THE ELECTION: Right Makes Might

The rumbling started in the East, where the polls opened first. Within hours the political seismologists at Voter News Service in Manhattan were getting off-the-chart readings from their exit polls. Tapping at rented computers in a windowless warren 30 floors up in the World Trade Center, analysts spent Election Day sifting the results of more than 10,000 field interviews by exit pollers who questioned voters as they emerged from 1,039 polling places across the country. By 11:45 a.m., Murray Edelman, the veteran director of the operation, expressed astonishment that for the first time in the 12-year history of exit polling, a clear majority of voters said they had cast ballots for a Republican candidate for Congress. Distrusting their data, Edelman and his colleagues double-checked individual precincts for glitches, but the rumbling only grew louder and spread westward. By 1 p.m., when Edelman placed a conference call to his clients at the four major TV networks, he could state with confidence that "the Republicans will have a big win," taking control of the Senate and perhaps even the House.

The networks did not share this news with their viewers for hours, until the polls closed, on the theory that the Great Unwashed must be protected from information that might discourage them from casting ballots -- and perhaps also to attract more viewers later, in prime time. But the news leaked out. Network employees felt no qualms about immediately phoning this scoop to their friends among top operatives for both political parties, who called their big campaign contributors, who called their brokers and whispered, "Buy!" By 3 p.m. the Dow Jones average was up 30 points on what TV business reporters coyly described as "rumors" of Republican gains in the elections. The irony seemed lost on most of the players that even amid a populist revolt, as voters angrily revoked the Democrats' 40-year lease on the Congress, the elites of both parties and the press indulged in a bit of insider trading.

The breadth and depth of the Republican victory -- a 52-seat pickup in the House, eight in the Senate, 11 in the Governors' mansions -- stunned Republicans as well as Democrats. Said David Wilhelm, departing chairman of the Democratic National Committee: "We got our butts kicked." Senator Mark Hatfield of Oregon had predicted that his party would pick up only 35 seats in the House, but he won his office pool because everyone else bet lower. Leigh Ann Metzger, a spokeswoman for the Republican National Committee, saw 3 p.m. exit-poll results cadged from one of the networks and furtively circulated. Fearing that the projections were "too good to be true," she downed two mint Maalox tablets. At least one Republican, however, looked genuinely unfazed: Representative Newt Gingrich of Georgia, who more than anyone else led the ) G.O.P. in tapping voter anger. "Newtron," as Democrats now call him, weeks ago drafted detailed plans to assume office as Speaker of the House, not only plotting a blitz of new bills but also hiring moving companies to help the Democrats clean out their desks and preparing the walking papers for more than 3,000 Democratic staffers. Like some kindly Scrooge, Gingrich explained that he wanted to let the staff members know where they stood as soon as possible, what with Christmas coming.