People are straining for rationales to this one, but I think it’s pretty simple – the election took place in an environment with a very unpopular Democratic President. That popularity may be in the midst of bouncing back after the jobs address, but that was too late to save Weprin.

Unions filed a new lawsuit to stop the anti-union law, but given the cravenness of David Prosser Who Will Choke You and the state Supreme Court, I don’t see much chance for overturning it. The ballot box is the alternative, for now, and it will take years to actually win back the necessary votes to repeal. It starts with the recalls.

Yesterday we looked at the potential responses from Democrats in Wisconsin to the dirty trick from Republicans, who plan to run “spoiler” candidates in the recall elections to force primaries and move the general recall elections out to August. Democrats had a couple options, ranging from taking the high road to retaliating with spoiler candidates of their own. The final decision reflected mostly a high road approach.

By now, it’s pretty clear that Wisconsin Republicans will run multiple “spoiler” candidates in recall elections set for July 12. Because of the peculiar rules of the recall, these spoiler candidates, basically Republican operatives, would run as Democrats, creating a Democratic primary election on July 12 against the official Democratic challenger. This moves back the general elections against six state Senate Republicans to August 9.

With almost no predictive power and no effect on the balance of control in Congress, this victory will only affect our government if most people assign a shared meaning to it.

One corner of real America just made it very clear they don’t want anyone messing with Medicare. And yet Obama’s off negotiating just that.

Democrat Kathy Hochul’s victory in NY-26 last night shows the impact of a tremendous House GOP overreach, one that could easily cost them control of the chamber next year.

This race is a test case, if a somewhat imperfect one because of the third party effort, on the potency of the argument against dismantling social safety net programs. Clearly, voters are on Hochul’s side on that issue, and she has been working to frame the race entirely around that. We shall see if that will carry the day. The election is May 24.

Jane Harman will announce tomorrow that she will leave Congress to head up the Woodrow Wilson Center, a think tank in Washington formerly chaired by former Congressman Lee Hamilton. In a note to supporters, Harman says that she would “remain in Congress for some weeks,” but would have to resign her seat before long, triggering a special election.

Republicans, in the minority in West Virginia’s legislature, now understand that they can basically push around the majority to meet their desired ends.

That’s a familiar tale in this short era of Democratic control in Washington. Looks like it’s spreading outside the Beltway, too.