STATE LEGISLATURES. Of all the stories that got ignored last night as Chris Matthews worked through his many public man-crushes, and as CNN kept warning us about the evil, lurking genius of Karl Rove, and the folks at Fox just kind of wandered around the set like stunned cattle, this one right here, as well as the Democratic sweep among the nation's governors, strikes me as the most important of them in the long term. It gives the Democrats a longer bench, as my coach buddies always say. If the national party intends to solidify its gains last night, it's out of these state legislatures whence will come most of those candidates. And the sweep in Iowa probably changes the 2008 presidential dynamic in a couple of dozen ways that nobody's figured out et, but I feel safe in predicting that most of these newly minted state reps have a new best friend in John Edwards.
--Charles P. Pierce