"To what purpose are powers limited, and to what purpose is that limitation committed to writing,
if these limits may, at any time, be passed by those intended to be restrained?"
-- Chief Justice John Marshall, Marbury v. Madison, 1803

Bring On 2004

by Lee

Make of this what you will.

Forecast as squeakers, the elections for governor in Mississippi and Kentucky turned out to be anything but on Tuesday, with Republicans comfortably on top. Haley Barbour won here by seven percentage points, defeating a Democratic incumbent, and Representative Ernie Fletcher won by 10 in Kentucky, ending 32 years of Democratic reign there.

After elections last year in which Republicans turned out Democratic governors in Alabama, Georgia and South Carolina, the latest returns were another indication of the South’s rightward march.

But even with Arnold Schwarzenegger’s recent victory in California, in the recall of its Democratic governor, Gray Davis, Republican Party leaders are hesitant to suggest that statehouse success in 2003 necessarily improves the chances of President Bush’s re-election next year.

“A lot of times the winning party always claims their victories are a precursor,” said Gov. Bill Owens of Colorado, chairman of the Republican Governors Association, which now has 29 members. “If we had lost, there would have been a lot of words spoken by the Democratic Party that reflected a lack of popularity of the Bush administration. Republicans won both states, and that is certainly good news for Republicans, but I don’t want to claim it’ll be a national mandate.

I don’t think for a second it’s a guarantee of any sort of mandate in 2004, but it’s nothing but good news for the GOP and definitely good for Bush’s reelection chances.

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