The results last night have been analyzed to death because political news is so slow that pundits need to find danger for the Obama administration in order to gin up ratings for the coming election cycle.

But looking at the data objectively, democrats should learn three lessons from last night and republicans one.

DEMOCRATS

1. Get back to grassroots, exciting campaigning. Otherwise our apathetic base stays home.

2. Recruit charismatic candidates who appeal to new voters and minorities. Otherwise our apathetic base stays home.

3. Look for every opportunity to create contests between rational sounding democrats versus tea-party-type conservative populists. This causes even moderate independents to vote democratic.

REPUBLICANS

1. Use the McDonnell/Christy big tent model and not the Palin/Club for Growth model. If Virginia, New Jersey and NY-23 did not prove this beyond any doubt to the GOP -- republicans will win far fewer seats than they expect in 2010. Next test --are they dumb enough to destroy Crist in Florida and hand another Senate seat to the Democrats?

Stay tuned to see if theSE obvious lessons are learned or ignored.