The 2005 vote.

IT is a quadrennial ritual of the punditry to evaluate the off-off-year elections in New Jersey and Virginia and search for glimmerings of what may come in approaching congressional races. There are indeed reasons why Democrats should be heartened by what happened on November 8, and why Republicans ought to be worried. But any talk of 2006 becoming a Democratic version of 1994--i.e., a year for taking control of Congress--is premature.

The gubernatorial victory of Democratic senator Jon Corzine in New Jersey was no surprise: He ran in a blue state, spent freely, and faced a lackluster opponent in Doug Forrester. The race was perhaps most notable for its tawdriness, including a GOP ad that featured Corzine's ex-wife.

The governor's race in Virginia is harder for Republicans to dismiss. The state voted for President Bush last year, and the GOP understandably expects to enjoy a home-field advantage there. Many national Democrats have attributed Lt. Gov. Tim Kaine's win to the president's sagging popularity. But it would be a mistake to think that Virginia politics is driven by presidential polls. If that were the case, then Virginia's outgoing governor, Democrat Mark Warner, wouldn't have been elected in 2001, when Bush's approval ratings were peaking in the aftermath of 9/11.

In truth, Kaine laced a weak Republican opponent in former state attorney general Jerry Kilgore. Although Warner and Kaine had pushed successfully for a tax increase, Kilgore never developed a convincing message on this core GOP issue, partly because Republican legislators split on the Warner/Kaine tax hike. Instead, he campaigned on the death penalty, apparently in the belief that Kaine's opposition to it represented a glaring vulnerability. If Virginians were drowning beneath a crime wave, that might have been true. But they aren't, and the cumulative effect of Kilgore's negative ads may have been to convince swing voters that Kaine is a man who stands on principle even when he knows his views aren't popular. Finally, the moderate Warner's approval rating was in the 70's. History says that Virginia incumbents who are that popular almost always see their designated successors win.

Yet there can be no denying that it was a Democratic year. In California, Republican governor Arnold Schwarzenegger saw a package of reform-minded ballot initiatives go down to defeat, thanks in large measure to well-organized union opposition. And in St. Paul, Minn., voters ousted Democratic mayor Randy Kelly, whose endorsement of Bush last year was a decisive issue. (His successor, Chris Coleman, is also a Democrat.)

Some giddy Democrats believe these results foretell a Democratic takeover of Congress. If so, their party has no margin for error. To move from a 45-member minority to a 51-member majority in the Senate, Democrats will need to win four open seats (including one in Tennessee), defend a few of their own endangered incumbents, and knock off at least five GOP officeholders. That's a tall order. Making a net gain of 15 seats in the House of Representatives may be even tougher: In 1994, Republicans benefited from 53 House districts whose constituents had voted GOP at the presidential level but sent a Democrat to Congress; in 2006, there will be only 18 districts that split their vote between Kerry and a Republican.

The challenge for the Bush administration and congressional Republicans is to do something that they have failed to do in recent months: Give voters, including their conservative base, a compelling reason to support them. If they don't, they should brace themselves for more electoral setbacks ahead.