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Georgia was the firewall after all
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The 111th session of Congress convenes today in Washington, DC. However, it will not convene with 60 Democratic Senators, the magic number needed to invoke cloture and stop any filibusters attempted by the Republican minority.
The Democrats will come to Washington with 59 members in the Senate, as it seems that Al Franken has somehow won the Senate race in Minnesota over incumbent Republican senator Norm Coleman.
Instead of having a runoff between the top two candidates, the country has been subjected to a two-month long recount process that has seen challenge upon challenge from both sides. Some of those challenges are still ongoing today, so it is astonishingly still not clear if Franken or Coleman will take the seat. For now, though, it looks like a Democratic flip by just 225 votes.
With that Minnesota race seemingly in the books, it seems that Georgia voters provided the key to erecting the firewall against a Democratic super-majority. Unlike Minnesota, Georgia voters had a runoff election between the top two candidates - a race which saw the incumbent, Saxby Chambliss, win with 56% of the vote. As it turns out, this race was just as important as Republicans thought it would be in the days leading up to the Dec. 2 runoff, as big gun after big gun came to the state to campaign for Chambliss.
Hopefully, next time, Minnesotans will have the chance for a runoff election, and not be subjected to another election circus as we've seen this year and in years past. But don't hold your breath.
At last, the 2008 election appears to finally be over.
And like 2008 itself, I say: good riddance.
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