I was going to post part 3 of my inflation series, but since no one will read it in the aftermath of the big vote last night, I’ll delay that till tomorrow and instead offer a couple of thoughts on the election. First, the VA results alone are very encouraging, but remember Mr. McAuliffe was a terrible candidate–his comments that parents shouldn’t have a say in their children’s education is a gift that will not likely be repeated. And Mr. Youngkin was an exceptionally skilled and disciplined candidate. Republican’s are not usually that lucky in both directions. But what must truly be terrifying Democrats is what happened in New Jersey: while we don’t know the winner yet, the votes seemed to mirror the VA experience and Democrats know they’re in trouble. So, while we await the much more thoughtful analysis of the election results by our own Mark Caleb Smith, I’ll share my quick “best and worst analysis” of the election here:

The best, which features this nugget, is here.

Of course, Terry McAuliffe gave the gift of all political gifts when he said, “I don’t think parents should be telling schools what they should teach.” But as I’ve noted, this was not a gaffe — McAuliffe was simply stating what an overwhelming majority of Democrats believe. Unfortunately for Democrats, according to CNN exit polls, 51 percent of the electorate said that parents should have “a lot” of say in what schools teach, and those voters went for Youngkin 76 percent to 23 percent. The big problem for Democrats is that education has become a classic issue in which Democrats, by the nature of their constituency, are forced to take positions that run contrary to the electorate.

The worst* is found here:

To be clear, temperamentally conservative suburbanites with maxed-out 401Ks are not the only group responsible for what is happening. There are also many independent voters who are not particularly politically engaged and simply tend to ping-pong between parties based on the vague sense that whoever is in charge must be responsible for all the bad things and instability. But I think it’s fair to say the dog-memory issue applies equally there, given that those voters have swung back to supporting the GOP less than a year after it got done creating the problems that they are now upset at Democrats for not immediately solving.

* Conservatives can only hope that progressives will latch on to these type rationalizations heading into the next election cycle. If progressives continue to refuse to acknowledge there are legitimate disagreements with their positions, they’re heading for disaster in 2022.