Can survivors lead GOP out of the wilderness?

In what was mostly an overlooked story on election night, there were clear signs of an increasing North v. South regional polarization between the two parties. America is not becoming “one nation,” at least if one considers Tuesday’s outcome.

Northeastern Republicans are now a nearly extinct species with the defeat of Rep. Chris Shays, the Republican who represented the Connecticut suburbs of New York City.

Meanwhile, Obama did not win any of the Appalachian or Ozark states, such as West Virginia, Tennessee and Kentucky, which Bill Clinton carried in 1996. Obama became the first Democratic candidate ever to win the presidency without carrying Arkansas.

In the all-important battle to control state legislatures and thus control the re-mapping of congressional districts after the 2010 Census, there were more signs of a regional divide.

State lawmakers and governors are the ones who decide what the new congressional districts will look like.

Who will re-draw the maps?
Democratic state lawmakers made big gains in New York, Ohio and Wisconsin and will control the re-mapping there.

But Republican state legislators made gains in Tennessee and Oklahoma, for the first time controlling both houses of the legislature in both states.

Finally, the surviving Republicans in Congress and the ambitious GOP politicians out there who might be contemplating a presidential bid in 2012 must ponder the evidence that social conservatism has not become extinct — it has simply escaped the notice of Washington and New York pundits.

Cases in point:

• In Florida, Arizona and California, constitutional amendments that define marriage as the union of one man and one woman won approval of the state’s voters.
• In California, the support for banning same-sex marriages, at 52 percent, was far stronger than the support for Republican presidential candidate John McCain, at 37 percent.
• In Nebraska a constitutional amendment to prohibit the state from discriminating against, or granting preferential treatment to, individuals or groups based upon race, sex, color, ethnicity, or national origin was approved with nearly 60 percent of the vote.

One question for the GOP survivors in Congress: Do they want to pick up the social conservative banner? What are the risks and benefits of doing so?

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