Republicans have good reason to rejoice in their victories in the gubernatorial races in Virginia and New Jersey. But however predictable, it's an unsupported stretch for them to hold out those gains as symbolic of a national discontent with the Obama administration. In fact, both races -- and the congressional race in New York, as well -- turned largely on state and personal issues and strong feelings about the individual candidates.

Pre-election and exit polls confirm that President Obama's approval rating in both states remains strong. They also show that voters cast their ballots based on their views of the candidates and the issues that mattered to them.

No turn against Obama

Polls do suggest, to be sure, that independent voters in both states who had supported Mr. Obama in a nationally historic election returned to their usual voting patterns in their statewide races. Some voted Republican, while others didn't have enough interest in the state elections to bother to go to the polls.

In Virginia, for example, just 39 percent of the state's registered voters cast ballots in their governor's race, as opposed to the 74 percent who voted in the presidential election to help Mr. Obama carry Virginia last year. And though President Obama did visit Virginia to try to bolster support for the Democratic contender, longtime state legislator Creigh Deeds, Mr. Deeds made enough gaffes throughout his campaign to cripple his candidacy.

He never made his platform clear, and he inflicted deep damage to himself in his flip-flop on a tax increase. By contrast his opponent, former state attorney general Robert McDonnell, executed a far more disciplined and well-crafted campaign that played to bread-and-butter issues, particularly jobs.

Jobs an issue in Virginia

Virginian analysts do acknowledge that a somber mood about the national economy and persistently high unemployment in rural parts of the state played a role in the election. Voters everywhere are reasonably worried about jobs and the rising federal debt. The question, however, is where to lay the blame.

The $1.3 trillion-deficit budget that President Obama inherited from President Bush for the current fiscal year wasn't Mr. Obama's doing. Nor is other massive future debt from the Bush administration that is already fixed and obligated for future budgets. But given the devastating financial crisis and the consequent economic bust over the past year that the president inherited, it was virtually impossible for the Obama administration to immediately ratchet down spending in the vise of vast losses in both jobs and tax revenue.

That economic cloud also helped Republican Christopher Christie oust incumbent Democrat Gov. Jon S. Corzine in New Jersey. But Mr. Corzine was already deeply unpopular for other reasons. An immensely rich man, he had trouble connecting with voters and his financial investments were questioned. The state's Democratic party also came under a cloud after a large federal sting operation snared a score of lawmakers.

Other factors in New Jersey

As in Virginia, many New Jersey swing voters and independents who had helped win President Obama's election also stayed home or went for Mr. Christie, a federal prosecutor who ran a disciplined campaign along the McDonnell model on unemployment and jobs.

The irony, of course, is that that damp mood about the economy in both states was created by a Republican president, George W. Bush, who doubled the national debt to more than $11 trillion during his two terms, and aggravated it further by huge tax cuts for the wealthy, all while bogging the nation down further with two long wars that were also run on borrowed money. And his party never about any of this while they were signing off on this haunting debt.

Backlash over debt, lost jobs

Clearly the nation's economic malaise, joblessness and rising debt has finally created such a backlash over the GOP-generated debt that voters want to change the circumstances immediately. But it's too soon to say they are ready to attack an Obama administration that has managed to keep the Bush-bred Great Recession from becoming Great Depression II, or whether their economic insecurity will be vented mainly on their own governors.

Democrats' victory in a widely watched New York congressional race suggests a lot of flex on that question. There, the GOP took a big hit when its harshest conservatives trashed and abandoned a moderate Republican congressional candidate who ran to fill a vacant seat owned by Republicans for 150 years.

GOP blunder in New York

Leading conservative GOP chiefs, major national conservative organizations and television pundits (including Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck) promoted the hard-right Conservative Party candidate, Douglas Hoffman, over the GOP's own candidate, Dede Scozzafava, whom they deemed insufficiently conservative because she supported gay rights and abortion rights.

After the conservatives unloaded on her, Ms. Scozzafava finally suspended her campaign last weekend and threw her support to the Democratic candidate, Bill Owens, a lawyer and newcomer. His victory Tuesday left extremist conservatives stunned and rebuked for their hard-right intrusion and myopic focus on their brand of harsh diktat.

Who's a RINO now?

Republicans aren't reflecting on the message in that loss any more than the Bush deficits, nor on the irony of their leading Republicans abandoning one of their own in a perverse twist on their frequently heard RINO (Republican-In-Name-Only) flaying of moderate Republicans.

Still, it appears that constituents sent messages to both parties about issues that trouble them.