GA runoff

Saxby Chambliss wins the GA senate runoff. Hopes for 60 senate seats are gone. As far as Obama is concerned this is probably an ok thing. One will notice that President Elect Obama did not put too much of his political capital into this contest. The calculation is that it would have lowered his status to a campaigning politician as opposed to a coalition building President. Also there is probably a good chance that Martin would have lost even with Obama's presence. There was no reason to tarnish or diminish Obama's accomplishment for one Senate seat. I have stated before in reacting to the Lieberman situation that Obama is not simply attempting to govern by keeping the Democratic Congress in lock step. There are a few good reasons why.

You are going to see that on certain areas it is going to be ok for Democratic congress persons to break away from the caucus and represent their constituents which might not always directly align with the Democratic caucus as a whole. This is probably true for a number of southern and rural members of Congress. He will, however, expect very strong support on the majority of the areas that they are in agreement.

Secondly President elect Obama is going to play for the center of the Congress. He is expecting to do big things and he will need support from the moderates on both side of the aisle.

Lastly, if this administration gets no buy in from any of the Republican caucus then there is no shared sense of responsibility. With buy in from certain portions of the Republican Party they will take on ownership to a certain extent. With ownership comes a responsibility to see that the governing is successful.