Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader is giving a half-breath of relief. It appears s though George W. Bush has won a second term as President of the United States.

In case you missed the blow-by-blows…

Your Maximum Leader doffs his bejeweled floppy hat to Steve the Llamabutcher. What a trooper! Did you read his liveblogging of the election? Find part one here and part two here. If your Maximum Leader may channel Scotty in Star Trek II, “When other bloggers ran, he stayed at his post…” Bravo Steve. Yeoman’s work indeed.

As your Maximum Leader types these words it appears as though the President’s lead in Ohio will hold up. And the un-prognosticated states remaining look as though they will break (more or less) for President Bush.

Your Maximum Leader, at this point, is reminded of 1960. If minions will recall (from personal or historical memory), the election of 1960 was close. Razor-thin margin close. It came down to Illinois and roughly 100,000 votes in Cook County/Chicago. The historical record shows that most likely these votes were fraudulently recorded for Kennedy. Knowing that massive fraud likely occured in this critical state; but also knowing that he had overall lost the race to Kennedy, Richard Nixon conceded. He didn’t think that the nation should have to go through the bitterness of a long-contested recount/investigation. In your Maximum Leader’s opinion, this is one of - if not the - finest moment of Richard Nixon’s political career.

We all know the pain and divisiveness caused by a bitterly contested recount. Both the Gore and Bush campaigns are guilty of causing one in 2000. (And because this is his forum, your Maximum Leader will go ahead and say that he thinks that the Gore Campaign started it…) We, as a nation, need to move forward from here.

From what your Maximum Leader knows this morning, it seems almost mathematically impossible for John Kerry to pull out a victory in Ohio. Your Maximum Leader hopes that Senator Kerry will conceed and move on. Your Maximum Leader also hopes that Republican’s don’t gloat.

Any American can see what has happened. “Red States” got redder. “Blue States” got bluer. That is interesting. Your Maximum Leader will have to ponder it further. In order to govern effectively, President Bush will have to reach out to Democrats and try to include them in government.

This will be hard. It used to be that Republicans could reach out to old “yellow dog” Democrats (as we used to call them). These Democrats were of the socially progressive but fiscally conservative ilk. Alas, there aren’t that many left. Those Democrats have been replaced with socially conservative (and generally) fiscally conservative Republicans. The Democrats in the Senate and House tend to be more partisan and more liberal. That just makes it harder to do business together. Some Democrats will have to step up. As will some Republicans. The first six months or so of a Bush second term will be critical in setting the tone.

Don’t misunderstand your Maximum Leader. He is not suggesting that Republicans coddle Democrats. Nor is he suggesting that Democrats roll-over because they are a minority. What your Maximum Leader hopes is that both sides will try to find a few issues on which both sides can compromise. Bush can afford to do this as he is a lame-duck now. He can afford to spend some political capital to heal wounds. He needs to.

Now, it seems as though our friend Jeff at Beautiful Atrocities has put us on a list of “poor sports” thanks to a post from the very happy Foreign Minister this morning. Come on Jeff! We’re not poor sports. Can’t we be afforded just an outburst of enthusiasm early in the morning?

But Jeff does ask a rhetorical question that your Maximum Leader hopes will be answered in the affirmative. The question is: “Do you think we can find some Rpublicans in favor of fiscal sanity?” Damn, your Maximum Leader certainly hopes so. But the recent past doesn’t bode well for us…

Carry on.