Here's my new post at The Right Place regarding yesterdays election results, with attention to the races for governor in New Jersey and Virginia.
In particular, I think it's difficult, though obviously not impossible, to spin it as a defeat for Bush and the Republicans based on national politics. But given the dynamics of the two states (as I outlined there), had the Democrats lost it could have been devastating to them. What happened was much more expected than not.
Kevin Aylward thinks that Godwin's Law was the real winner in Virginia.
11/9/05 1310: Ron Fournier of the Associated Press agrees:
There's no evidence that voters were sending Bush a message in Virginia or New Jersey, but Tuesday's results heightened Republican anxieties about the 2006 midterm elections, when much more will be at stake. Some GOP officials blamed Bush's political slump for a low GOP turnout.
