Weekly Podium: "Getting Beyond Rhetoric"

I hope the political pundits within the state of Virginia is happy. I hope the angry voters are happy. I hope the women of Virginia are happy.

They got what they supposedly wanted, someone other than George Allen. Someone other than a man who has done no harm to the state, and has represented Virginia well as a Senator. I know there are absentee ballots to be counted, but barring something short of an elephant-sized miracle, Jim Webb is our new junior Senator.

All "macaca" aside, there was nothing wrong with George Allen as far as whether or not he was a detriment to the state. He stood for lower taxes, smaller government, 2nd amendment rights, and other items. However, it was liberal rhetoric, skewed media, and the hoodwinking of voters that has led to this race being as close as it is.

The biggest piece of rhetoric was "George Allen marches in lock-step with George W. Bush!"

Now, as Jim Webb has not solidified himself on any particular stance, lets watch as our Senator-elect starts to march in lock-step with Hillary Clinton, Nancy Pelosi(aka Hillary Clinton, Jr.), Ted Kennedy, John Kerry, and become part of an immediate future filled with congressional gridlock and inaction...all of which will be blamed on the Republicans, as blame-shifting tends to be the liberal strategy as of late...well, I apologize for that. It has been their strategy for quite a while, now.

Speaking of the walking slab of New England concrete known as Senator Kerry, during his congratulation of Deval Patrick becoming Governor of Massachusetts, he spent over half of his speech talking about how great Ted Kennedy is, the other half talking about how "America spoke today", and only mentioned Patrick at the end...when he introduced him as the new Governor. Anyone else reading into Patrick's placement as more of a figurehead for supposed liberal "racial equality"? Obviously, John Kerry didn't think enough of his fellow party-mate to speak about his victory, other than announce him the winner.

Now, the liberals have the House and a strong minority in the Senate. Expect more Chicken Little-esque "the sky is falling" pro-environmental rants from the Left. By listening to these people, I've come to the conclusion that a few too many people took the unrealistic aspects of the movie "The Day After Tomorrow" a little too seriously. Erik Curren, I hope you reading this.

This may have been a good thing for the Republican cause, as several of the losers in their respective races are politicians who have bright futures ahead of them. Rick Santorum, Michael Steele, Bob Ehrlich, Jim Talent, and Mike McGavick all have time and potential on their side to pursue equal or higher offices in future years, and these are the gentlemen who will lead the Republican rebound from yesterday's loss. Most of those men would have won their targeted office, but just happened to get swept away in a tide of an admittedly well-crafted Democratic national campaign of rhetoric and slander, centered around turning the name "Bush" into a 4-letter word, and applying it to every conservative candidate out there.

With all of this rhetoric, no wonder there is a general malaise about the general public towards the government.

Oh, and could someone tell CNN that George Allen did not win the male vote in Virginia based on who his father was. Tell them it was because the majority of males in Virginia liked his policies over Webb's. Is it that hard to believe that Allen could be a better candidate than Webb? 49% of the population didn't think so...