If you recommended Crusader's diary, I hope you'll recommend this so people have equal opportunity to read the other side. Here's why Crusader is wrong...
First:
Exactly 1,782,165 vote were cast for Bredesen (D) and Bryson (R) combined in the governor's race. Exactly 1,805,059 votes were cast for Corker and Ford combined. There's no undervoting the Senate race! So where are the missing Democratic voters who allegedly just couldn't bring themselves to vote for Ford? Did they refuse to vote for Bredesen too? That's hard to imagine since 1) turnout was amazingly high and 2) dedicated liberals hopefully showed up to vote "no" on the gay marriage ban if nothing else.
1,741,951 were cast in the gay marriage vote. 81% (ugh!) voted "yes" to give you a clue about the state's demographics.
Second:
In Tuesday's election, white evangelical Christians made up 51% of the voting public. And one-third of them voted for Harold Ford, Jr. (Source: The Tennessean)
One third of those 51% is equal to 17% of voters on Tuesday.
What percentage of Tennessee voters identify themselves as liberal? 17%. So, for Crusader's theory to be correct, Ford would have had to have scared off almost every single liberal in the state to cancel out the white evangelicals he was able to win over.
Third:
Ford outperformed all previous Democrats except Phil Bredesen for the past 10 years. That includes Al Gore in 2000. And he did it despite his infamous family name, his hometown of Memphis, his skin color, and a record-breaking $16 million spent against him.
And about the dishonesty:
In Crusader's recommended diary, he says:
I've even been volunteering on his campaign since he won the primary
But on Oct. 10 (two months after the primary), Crusader said:
Indeed, until tonight, I was fully content to keep kicking the crap out of Junior to anyone who would listen.
Perhaps Crusader had a change of heart and started volunteering for the Ford campaign after the Oct. 10 debate. But it's near impossible to believe he has been supporting Ford "since he won the primary" and "kicking the crap out of Junior to anyone who would listen" at the same time.
Furthermore, on August 5 (right after the primary), Crusader predicted why Ford would lose:
Ford has successfully alienated vast swaths of the grassroots activists in the state, not just on the issues, but because of his Lieberman-like tendency to adopt Republican framing and provoke liberals. This strategy, which Ford thinks will attract independents (who simply don't vote in non-presidential years in Tennessee) and moderate Republicans will fail
Crusader's diary isn't anything new or insightful based on closely following the entire campaign as he would have you believe. This is the same tired complaint he's made about Ford over and over again (to anyone who would listen) since at least the start of August.
The deck was stacked against Ford because of demographics, because of his family name, because he's from Memphis, because he's black, and because his opponent had unlimited cash. Those are the reasons why he lost (in that order, I think). And despite all of those reasons, Ford barely lost. It was an amazing, amazing campaign.