__________UPDATE____________
I suppose retiring the "60 medallion" pic is appropriate. This is the morning after, first cup of coffee, and it is Saxby for Georgia - a fit, for Newt Gingrich land.
Detail from Georgia's GPB blogs is here and here.
Al Franken can make it 59, and then the wingnut fringe of GOP Senate membership will have to be nice to the moderates, so that nobody "Jeffords" away, just as the Dems must be obsequious to prevent Lieberman from "Liebermaning" away. Being obsequious to Lieberman is easy, just mirror the man and behave as he does. It's his manner, if not his position holding the hammer as Snowe and Collins do on the GOP side, so that Maine and Connecticut should each get an above average share of pork.
So, middling pressures, that I can believe in, but change is looking more and more remote as something where it is unwise to spend a lot of belief for a diminishing expectation.
What a world.
Susanna Capelouto of GPB posts of Martin expressing optimism in defeat:
But Martin said his race was not in vain. Georgia Democratic party officials say this election season has seen their party re-organized and energized. They hope to make real inroads in the 2010 elections.
I hate to say it, but with Chambliss at just under 58%, that's having blinders on as much as the GOP theocrats basking in the light emitted, in their eyes, by Sarah Palin. It's really not there, but somebody says, "I see it." Wanting to see it is like me wanting to have had Franken be number sixty. I admit, it is not there - people in the Senate do switch, Jeffords did, Lieberman teetered, but it is still going to be yet more of the lobbyists visiting a lot, and the auto moving down the yellow line on the highway with Obama driving, not really in the leftmost lane.
But if valid and extensive change were in the cards, would he have been electable within the Dem.party, the party of too many Elwyn Tinklenberg clones too plentifully positioned? So it likely is folly to expect national movement in a Wellstoneian way. Even when truly wanting to to see Obama drive the highway eight years in a Wellstone way, I cannot see it as being there. He could surprise me, but I am a skeptic unwilling to bet money on that surprise happening. Rather I'd bet on a miniscule difference from the Clinton years as something I can, given appointments so far, believe in.
I found this GPB post interesting:
Chambliss' mantra on the runoff campaign trail was simple: His re-election was critical to prevent Democrats in Washington from having a blank check. Chambliss, 65, had angered some conservatives with his vote for the $700 billion bailout of the financial services industry and his early support in 2007 for the guest worker provision in President Bush's immigration bill. But fearful of unchecked Democratic dominance, some came back into the GOP fold Tuesday
Martin made the economy the centerpiece of his bid, casting himself as a champion for the neglected middle class. He also linked himself at every opportunity to Barack Obama and his message of change. The Democratic president elect was a no show on the campaign trail in Georgia but did record a radio ad and automated phone calls for Martin.
In the end, Martin, a 63-year-old former state lawmaker from Atlanta, wasn't able to get Obama voters back to the polls in large enough numbers to overcome the Republican advantage in Georgia, which has become an increasingly a reliable red state since 2002.
Turnout was light throughout the state Tuesday. A spokesman for Secretary of State Karen Handel predicted between 18 and 20 percent of the state's 5.75 million registered voters would cast ballots - far less than the 65 percent who voted in last month's general election.
The runoff between the former University of Georgia fraternity brothers was necessary after a three-way general election prevented any of the candidates from getting the necessary 50 percent.
It should make the GOP regulars happier than the Wellstoneian Democrats to see that analysis, which unfortunately seems to resonate as truth, to me.