Chuck Muth lays the Republican losses in 2006 at the feet of fiscal moderates and Republican big spenders. While a number of voters likely stayed home for that reason, or stated that reason to pollsters, a vaster number stayed home or voted Democratic for a different reason, the failure of the Bush Administration to effectively prosecute the war. Indeed, the release of Bob Woodward's book laying the failure of the occupation on Don Rumsfeld seems much more of a proximate cause than any pork barrel spending spree. Given how most of us feel about the war, anything to help hasten its end is a good thing - that includes the loss of GOP seats.

Hopefully, much of the fundraising and activism which is buoying Ron Paul will also find its way into Senate and House campaigns at the primary stage so that more Paulists or Huckabites will run and push out the establishment Republicans and Democrats that are holding back change.

Michael Bindner