I Haven’t Heard The Fat Lady

As the 2010 election gets closer and closer, it seems like everyone is trying to figure what the results will be and who's going to win where. The story lines are great too. The Tea Party is two steps away from taking over the Republican Party (they're already old and have party in their name), Robert Gibbs' media flaps, Momma Bear Sarah Palin, and President Obama's approval ratings. And with all that, the election is still up in the air.

It shouldn't come as a surprise to Democrats that the party without an agenda seems to have better winning odds. Finding holes or problems with policy ideas are easy. No policy is perfect and in today's twenty-four hour media, blogs (except for this one), and Twitter, it's easy to get as much bad information as much as there is good. But then you have to ask yourself, how many people realize the amount of money that will be saved by the new health care law ($143 billion), that the government actually made money from the TARP program ($201 billion), and we don't even know how many more jobs would have been lost if not for the auto bailout which all recently reported strong earnings. Governing is hard, and even though the Democrats did a good job communicating during the campaign, it's hard to juggle the two acts at once.

There are economists who fear deflation, and the unemployment rate is still staggeringly high (9.5%), but there are no actual facts that can be used to blame President Obama or the Democrats to say they have made it worse.

The Democrats should be touting their victories while they campaign, and Obama is finally doing so. The latest Third Way poll shows that the American people don't want to go back to the policies of the past. Even with all the craziness out there, I still believe that (especially since we are in such troubled times) people pay attention. The American people want answers, and the Democrats have legitimate evidence to show their policies have been working. So let the Republicans have no agenda, let them try and say things are worse from when they were in charge, and while doing so, ask what they would have done differently.

The only way the Republicans can actually claim victory is if they take over one of the Houses in Congress. But according to Real Clear Politics, both are still very much in play. I haven't heard the fat lady sing yet, and neither should you.