To begin with, the Democrats’ gains were not quite as comprehensive as they had hoped or as the structural political conditions would seem to have predicted. Mr Obama won a lopsided victory in the electoral college, thanks to quite narrow victories in a number of states, but his lead over his opponent in the popular vote (about 6 percentage points) was well short of landslide proportions.
What’s more, the Democrats did not really make the sweeping gains in Congress that they had been expected to make. With recounts still going on in a number of states yesterday it looked as though they might have increased their total number of Senate seats from 51 to 56 – a comfortable majority, but well short of the 60 that many had forecast.
Most important, when you think of the macro-political conditions in America in 2008, you are left wondering why the Democrats did not do significantly better.
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