Mila's first Election Day

I’ve been following elections since around 1984, through fits of curiosity, elation, disappointment, drunkenness, fear, and loathing. But there is nothing that puts things in a new perspective more than the way I watched last night’s late late returns come in: when CNN called Missouri’s Senate race for Democrat Claire McCaskill at about 2 a.m., and my nine-day old Mila spat up on my knee.

Considering my line of work, and my desire to avoid having to defend my objectivity in awkward situations, I try to keep my thoughts on our political climate very simple and vague. But I simply can’t hide that it is very important to me that my daughter grow up in a civil society that refuses to be guided by greed, hate, and fear. The fact that any honest person reading that line can tell exactly where I stand should tell you a lot about American political culture in the past few years.

I spent most of the night at the Eagle running our election blog, which unlike the primaries, was terribly boring. The Democratic state senate candidate Ben Downing had it in a walk after very early results. And the governor’s race was not much of a contest at all.

Good. It shouldn’t have been. Republican Kerry Healey’s campaign was one of the most vile in memory, more so because it was perfectly unnecessary. In all the mud and bile she paid to spew across the state, many may have overlooked the fact that she is a moderate on most issues, and probably a very nice person beneath it all. But she chose to take a very dark path – she became her own Lady MacBeth. She could have used this race to build an amiable public persona, she could have positioned herself for a serious run at some of our weaker House seats or even at John Kerry the next time he comes around. But she refused to do that, and she deserves a nice quiet life in private sector oblivion because of it. (The Globe reports on the incredibly weak thinking behind it here)

It is a testament to the fact that things are, indeed, different that Democrat Deval Patrick refused to hop into the gutter as well. I’ll confess that I was a late-comer to the Patrick bandwagon, which lit people on fire around here in the Berkshires. He has a house in Richmond a few towns away, and I remember a year and a half ago getting emails and calls from Democratic folks around the area telling me about meet and greet events with Deval, and my response was “Who? Holy cow, don’t you realize the election is a year and a half away!”. I admit I was suspicious of his background: I don’t believe that success in business in any way qualifies you for elected office, and telling me you were a high-level executive at Texaco and Coke is like telling me you were a third-mate on a pirate ship. But through the primaries I came around and inhaled the spore with everyone else.

So while I was in the newsroom keeping tabs on the local races, the television gave dribs and drabs of what was happening at the national level. I didn’t have a chance to really start paying attention until after deadline, when it was down to Tennessee, Missouri, Montana and Virginia. When I got home I took Mila to the living room so we could watch some results before collapsing myself.

This afternoon I caught glimpses of Bush’s press conference. For the first time he looked and sounded like a beaten man, like someone who has heard the music. He was vicious and ruthless having won, and ferocious and nasty while in the process of loosing. But having lost almost seems to agree with him. I even laughed at one of his jokes (the one about Karl and the reading list). I almost can’t believe I’m saying this, but I have a hunch that the glad-handing bipartisan Texas governor we heard so much about years ago might make an appearance after all because he is all out of options. And if recent political history has taught us anything, it is that the Republicans are probably a more skillful minority party than a majority one (remember Newt Gingrich?). The next two years will be very interesting. But at the risk of sounding like a Massachusetts Republican, thank god there will now at least be a little bit of balance in the nation’s government.

On Halloween night, when we were still in the hospital, I turned on the television to watch the news. On the Albany stations there were a lot of awful ads in the Sweeney/Gillibrand race. We switched to the Vermont channels and there were lots for the Rainville/Welch race. We turned the whole thing off.

Those first few days in the hospital are a real blessing. You have lots of people around to help you out, you have no cares or responsibility beyond the new member of your family, and you have nothing ahead of you but the bright field that is the rest of your life. Yet it doesn’t take long for you to be ready to head off into the big Whatever-it-may-be, to get bored with the hospital walls and the hospital halls and to get back Home. Even though one can’t know what awaits, I knew all along this election day was coming. And in addition to hoping for a happy, healthy baby and wife, Tuesday was one of the things I wished would happen. I hope we earn it.