The Post-Standard in Syracuse reports on a special election result that will warm liberal hearts:

The Democrat rode a wave of voter discontent over the national GOP’s plan to change Medicare and overcame decades of GOP dominance here to capture Tuesday’s special election in New York’s 26th Congressional District.

Well, that settles it – the American people want limitless entitlement spending and are willing to accept the necessary punishing tax increases. At least, that’s the narrative donkey Democrats will ride to next November.

Don’t read past the second paragraph, and the NY-26 special election paints a dire picture for the GOP. As sometimes happens, though, all the good news for the left is loaded into the first few sentences…

Hochul defeated Republican state Assemblywoman Jane Corwin on Tuesday night, capturing 47 percent of the vote to 43 percent for Corwin, to win the seat vacated by disgraced Republican Chris Lee. A wealthy tea party candidate, Jack Davis, took 9 percent.

Democrat Kathy Hochul “rode a wave of voter discontent” over GOP budget proposals… to a 4 percent victory with a conservative* third-party candidate taking 9 percent. In a special election necessitated by an outrageous sex scandal involving the previous GOP congressman. But we know Medicare is the reason, because the Democrat’s supporters say so!

The special election that became a referendum on the health care plan for the nation’s seniors may serve as a warning shot to further GOP efforts to cut popular entitlement programs.

“The three reasons a Democrat was elected to Congress in the district were Medicare, Medicare and Medicare,” Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee Chairman Steve Israel, D-N.Y., said in an interview.

This stuff goes both ways. When Scott Brown won in Kennedyland, conservatives made a fuss about what it meant for the future. In that case, the GOP victory was surprising. In this case, the Democrat’s victory is surprising. In neither case does a single issue tell the whole story – though it’s worth noting that Scott Brown took the seat of America’s most beloved leftist dynasty, didn’t have a tabloid scandal on his side, and didn’t have a third-party candidate pulling 9 percent of his opponent’s likely voters.

At least Hochul has some bold ideas for New York’s future!

“How about ending big handouts for Big Oil?” she said. “How about making millionaires and billionaires pay their fair share? We can do all that and not decimate Medicare.”

The victory of another Democrat who’s wrong about nearly everything isn’t good news, but the only tragedy here for conservatives would be accepting the left’s hollow rhetoric.

* Update – Apparently the “tea party” candidate was a Democrat? Stay classy, New York.

The New York Times confirms that, after President Obama’s Thursday Theater proved a helpful showcase for ideas Republicans have been touting since last summer, Nancy Pelosi is readying spoonfuls of sugar:

Seeing no prospect of a bipartisan agreement on health care, Congressional Democrats said Friday that they would make another effort to pass sweeping health care legislation on their own.

The Grand Old “Party of No” came prepared to a production that Obama’s people thought would make the same idiotic scam look less idiotic (or at least new), but don’t expect the left to retreat from their weak rhetorical position! It’s interesting that the Republican ideas which burst from the ether yesterday have already been deemed incompatible with the Pelosi & Reid definition of bipartisanship. Almost… almost as if the outcome was predetermined.

Throughout 2009 voters grew increasingly disgusted by the dishonest accounting and shameless favoritism Republicans criticized in the House and Senate bills… and Democrats, naturally, blamed the Republicans. Since Boehner et al didn’t have union-boss level access to the legislative process, the only way to do this was by drawing attention away from the awful legislation and towards the angry old white guys fighting Progress^TM.

Then Scott Brown took their seat in Massachusetts, and the leftists in control of Congress were suddenly not so in control. It was time for Obama to dust off a few old saws about bipartisanship, repeat them each a thousand times, and schedule a TV appearance wherein his rapier wit would disarm Republican opposition. That sounded like a good idea to someone, I guess?

Since that didn’t buy them any credibility, it’s RAMMIN’ TIME!

Ms. Pelosi described the steps she had in mind, saying: “What is the substance? That’s what we will be putting together, and we didn’t want to do that before we could hear from our Republican colleagues yesterday. Secondly, what is the Senate able to do with a simple majority? And then we will act upon that.

“I believe that we have good prospects for passing legislation,” said Ms. Pelosi, of California.

I believe you have got to lay off the recreational drugs, Nancy. With all the sugar in the world, it’d take far smoother operators than yourself and Harry Reid to make this medicine go down.

Good news for conservatives from an unlikely locale, as Scott Brown wins the Senate seat vacated at death by Ted Kennedy! This is something few could have predicted as recently as several weeks ago, but it turns out even Massachusetts voters have their limits where big government is concerned. The great thing about Brown’s victory, of course, is the Democrats’ loss of a guaranteed vote for Obamacare. The aftershocks should also be positive, as squishy Dems in states far less blue than Massachusetts pause to reflect on their political mortality.

Hot Air has some thoughts on a Politico story wherein the White House tacks a characteristically arrogant course. If there were any chance the national implications of Brown’s victory could have been overlooked, Obama went ahead and thrashed those over the weekend with a halfhearted last-minute speech. What now for the left’s health care, cap & tax, open borders, and more-rights-for-terrorists endeavors? Nancy Pelosi isn’t worried about the current project:

“Let’s remove all doubt,” Ms. Pelosi said. “We will have health care one way or another.”

“One way or another” is a reassuring promise (threat?), coming from the most transparent Congress in history. While the White House gets serious about digging themselves deeper and Nancy Pelosi talks like the Cheshire Cat on crystal meth, prominent lefty Arianna Huffington mopes about Obama’s failures:

On the eve of the first anniversary of President Obama’s inauguration, it’s become painfully obvious that elected officials are not going to save us. The 2008 election was all about “Hope.” But Hope is simply not cutting it.

No kidding. See, I have never bothered to read anything from the Huffington Post before, so at this point I was optimistic that Arianna might come to a sane conclusion, if not one I’d agree with. Hah!

One year later, wracked with conflict and discord, and battered by petty grievances, false promises, and worn out dogmas, we stand on the verge of passing a giant boon to health insurance companies and calling it “reform.”

The reason we are given? What else: the votes just aren’t there for a real reform bill.

That’s where Hope 2.0 comes in. If the votes aren’t there, the people need to create them. Just like King did. They need to build a movement. And to make that happen, we need to adopt another of the great lessons of Dr. King’s life: elevating the role empathy must play in our society.

Arianna Huffington is sad that the Progressives in Congress are ruining her government health care dreams by catering to special interests (e.g., groups lobbying furiously to secure their place in a rigged system). Somehow she thinks a majority of Americans agree that unaffordable state-run health care is a right we must force down Washington’s throat, which indicates she doesn’t talk to many people who live outside her head. Even among public option supporters, how many would be cheering for government intervention if Congress were remotely honest about the costs?

Here’s hoping the John McCains and Lindsey Grahams of the GOP don’t swoop in on gilded bipartisan unicorns to help the leftists salvage their shell game. Congratulations to Senator Brown (R-MA)! “R-MA” – now there’s something new.