Don’t miss John Fund’s widely cited premonition that President Obama and the Congressional Democrats are planning implementation of a last-minute wish list after the election:

It’s been almost 30 years since anything remotely contentious was handled in a lame-duck session, but that doesn’t faze Democrats who have jammed through ObamaCare and are determined to bring the financial system under greater federal control. …
Many Democrats insist there will be no dramatic lame-duck agenda. But a few months ago they also insisted the extraordinary maneuvers used to pass health care wouldn’t be used. Desperate times may be seen as calling for desperate measures, and this November the election results may well make Democrats desperate.

The message to bring to this summer’s “meet your representatives” events will be that consequences can follow a politician and a party even when out of office and out of power… after, of course, all of the horrible legislation is reversed and then some. As disheartening as it may be to acknowledge that ideals of representative government are waning (and may always have been naive), that’s the world in which we live. It’s unlikely to affect the likes of Sheldon Whitehouse to have constituents call and express their hopes that he won’t participate in efforts to explicitly subvert the will of American voters. Perhaps it will have a marginally greater effect if he worries that his actions in the fall will define public perception of his character for the rest of his life.