Lori Sturdevant: Tracking the clout

Ornery observations and sleepy speculation on the morning after:

•Gov. Tim Pawlenty wasn't on Tuesday's ballot. But he emerged a winner this year among Minnesota's and the nation's Republicans.

Pawlenty may have backed a losing candidate for president and may have been stiffed in the veepstakes. But his good-sport stumping for McCain outside the state, even after the Sarah Palin pick, left him with plenty of pluses and no discernible minuses should he take a flier at the presidency in 2012.

The two-term Minnesota governor has a clear national rival for Republican affections in Palin. But she's been scarred by this defeat. Exit polls reported by the Associated Press found four in 10 voters saying Palin was an important factor in their vote -- and that more of that group voted for Obama-Biden than for McCain-Palin.

At home, the DFL surge sputtered three short of the 90 state House seats required to override Pawlenty's vetoes. Pawlenty remains powerfully relevant in a state government that, by design, gives governors great clout.

•The Republican Party that was still standing Wednesday morning is a more conservative party than was arrayed on the ballot the day before.

That's true in both Congress and the Minnesota Legislature, for different reasons. In Congress, moderate Republicans took the brunt of voters' punishment for the mistakes of the last eight years. At the statehouse, moderate GOP House members are in scarcer supply because of the party's purge of its gas-tax dissidents. The dean of that group, Edina's Rep. Ron Erhardt, ran as an independent and fell in a tight three-way race on Tuesday. Of the six who overrode Pawlenty's transportation bill veto, only two will be back in the House in January.

•Finding willing GOP defectors the next time DFLers want to override a veto will be tougher in 2009 than in 2008. But in a perverse way, that situation might not be all bad for House DFLers -- and particularly for Speaker Margaret Anderson Kelliher, whose name is at or near the top of a lot of DFL 2010 gubernatorial wish lists.

Budget woes could make the next two sessions as difficult as any in living memory. By not giving DFLers too strong a hand, voters have created a situation that will let legislators share blame with Pawlenty for the pain that's coming

•The GOP's national setback is bound to trigger a round of intraparty introspection. At home, the DFL has reason to do some, too.

In a year when the Democratic presidential candidate carries the state by 10 percentage points, party leaders have to ask themselves why they couldn't muster a convincing win in the U.S. Senate race and why they fell short in the two U.S. House races that were clearly in play.

A recount might yet prove that Al Franken unseated Norm Coleman. But if it does not, Franken's loss adds to a dismal DFL record in endorsing candidates for top statewide offices. In the past two decades, only Paul Wellstone and Amy Klobuchar won both at the convention and in November.

One more time, morning-after DFLers are asking themselves whether their conventions went with the right candidates in endorsement contests. This time, party leaders ought to ask whether the party's caucus-convention system is stacked against the exercise of sound political judgment and in need of reform. Multiple endorsements and an earlier primary, anyone?

•Look for a renewed push for instant-runoff voting as disgruntled DFL leaders jealously eye the votes garnered by Independence Party candidates in the U.S. Senate and U.S. House races and angle for a voting method that would allow those voters' second choices to count, too.

Exit polls undercut claims that IP founder Dean Barkley's Senate bid cost Franken the election. The second choices of Barkley voters were evenly split, the poll found -- and 45 percent of his voters said they would not have been able to bring themselves to vote for either big-party candidate. Anyone seeking proof that negative campaigning depresses voter participation, look here.

•Thanks to voters in the Sixth District, the political value of the name Bob Anderson in Minnesota has now been quantified. It's worth 10 percent of the vote.

Candidate recruitment for 2010 has already started. If your name is Anderson, expect a call.

Lori Sturdevant is a Star Tribune editorial writer and columnist. She is at lsturdevant@startribune.com.