The Votes Are In

Turnout for today's elections was light, as it usually is in odd–numbered years. And I know that polls close at different times in each state. But the results seem to be coming in at a frustratingly slow pace.

• I've been watching the election returns, and I've heard a lot of theories about what has happened in Virginia. There will be theories about New Jersey and New York, too, I'm sure, but, at this point, Virginia is the only place where today's election results are known.
  
  Some people have spoken of the Democrats' inability to bring young and minority voters to the polls without Barack Obama on the ballot, and I think that may be a factor, but I think it is more likely to be a problem next year.
  
  Most people seem to agree that this election is not a referendum on Obama's presidency. Nevertheless, I have heard some saying the results represent an anti–incumbent mood. That's a tougher case to make, as far as I am concerned, at least in Virginia. State law bars the incumbent from seeking a second consecutive term, and he seems to be personally popular, but his popularity doesn't seem to be transferring easily to the Democratic standard bearer.
  
  The Republican's triumph doesn't seem to be connected to any sort of anti–incumbent mood in Virginia.
  
  My suspicion is that it has much more to do with what I believe to be the real historical trend. The party that has won the White House has lost the governor's office the next year ever since the Carter presidency, as I wrote in May.


• But an anti–incumbent mood may well have played a role in New Jersey; if the projection that was just made a few minutes ago by CNN holds up, the Republicans are going to win the governor's office there. And the Democratic incumbent is on the ballot — so it is plausible to conclude that this is a referendum on his performance in office.
  
  For that matter, the outcome in New Jersey could be seen as, if not a referendum on Obama, certainly an early temperature reading. And there may be some findings Obama would do well to heed.


• But the White House says Obama isn't watching the election returns. It will say that he is "watching the game." It won't positively confirm which game. Football? Can't be the NFL, unless he's watching a recording of the Falcons–Saints game from last night. ESPN2 is showing a college game, but do you suppose Obama is really more interested in the Bowling Green–Buffalo game than the outcome of the New Jersey election? He was campaigning in New Jersey last week. He had some interest in it then.
  
  Baseball? Can't be. Today is a travel day in the World Series.
  
  I suppose he could be watching the NBA, as some of his aides speculate, but that season is just getting started, and the NBA will still be playing in April. Over the next three years, Obama will have to work with the New Jersey governor, in one way or another, because of the economic difficulties with which the state is being forced to contend.
  
  So I find it hard to accept that he is paying no attention to the election returns tonight or that an NBA game has his attention instead.


• I think 2010 probably will be the real backlash election. The hurdles facing the president and his party seem clear. Obama won't be on the ballot. And he risks alienating some supporters by actively trying to transfer some of his star power to incumbents who may be in trouble, like Chris Dodd and Harry Reid. But he is the leader of the party, and his personal appeal was responsible for attracting many voters who belong to demographic groups that are not normally electorally active. It will be a challenge to get them to return to the polls. Many are ignorant about the way things work and somehow got the idea that a single election could be eternally binding, whereas the folks from the opposition party already are motivated — as they usually are.
  
  Nothing gets a politician's attention like election returns — normally, unless one happens to be the president and thinks that, in some way, he is above such things. But I doubt there is any truth to that tale about his election night activities. And one can sense something of a sea change already occurring within the ranks. Democrats already are making noises about delaying action on health care reform until next year — if not sometime after the midterm elections.
  
  The window of opportunity for Obama and the Democrats to get some things done in the first half of his term seems to be slamming shut.
  
  Perhaps some of the Democrats who were on Capitol Hill in the first years of the Clinton presidency now remember the beating the party took when it emphasized health care reform over job creation and, perhaps belatedly, want to take steps that can avoid a repeat of that experience.
  
  Based on what I'm seeing tonight, I think the battle next year will be won and lost with independent voters. Since independents seem to favor a progressive social agenda, that might be a good place to start in the campaign for their allegiance. On the surface, it looks like more of a reach for Republicans than it is for Democrats.


• A couple of social issues were on the ballot in Maine, though, and supporters of both are leading with just under 30% of the vote counted. About 51% of the voters are endorsing the law that was approved by the legislators and signed by the governor allowing same–sex marriage. And more than three–fifths of voters support expanding the list of conditions that could be treated with medical marijuana.
  
  Once a reliably Republican state in presidential elections, Maine has shifted toward Democrats in recent decades, but it is represented in the Senate by what may be the last Republican moderates — Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins. Neither will face the voters in 2010 so it does retain some of its political roots. But the Republican Party that is admired in Maine has more in common with Abe Lincoln than Newt Gingrich.
  
  For many years, though, Maine had a reputation for recognizing emerging social issues. "As Maine goes, so goes the nation," the saying went. The saying originally referred to Maine's tendency to be on the winning side in presidential contests, but it also has been a political barometer for social issues. The present political climate may be giving it the opportunity to reclaim that role.
  
  But there, as elsewhere, the returns tonight seem to be driven by independent voters.
  
  Neither party is in the position of claiming a majority among self–identified voters in most states. The ones who call themselves independents typically hold the key to electoral success. To ignore what their votes can tell you is to court disaster.
  
  That may hold some cues for Obama, who has not been an advocate of either cause but may want to revise his position to curry favor with independent voters, many of whom supported him last year but seem to be abandoning his party in New Jersey and Virginia this year — and might abandon it in other places next year.

Well, that's just a thought. But the numbers in Virginia and New Jersey, compared to what we saw a year ago when Obama carried both states, are startling.

The battle of the 2010 midterms began in earnest tonight.