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Al Franken
Mary Landrieu's loss and the end of ticket splitting

Louisiana Sen. Mary Landrieu's defeat in the Dec. 6 runoff certainly was no surprise. If anything, it seemed inevitable since the evening of Nov. 4, when it became clear a Republican rout was underway and Democrats would lose control of the Senate. But the veteran Democrat's defeat is another reminder we have entered a period of parliamentary elections, where the parties stand for starkly different ideological agendas and where ticket-splitting, which follows from individual evaluations apart from party, is relatively rare. In the end, the "Landrieu brand" in Louisiana did not matter any more than the Pryor brand mattered in Arkansas or the Begich brand mattered in...