Election Surprise: The Senate

The GOP had hopes of taking the Senate and they needed a net gain of four seats. As of right now it looks like the Democrats are going to pick up at least two and maybe three seats. Two Senate seats that the Republicans should have won were in Indiana and Missouri. Both appear to have been lost because far right tea party candidates made highly inflammatory statements which permitted Democrats to paint them, fairly or not, as extremists. Another consequential Democratic pick up is in Massachusetts where Elizabeth Warren defeated Scott Brown, one of the last moderate Republicans. Warren is an old fashioned and unapologetic liberal who has been a brutal critic of Wall Street and the financial interests.