to be losing by a substantial margin -- Carl Paladino here, Linda McMahon in Connecticut, Christine O'Donnell in Delaware, Meg Whitman in California.
