Jenkins: The prez gets a do over.

On Wednesday, we woke up to the same old reality, a divided government and overextended fisc whose options are steadily narrowing. The country may start to wonder what the pundits are good for, when it figures out how little help they provided in the voting booth.

Mr. Obama now can be expected to claim a mandate, one whose content he will perhaps share in his memoirs. Judging by his campaign, he expected his victory margin to come from single women frightened that their abortions and contraception would be taken away.

This is a mandate to do what? That is, besides a mandate to keep frightening women about abortion and contraception every time Democrats need to scare up a few votes in close races?