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November 09, 2006

No Need for Conservative Panic -- Yet

By Thomas Bray

For conservatives, it's time for introspection but not panic. Tuesday's Democratic sweep was broad and deep, but it was certainly not a sweep for Move.on.org liberalism. Indeed, conservative ideas are alive and well in heartland America.

Nowhere is all this more clear than in Michigan.

The Democratic governor of Michigan, Jennifer Granholm, and the Democratic U.S. Senator, Deborah Stabenow, chalked up solid wins against potentially serious Republican opponents. Democrats took control of the state House of Representatives for the first time in 12 years and nearly won control of the state Senate. And down the ticket, Republican regents and trustees of the state's two leading public universities were blown away, a sign that voters were pulling the party lever.

But where voters were required to consider individual questions, it was clear they weren't in a revolutionary mood. By a whopping margin, they voted down a potentially bankrupting proposal that would have guaranteed annual raises for teachers, as well as required the state to pay for any pension and health care promises that local districts decided to grant. As in nearly 20 other states, voters also approved a measure banning government takings of private property for private purposes.

And by a landslide of 58-42, they banned affirmative action practices by the state and its universities that would result in racial, gender and other preferences - despite being outspent nearly 10-1 by a well-orchestrated establishment coalition that included virtually every major business firm, labor union, academic group and Republican as well as Democratic candidates. Michigan thus becomes the third state to outlaw race-based preferences, following in the footsteps of California and Washington state.

The U.S. Supreme Court, with two new justices on the bench, is scheduled to consider two racial preference cases in this term involving the question of assigning students to public schools to achieve "diversity." The Michigan vote sends yet another clear signal, if any were needed, that voters think the time for restraint in such practices is long overdue.

The vote was all the more impressive because opponents of Michigan's Proposal 2 had tried to portray the measure as anti-woman. Well, women turned out at the polls in large numbers, giving most Democrats an advantage, but they obviously weren't buying the anti-Prop. 2 line. For most voters, it obviously was a question of fundamental fairness: all Americans deserve to be treated equally before the law.

There is no question that it was a Democratic hour. Republican gubernatorial candidate Dick DeVos can't complain that his message wasn't heard. He reportedly spent a staggering $35 million on his campaign; his ads were ubiquitous. His message may have been unpersuasive, however. He tried to portray Gov. Granholm as somehow responsible for Michigan's single-state recession and he emphasized business tax cuts as a remedy.

But it wasn't hard for Democrats to "nationalize" the economic issue, just as they were "nationalizing" elections elsewhere by tying local candidates to President George Bush and the Republican-held Congress. Michigan's economy is indeed in a parlous state, but just how much any governor could have done to prevent that was always a much fairer question than DeVos tried to pretend. Michigan's major industry has been hard hit by foreign competition, and Granholm hit DeVos hard for "outsourcing" jobs while he was chief executive of Alticor Corp., formerly Amway.

It's no great surprise that Republicans took a whomping. Voters nationwide clearly decided it was time to give the other guys a chance to make their case. Michigan will feature prominently in that exercise as well, with Detroit Congressman John Conyers as chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, Carl Levin as chair of the Senate Armed Services Committee and Rep. John Dingell as chair of the powerful House Energy and Commerce Committee.

But if Democrats run wild with their regained power, they are likely to pay a heavy price themselves in 2008. Voters may have given liberals some hope by rolling back a heavy-handed abortion measure in South Dakota, rejecting a gay marriage ban in Arizona or giving Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger a green light for billions in "infrastructure" spending in California. But by and large voters showed a continued preference for conservative approaches on most issues.

Introspection, not panic.

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