Please add your own even if you don't agree.
Winners and Losers
Winner: George W. Bush
Pulling out a win despite what has been the most contentious election cycle in modern history. Bush pulled off an impressive win by carrying both the electoral vote and the popular vote, while simultaneously providing momentum to House and Senate races.
Winner: John F. Kerry
Kerry needs to be given credit for conceding a hard fought race with grace and touching emotion.
Winner: Karl Rove
Rove is the architect of the Presidents reelection and the Republican sweep of the Senate and House races. Although I'm not sure his idea of creating a 'perminate' Republican majority is possible with the States the GOP is strong in.
Winner: The Republican Party
Election night was huge for the GOP. Not only did they expand their margins in the House and Senate to the point where Democratic opposition is almost unbearable to maintain in the Senate, but they also maintained the advantage in Governorships. A notable first for the GOP is the election of Louisiana’s first Republican Senator since reconstruction without a runoff. The GOP also proved that they could now run a voter turn out drive as good or better than the Democrats.
Winner: The State of Florida
What do you know…it turns out Florida has learned from it’s mistake in 2000 and actually got it right this time around. Watching the election night coverage I mercifully only heard the word ‘Chad’ mentioned a handful of times.
Winner: Ohio Sec. of State - J. Kenneth Blackwell
A cool customer. He must have been breaking out in a cold sweat when the Kerry camp signaled they might begin litigation in Ohio but you couldn’t tell. He stuck to his guns and avoided saying the kind of things that exacerbated the Florida 2000 debacle.
Winner: Jim Bunning
Being insane doesn’t disqualify you from being elected to Congress after all. Go figure.
Winner: David Vitter
First Republican to be elected in Louisiana to the Senate since reconstruction, and surprisingly with out the customary Louisiana run-off election being necessary.
Winner: John Thune
The ‘little engine that could award’. Thune knocks off one of the GOP’s most despised enemies Tom Daschle and decapitates the Democratic leadership in the Senate at the same time.
Winner: Barack Obama
The only real question in the Illinois Senate race was how big the margin for Obama would be. At the end it settled around 70%, but Obama is notable for being one of the rising stars of the Democratic Party. Obama could be the nucleus of a badly needed new force in the Democratic Party centered in the heart of the Midwest.
Winner: The Swift Boat Vets for Truth
Love them of hate them they had the single most efficient and effective use of 527 money and organization in the Presidential race. You have to think that somewhere ‘Tricky Dick’ Nixon is smiling at having put John O’Neill up to facing down Kerry in the 70’s.
Winner: Fox News and NBC
Both carried the lions share of election viewer ship among the big three networks and the cable channels.
Winner: Extreme Sports - Windsurfing
Windsurfing has gained much more exposure as a way for the ‘common man’ to relax and unwind.
Winner: Al Sharpton
Al Sharpton has managed ‘almost’ make himself respectable.
Winner: Heinz Ketchup
All the exposure has to have been good for business on the Northeast and the West coast.
Winner: Internet Bloggers
Famous for lounging in their P.J.s while huddled over their computers bathed only in the soft artificial light of monitors (Direct sunlight burns them). These strange and elusive creatures are credited with debunking the CBS/Dan Rather ‘Memo Gate’ story, while at the same time providing a constant level background of partisan static to the Presidential race. Having become definitive experts on such subjects as typesetting in 1972, early model IBM electric typewriters, Microsoft Word Fonts, and US Air Force document formatting from the early 70’s, many Bloggers have begun to teach a college course in them titled “Applied Useless Knowledge in Political Science - 1001”.
Winner: Bill Clinton
Former President survives the 2004 election with his reputation and stature intact. Sidelined most of the time for heart surgery he did make brief appearances in Arkansas for John Kerry. Nevertheless no amount of blame for Kerry’s loss can be laid at Clinton’s feet (rightfully so) and he remains the one true ‘rock-star’ of the Democratic Party.
Winner: Howard Dean
Dean will be remembered not for his mercurial nature or the famous ‘I Have A Scream Speech’ but for charting what is to be the likely course of the Democratic Party. He is and will remain a unique fixture in Democratic politics and could have the same impact as Barry Goldwater did for the GOP.
Winner: Zell Miller
The ‘I Told You So” Award goes to the Democratic firebrand.
Winner: John McCain
The Republican’s best hope in ’08 for expanding their majority into West Coast Democratic controlled territory returns in triumph to the US Senate.
Toss Up: Canada
Canada remains Canadian despite everyone’s best efforts
Loser: Attorneys
Not many billable hours charged for this election…too bad.
