Opinion: The voters have spoken: More dysfunction and gridlock, please

It’s clear here on this post-election Wednesday that the anti-Obama camp won the day Tuesday -- Democratic candidates for whom the president campaigned were shellacked, and Republicans who ran against the president’s policies did well.

The oddity, though, is that while the nation has a persistent dislike for how Washington works (or doesn’t work), few incumbents were turned out – 12 in the House, three in the Senate (four if Mary Landrieu loses a runoff in Louisiana). So anti-Washington sentiments didn’t seem to play out at the ballot box, though you could infer some of that in the dreadful voter disengagement.

Remember, Congress’ disapproval rating among voters is much worse than the president’s low numbers. In a pervasive disconnect, while voters tell pollsters they hate Congress, they often like their own representative (thank you, gerrymandering).

The reality is voters send different messages from within different jurisdictions, and they often are contradictory. Look at the results of Senate elections in states that had referendums raising the minimum wage, measures generally supported by Democrats and opposed by Republicans.

In Alaska, Arkansas, Nebraska and South Dakota, minimum wage hikes passed (as did non-binding votes in two more states and binding votes in several cities). But Democratic senators Mark Begich and Mark Pryor lost their seats in Alaska and Arkansas (though Begich hadn’t conceded Wednesday morning). Tea party-linked Republican rookie Ben Sasse easily won an open seat in Nebraska, while in South Dakota former Republican governor Mike Rounds cruised to an easy win to replace retiring Democrat Tim Johnson.

The minimum-wage initiatives were hardly litmus tests in the Senate races, but their success could portend good things for raising the minimum wage nationally, something President Obama has pushed but congressional Republicans have rejected.

It could just be that the voters are ahead of the politicians on this one. Exit polls found that seven in 10 voters Tuesday were concerned first and foremost about the economy. While the economy has picked up strength in recent quarters, and the stock market is soaring, little of that has reached the bulk of Americans, who still struggle with the aftershocks of the Great Recession. Voter support for raising the minimum wage likely reflected that frustration (and tracks national polling).

Similarly, two-thirds of Tuesday’s voters said they think the country is on the wrong track, yet support for either of the major parties was a distinct minority even as most incumbents were returned to Congress. So while voters think Washington is broken, they tend not to take the opportunity to change the part of it over which they have control.

In his first presidential campaign, Obama pressed the theme “we are the change we seek.” But you have to wonder whether the electorate really does seek change. Tuesday’s results - it’s hard to imagine likely Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell as an agent of compromise and good governance - will do little more than firm the ideological battlements from which Washington’s war of dysfunction has been fought.

Which reminds me of that old Pogo line: “We have met the enemy and he is us.”

Follow Scott Martelle on Twitter @smartelle.