Excerpt: Progressive Victories

By Evan Derkacz, AlterNet. Posted April 20, 2005.

• The seven Democratic senators who voted against the Iraq war resolution all won reelection. The senators and their margins of victory:

  Barbara Boxer (California), 58 to 38 percent;
  Russ Feingold (Wisconsin), 55 to 44 percent;
  Daniel Inouye (Hawaii), 76 to 21 percent;
  Patrick Leahy (Vermont), 71 to 25 percent;
  Barbara Mikulski (Maryland), 65 to 34 percent;
  Patty Murray (Washington), 55 to 43 percent;
  Ron Wyden (Oregon), 63 to 32 percent.

• Democrats picked up 40 state-level seats and took control of twice as many state legislative chambers as the Republicans, virtually erasing the GOP's substantial 2002 gains. Democrats retook the North Carolina house and now control both the house and the senate in that state. Democrats also won both of Colorado's chambers for the first time in 44 years -- in a state that voted for Bush 52 to 44 percent.
• In Dallas County, Texas, Bush won by 10,000 votes, but voters in the very same booths chose Democrat Lupe Valdez as its sheriff. Besides being a Democrat and a woman, Lupe is openly gay and Hispanic. Dallas County has never had a female, a Hispanic, or an openly gay sheriff.
• All 18 of the League of Conservation Voters' "Environmental Champions" won. Of the league's "Dirty Dozen," four went down in flames. Of the eight congressional races into which significant LCV resources were invested, the LCV candidates won seven, including Ken Salazar of Colorado, who beat millionaire and anti-environmentalist Pete Coors by 3 percent.

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Evan Derkacz is a New York-based writer and contributor to AlterNet.

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