After a near-decade of national leadership from big government Republicans, the voters sent our party packing on Nov. 4, handing the presidency and additional Congressional seats to the Democrats. Republicans of all stripes were caught up in the rout.

Still, there were victories both in Florida and the nation for libertarian Republicans.

A major victory was won in California where long-time friend of the RLC Tom McClintock - for whom Rep. Ron Paul actively campaigned this year - won a seat in the U.S. Congress. Here in Florida, term limits advocate Tom Rooney picked up a Congressional seat (CD16), replacing incumbent Tim Mahoney in a district still referred to as "Mark Foley's old seat." Meanwhile, Rep. Tom Feeney of Orlando (CD24) lost his Congressional seat.

In the Florida legislature, two of the five RLC-endorsed candidates won their seats - Rich Workman (D30) and Lake Ray (D17). Thanks to Sarah Lovett, Dean Santoro and Matt Caldwell for flying the limited government flag in their first, but hopefully not last, electoral efforts.

RLCer Bruce Reichert and Alan Burton won non-partisan seats on the Collier County and Volusia County Soil & Water Boards, respectively, as did Jeff Hunt in Duval County. Hunt is not an RLCer, but is the right-hand man for RLCer Adam Guillette, the Florida director of Americans for Prosperity.

For a full recap of RLC results, see the national RLC blog at http://www.rlc.org/blog.