Seems that hopey, changey stuff had 2010 expiration date
On Jan. 20, 2009, President Barack Obama and the Democrats took office from George W. Bush and the Republicans by riding a wave of hope and change fueled by inspired voters across the nation, Illinois and the suburbs. Those winners woke up Wednesday to discover inspired voters across the nation, Illinois and the suburbs changed their minds.
It's been 654 days. My Verizon cell phone plan forces me to show more commitment and loyalty to my flip phone.
Many of the Democratic candidates who took office after that historic victory now are simply history as Republicans won back the House, fell just short of taking the Senate and turned much of the suburbs from blue to red.
What happened to the Democrats' mandate for hope and change?
“That mandate is gone,” proclaimed Mark Kirk shortly after midnight Wednesday when vote tallies confirmed the Republican congressman from Highland Park won the U.S. Senate seat that used to belong to Obama before the Roland Burris sorbet served up in the last throes of the Gov. Rod Blagojevich regime.
“This Senate seat was just returned to its rightful owners, the people of Illinois,” Kirk explained.
Suburban GOP members of Congress such as Peter Roskam, Judy Biggert and Donald Manzullo held onto their seats, while Republican newcomers Bob Dold and Randy Hultgren joined the club. Even tea-party-fireball-turned-Republican Joe “Let's Take Our Country Back” Walsh claimed victory in a tight race over third-term Democrat Melissa Bean.
“We are 800 miles from any ocean but a tsunami just hit the heartland,” Kirk told his crowd of jubilant supporters.
“There's a tea party tidal wave, and we're sending a message,” echoed Rand Paul, the winning Senate candidate in Kentucky.
I've never understood the logic of comparing your victory to the arrival of a devastating natural disaster, but who am I to argue? Tsunamis and tidal waves, like Republicans and Democrats, quickly wash over a land, create chaos and change the landscape before fading away as the survivors stick around to pick up the pieces. Tsunamis and political mandates are fleeting things. One election you're holding your breath until your state turns blue, and then next you turn red with anger.
Less than two years ago, the people elected a wave of candidates who boldly promised health care reform, plans to pull our economy back from the brink, save the auto industry, crack down on unregulated Wall Street and polluters and find ways to end our wars. People seem divided about whether those candidates did nothing or far too much, so now voters have elected candidates who promise they won't do any of those things we voted for last time.
It's been said that voters want jobs, lower taxes, better services, victories over terror, a balanced budget, more rock, less talk and maybe a cell phone plan that doesn't make us wait so long to qualify for a new phone. Maybe we want to go back to the future by making the past our future, or something like that.
I wish the Democratic president and new Republican House good luck. Republican Kirk promised he and his Democratic counterpart Sen. Dick Durbin will be a “dynamic duo” when it comes to doing good for us. A contrite President Obama noted, “We must find common ground in order to make progress on some uncommonly difficult challenges.”
Let's hope Republicans and Democrats, old and new, crack to it as quickly as superheroes would. We voters have only 733 days until we can take back our country from the people who took back our country from the people who took back the country from the people who never seem to realize that when it comes to politics, our national motto of “E Pluribus Unum” might as well be “Lather, Rinse, Repeat.”