Obama, Palin and the off-off-year election

Reading too much into Tuesday's off-off-year election results would be a mistake, but reading too little into them would be wrong as well. My take is that President Obama is right to worry about keeping independents in the fold -- and that Sarah Palin is the most polarizing figure in American politics right now. Virginia has a long history of giving newly elected presidents their comeuppance. And most voters in both Virginia and New Jersey said Obama had no influence on their votes. But the exit polls indicating that independents broke fairly heavily for Republicans suggest that what many progressives (including me) sometimes see as Obama's temporizing -- on issues like the public health insurance option or Don't Ask Don't Tell -- might be sensible politics. The left of the party should take note. As for Palin, her Facebook role in the New York special House race is well known. But I'd also note that in Virginia, Republican Bob McDonnell twice declined her request to come to the state and campaign for him. Clearly she captures the anger and disaffection of the tea party right, but independents tend to see her as Tina Fey. Obama's moderation, Palin's fire-breathing: We'll see a lot of both in the next few years.