...is that this was an election we can all be proud of as Americans. The Democratic base isn't big enough to have produced this outcome. It was right-leaning centrists and moderate Republicans who produced the outcome, by withdrawing their support for the GOP. When the good of the country required setting aside partisanship, they did the right thing.

I'm not sure we need a third party to replace either or both of the existing parties. What we need to do is take this election as a reminder that there's already a third party, albeit a virtual one: The center. The center has traditionally had the power to choose between the partisans, lending and withdrawing its support as moderate judgment dictated. We saw it happen yesterday, and maybe we can build on it to restore the center to its rightful power.

I view the mission of this new Congress as being an independent Congress and exercizing proper Constitutional oversight over the Executive. It's not to be a Democratic Congress; the Democratic agenda got no mandate yesterday. If we're smart, we'll make this a precedent and insist that Congress do its job of balancing the Executive on a permanent basis. This should be a reform, not a temporary emergency measure. The People's representatives shall be nobody's lapdogs. Not the White House's poodles, not a Party's lackeys. Those dogs belong to us, and they've been heeled.