Loser: Unnamed World Leaders
Whether they hang out at the UN or at New York restaurants, these guys were rooting for a Bush defeat – and even told John Kerry so. They have got to be thankful that Kerry never outed them. Talk about awkward!
Loser: Democraticunderground.com
Eric Cartman’s comment about “tears of infinite sadness” comes to mind. The web home of an assortment of hardcore lefties, Bush haters and fired Halliburton employees, is taking this election hard. Venture forth if you dare but a tin-foil hat is now mandatory to read and understand the strange language they communicate in.
Loser: Moveon.org and George Soros
The much-touted Democratic 527 group that received the lion’s share of money from the likes of Billionaire George Soros, Moveon.org actually endorsed 27 candidates for the House and Senate. However, of the 27 only 5 (or 18%) actually were elected, and all of them in heavily Democratic non-competitive races. You have to think that George Soros is checking the receipts at Moveon PAC to see what the hell they were doing with his money.
Loser: Tom Daschle
Since engineering the defection of ‘Jump’n” Jim Jeffords, Tom Daschle has been on the GOP hit list. Rumored to have targeted for termination by a GOP programmed cyborg from a dark future, Senate Minority leader Daschle has long confounded his enemies by playing out a drawn-out scorched earth policy of opposition to the President in the Senate. Ultimately he goes down to defeat not at the hands of a robot with a curiously Austrian accent, but to John Thune in a close race.
Loser: Osama Bin Laden
Before Spain’s election they get bombed. Before Australia’s election islamofacists bomb Jakarta. Before the US election we get…a tape of Osama reading exerts from Fahrenheit 911 with a vague promise not to attack states that vote “not Bush”, as if anyone finds that believable. BRING-IT-ON!
Loser: The Unnamed Goose
The only direct casualty of the 2004 Presidential election that I could find was a brave but unknown Goose that made the ultimate sacrifice for John Kerry. It’s unknown, but assumed that the Goose was a Kerry supporter.
Loser: CBS News and Dan Rather
CBS News and Dan Rather irrevocably tarnished their images and credibility with the ‘Memo Gate’ story that had little affect than to fire up Internet Bloggers and bring them out in force. In a side note what is up with Dan Rather’s election night ‘frog’ metaphors?
Loser: Allen Keys
What were you thinking? Didn’t you criticize Hillary Clinton for this exact same thing in 2000? Dunce!
Loser: The Democratic Party
This is the third national loss the Democrats have had to endure since the departure of Bill Clinton. This is election and the ’02 midterm confirms that the Democratic Party is no longer competitive in the south and non-coastal western states, and loosing its competitive edge in the rust belt states. If the Democrats don’t actively work to alter this situation they will be effectively ceding the control of Congress to the Republicans for the foreseeable future. The Democrats have to either reach out to cultural conservative voters in the South or Midwest, or find a way to cobble together a collation from disaffected GOP moderates.
Loser: Network Exit Polling
Early exit poll results had Kerry winning battle ground states like Ohio by as much as 5 points. Most of the Networks did not immediately notice this and continued to use data that must have been derived from a skewed sample even as actual vote totals began to contradict it. Kudos goes to Fox News and Brit Hume for being the first network to throw the suspect polls out the window.
Loser: Michael Moore
Some might argue that having Bush in office for 4 more years might be good for Moore in the short run. However after the considerable amount concentrated of ammunition Fahrenheit 911 unloaded on President Bush to little effect, and the honored status Democrats conveyed on him at their convention, his stock has to be diminished.
Loser: John Edwards
Edward’s run for the Presidency was a coldly calculated maneuver based on the estimation that he could not win a second term in his Senate seat (which did in fact go to the GOP). However he displayed none of Kerry’s class in his concession speech. Now that he’s fully unemployed he can go back to doing what he did best before entering public life, suckling at the court’s tit.
Loser: Terry McAuliffe
Stick a fork in him…he’s done. McAuliffe may be a capable fundraiser on the national scene but he has been a disaster at the helm of the DNC. The party faithful had it out for him after the midterm elections, now the long sharp knives are coming out.
Loser: Bob Shrum
Shrum’s career as a political consultant is effectively over. He has presided over at least four major defeats for Democratic Presidential candidates and it is difficult to see why anyone would want to retain his services – even to walk their dog.
Loser: Don Rumsfeld
“We won, but I don’t get to keep my job?”
Loser: Ted Kennedy
Its sad but Kennedy has invest so much into the election of John Kerry, a man he has been grooming since the 70’s only to have it fall apart on him. At least he didn’t take John out for a drive across a bridge
