The Black vote turned out in South Carolina and enabled newcomer John Edwards to send Jesse Helms' protege Senator Lauch Faircloth into early retirement. Charles Schumer will replace Alphonse D'Amato as the junior U.S. Senator from New York due in no small part to black voters lured to the polls to support Comptroller Carl McCall, an African-American. A media blitz of commercials on Black radio stations hammered away with get-out-the-vote messages bolstering McCall's victory and aiding Schumer as well. McCall is considered in New York Democratic circles as a serious candidate to run for departing U.S. Senator Daniel Moynihan's seat in 2000.

Democrats woke up the morning after Election Day still in the minority and out of control of the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives, but they could grin with the knowledge that instead of the Monica Lewinsky backlash they feared might cost them 20 or more House seats and the Republicans picking up seats in the Senate, things had turned out better than they could have hoped. A five seat gain in the House diminshes the Republicans grip on power to a razor-thin six vote majority. While the G.O.P. maintains firmer control of the Senate, Trent Lott probably wasn't thrilled his edge remained at 55-45.

Oh, there were a few down notes. Even the Black voters of Illinois couldn't save Carol Mosely-Braun from her own incompetence and she lost her U.S. Senate seat. However, despite the fact that the Senate will be minus an African-American presence, the trade-off of losing a mediocre Black senator is bearable when the result is the detestable D'Amato and Faircloth join Mosely-Braun on the unemployment line.

Black people have suffered insult after insult from the hands of Republicans since the dawn of the Reagan Revolution. This year they dealt out a little payback. Utah Senator Orrin Hatch, a man of conservative principle but good common sense as well, spoke to Ted Koppel as Republicans were going down in flames across the nation how the party must reach out to African-American voters.

No duh Orrin.

• Instead of reaching out to Blacks, Republican candidates seemed to go out of their way to prove how mean they could be. In North Carolina there was a Republican plan to videotape polls in Black districts. The incumbent governor, David Beasley, promised and then backed off a pledge to remove the state's Confederate-era flag from the statehouse. Beasley was turned out by Democrat Jim Hodges.
• In Georgia the Republican candidate for governor, Guy Millner ran ads blasting affirmative action. The candidate for lieutenant governor was openly critical of the Black administration in Atlanta. Both were defeated by Democrats.

The Grand Prize was the part the Black vote played in sending Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich scurrying into early retirement rather than face the wrath of his own horde of right-wing barbarians. Now that was satisfying. There is no truth to the rumour that Newt's next gig will be as a greeter at a Wal-Mart.

The awesome display of Black political clout reminded Democrats how vital African-Americans are to their party's continued survival and humbled Republicans who dismissed Black voters to their lasting dismay.

There is a portion of the Black vote that is up for grabs: Middle-class Black kids who live in suburbs, prefer Alanis Morrissette to Mary J. Blige and don't possess the antipathy of their parents to Republicans. But the G.O.P will have to go out and work for those votes. In Missouri, Florida and Texas, moderate Republicans like Senator Christopher Bond and the sons of President George Bush, Jeb and George Jr., went after and got a healthy share of the Black electorate.

That wasn't enough for SALON token right-wing blabbermouth, David Horowitz. Horowitz bitterly lambasted Blacks for delivering almost 90 percent of their vote for Senator Ernest "Fritz" Hollings as he sputtered, "...the black community votes like a communist country."

Hey David. Two words babe: Fuck you.

Instead, the Republican party has made a conscious decision to play race-baiting games where Blacks are boogeymen for crime, welfare and lower educational standards. Horowitz is one of those dopes who figure Blacks will just wander on home to the Repubican "big tent" because of the innate conservatism of the Black middle class and church toward social issues such as abortion and homosexuality. AS IF. From here the G.O.P's "Big Tent" looks more like the Big Plantation.