Recent elections bode well for Dem fortunes

This week's elections underscore three trends -- all of them worrisome to Republicans.

President Bush's political ills seem contagious. Democrats can win values voters. Republicans have no monopoly on the nation's fast-growing suburbs.

Democrats won governor's races in Virginia and New Jersey while California voters rejected ballot initiatives backed by Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger. In St. Paul, Minn., voters ousted Democratic Mayor Randy Kelly a year after he publicly backed Bush for re-election.

"If I were a Democrat," said Republican Gov. Mike Huckabee of Arkansas, "I would make hay of this."

They were pitching hay at the Democratic National Committee, where party leaders declared Tuesday's results a harbinger for the 2006 midterm contests when more is at stake: 36 governorships, 33 Senate seats and all 435 House seats.

"This portends really well for the future," said Sen. Charles Schumer, chairman of the Democratic Senate Campaign Committee. "Unless George Bush reverses his policies and reaches to the middle you're going to see many more victories like this."

Republicans were especially alarmed at the defeat of gubernatorial candidate Jerry Kilgore in Virginia after Bush personally endorsed him Monday. Polls showed the race tight before the president's visit. Democratic Lt. Gov. Tim Kaine won by about 6 percentage points.

Further analysis by the Sun-Times' Ron Fournier here.