The mid-term elections are over and, yes, things overall did not turn out well for those of us who value reality-based thinking. Too many state legislatures, governorships, judgeships and congressional seats went into the hands of the undereducated tea party Dark Side. It appears marriage equality is either dead or endangered in much of the rest of the country -- including in Iowa where pro-equality state Supreme Court judges were routed, and in New Hampshire where a veto-proof anti-equality majority in the legislature might be looming for re-elected Democratic Gov. John Lynch.

So why do I feel like Lily Tomlin's character in the Snow White-esque scene from the movie 9 To 5, in which murderous cartoon woodland creatures frolic and giggle conspiratorially at my feet as we watch Dabney Coleman's "sexist, egotistical, lying, hypocritical bigot" plummet to his demise as bluebirds warble approvingly?

It's simple, really, if you think of Tomlin's character as the Massachusetts electorate on Election Day and substitute Coleman with state Republicans getting their comeuppance from the voters. Let bells everywhere tolls the glad tidings: the Massachusetts Republican Party has been stopped in its tracks, despite going so far as to pick an openly gay man as its lieutenant governor candidate in a brazen bid to conceal the fact that nearly every one of its statewide candidates below the gubernatorial ticket was an anti-gay wingnut who would be a solid vote in Washington against equality for that same gay running mate, state Sen. Richard Tisei.

I felt a twinge of momentary sympathy for Tisei as he stood wanly to the side of running mate Charlie Baker as Baker delivered an admittedly generous concession speech after losing to incumbent Deval Patrick. Tisei looked every bit the part of exactly what he was: a prop; a ruse; a stand-in for the high political ideals from which the state and national Republicans are straying ever farther while they dance their dangerous minuet with the unrestrained bigotry of tea partiers whose passions are being controlled (barely) by the mostly unseen hands of their corporate overlords.

But then I realized that Tisei will land on his feet because he was what he needed to be in this GOP tragedy: a team player lacking in self-respect. He was the gay guy who dutifully traipsed around the state pimping the campaigns of blatantly anti-gay GOP candidates, arguing implausibly that he as a gay man was justified in doing so because, after all, President Obama is against same-sex marriage and LGBT people still support the President. (This despite the fact that all of us -- gay, straight, Republican, Democrat, and Maggie Gallagher -- all know that Obama would support same-sex marriage in a split second if he knew that Tisei's own party wouldn't try to use that support as a weapon against the Democrats.)

As for the rest of the GOP in Massachusetts, they must be feeling understandably dejected this morning after the electorate wiped off their faces their smug pre-election smiles and exploded their disingenuous narrative about Scott Brown representing a new GOP tidal wave that was going to wash across the Bay State. Let's be clear: Brown is every bit the fluke as every other Mass. Republican who has won a seat on Capitol Hill in the last 20 years, only to be summarily ejected from office once voters realized that they've been duped in the same way Mitt Romney lied his way in the Governor's office and had to bow of out of re-election lest he suffer the humiliation of certain electoral defeat.

Scott Brown, your future is calling you, and I'll bet you know it as well any anyone after only months of dealing with the crazies in your own party that you are serving two incongruous masters: on one side you have Sarah Palin and the GOP's increasingly marginalized and polarized party regulars who can't decide whether the Constitution is the supreme law of the land. On the other side you have Bay State voters who have a history of rejecting Republicans when their national and state party leaders invariably stray too far into Looney Tunes territory.

Sen. Brown, you deserve every sleepless night.

Of course, state GOP Chairperson Jennifer Nassour has been trying to put the best spin on the GOP trouncing at the polls, noting that at least they didn't lose seats in the state Legislature this time out, and that this years-long journey to "massive" GOP victory starts with baby steps. It says something that a party that's been around since 1856 has to resort to painting itself as the new kid on the block to lessen the perception that it's populated by bigots, conspiracy theorists and assorted other fruitcakes who can't get elected in the middle of a national GOP rout during the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression.

No matter how much the national Republicans won elsewhere, this state -- in which out-of-state bigots sunk so much money -- remains the great irritant under the skin of wingnuts everywhere.

Massachusetts, I love you! Mwah!