And we've been losing for nearly two years.

Since 2000, the unemployment rate has risen by more than 20 percent, the stock markets have plummeted, health-care costs are skyrocketing, we suffered a horrendous terrorist attack and, now, we're being steered toward an invasion of another nation.

Yet voters last week gave the president virtual control over the government by sending the opposition party to defeat. Unfortunately, he sees the election as a green light for more of the same — except that now it will be harder to get that light to blink yellow, let alone turn red.

Bill Moyers, PBS commentator, said last week that "for the first time in the memory of anyone alive, the entire federal government - the Congress, the Executive, the Judiciary - is united behind a right-wing agenda for which George W. Bush believes he now has a mandate."

And that mandate should be sending shivers of fear through anyone concerned about peace, the environment, corporate power, reproductive and civil rights, the working poor and religion creeping into government.

How did this occur, this unusual phenomenon of the president gaining more power, not less, during a midterm election? Was it really a presidential mandate, or the result of the weakness of the opposition in hitting on the issues mentioned above?

Well, a big majority of Congress had already sided with the president on an Iraq invasion. It's hard to campaign for peace after casting your vote for war. And too many Democrats didn't have an agenda to distinguish themselves from Bush's Republicans. You have to give voters a reason to pull one lever rather than another.

The voter turnout last week was just 39 percent. Scores of voters weren't hearing any warning of the dire possibilities if the president were to be given more power over the fate of the country.

It would not have been crying wolf to tell voters that a Bush Congress could easily expand the Iraq war measure at some point to give the president the OK to go after the other members of his "axis of evil."

Or that the energy industry, which already has a foot in the White House, would have even more opportunity to push through its wishes, including the stalled proposal to drill in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska.

Or that the president's judicial nominations stuck in Democrat-led committees now would be moving toward Senate approval. If Bush gets to fill enough vacancies around the nation, he could change the tone of courts away from respect for civil rights, labor unions, environmental regulation and free speech.

And if, as is likely, the president gets to make an appointment to the Supreme Court, the Roe vs. Wade decision that legalized abortion 30 years ago could be in jeopardy. Pro-choice supporters already are reeling from the election results, just as the anti-abortion forces are now gathering steam.

Or opposition candidates could have warned voters that the president's tax-cut proposals during a time of huge defense spending increases would spell trouble for ordinary people. Corporations and the rich would be the main beneficiaries of a tax cut, and the result would be deficits, cuts in social programs and little hope for a national health insurance solution.

Or they could have gone on record supporting an increase in the minimum wage, which hasn't gone up in more than five years. While the proposal was dormant even with a Democratic Senate, now there is no chance that low-income workers will see relief any time soon.

But perhaps I'm wrong. Maybe voters were aware of the consequences. Perhaps most people are in favor of the president's stance on the issues.

Either way, the path has been cleared for him to push his agenda through Congress.

It's surprising, though, after the past two years, that people would want to go even farther down Bush's road of war, environmental assault, corporate corruption and sinking investments and pensions.

With Bush winning yet again, we'll continue to be the losers.

Cary Brunswick is managing editor of The Daily Star. He can be reached at (607) 441-7217 or at cary@thedailystar.com.