North Star Writers Group

In all the discussion surrounding the election, and every last mainstream media outlet's automatic presumption of a big Democratic victory next Tueday, no one has asked a simple question: What if it doesn't happen? What if the GOP retains control? What does it mean for each party, and what does it mean for a media that has relentlessly driven home a "story" that will have proven to be utterly false? Let's take each in turn:

Republicans: The GOP probably will be the least affected. They've been dealing with a razor-thin majority anyway, and the loss of a handful of seats will not change that situation. If anything, the problem they currently have will deepen, that the moderate RINO (Republican-In-Name-Only) wing of the party will gain even more power than they already have, simply as the result of a very few of them threatening to bolt on every bill. This, in turn, will further upset an already discontented base, which will have only voted GOP this time out of total fear of Speaker Pelosi and Majority Leader Reid. Holding these two pieces together without a 2008 presidential candidate of sufficient stature to act as that glue will be difficult (fear of a President Hillary serving the same purpose notwithstanding). And I doubt either Speaker Hastert or Majority Leader Frist will hold onto their positions come January regardless.

Democrats: The leadership of Howard Dean and perhaps even the party itself may not survive a defeat, no matter how close. If the Democrats, with all the political stars aligned their way and a blatantly biased media propagandizing in their favor, still cannot beat a stumbling GOP, their entire reason for being has to be called into question. Certainly Howard Dean would be the favorite as scapegoat and sacrificial lamb, but the blood-letting could go well beyond that. (Pelosi and Reid would stand just as big a chance of being ousted as their Republican counterparts.) The far left, represented by MoveOn.org and Green Party types, might just leave the fold altogether. And while Hillary has sufficient star power, she may well be more divisive than unifying. (Heck, she might unify the GOP more than the Democrats.) The circular firing squad that will almost certainly form in the wake of a stunning defeat will be quite a sight to behold.

Mainstream Media: They will take the biggest hit of all, as all their polling, prognosticating and pontificating will have proven to be just an enormous load of fertilizer. Nothing that any of them say should be heeded, much less taken seriously, anymore. And their total liberal bias in "reporting" a "big Democratic victory" that never was should be exposed once and for all, undeniable, for all of us to see. This might just well be the final nail in the coffin for the mainstream media, whose ratings and circulation have been in steady and precipitous decline for years. Then the work can begin toward breaking the monopoly that liberals have on the Fourth Estate. The GOP will not ever be able to get their message through the perpetually leftist cacophony via FOX News, talk radio and a few websites alone. They need to get some of their bigger-money interests to invest in TV and newspapers, be it by purchasing existing entities or starting them from scratch. And a failed attempt to blatantly lie the Democrats to victory should leave a lot of low-hanging fruit in the media tree ripe for the picking.

So, in spite of the fact that you haven't seen and won't see any stories about it, there are far more dire consequences for the liberal institutions - Democrats and mainstream media - should they lose than for the GOP should it relinquish control. (Perhaps the latter point explains the former.) We'll see what happens next Tuesday, but don't be surprised if the outcome is one nobody was willing to discuss – until it happened.

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