Poor Dick Cheney. He was only trying to help.

Judging by the blog buzz and Beltway chatter, yesterday's most significant and surprising election wasn't the one in West Virginia--apparently, everyone expected Hillary Clinton to win--but the cagematch in Mississippi's First Congressional District, where Democrat Travis Childers’ thumped Republican Greg Davis 54-46. The odds were in Davis's favor. George W. Bush won this heavily red Deep South district by 45 points in 2004. Republican Roger Wicker had captured the seat with 63 to 79 percent of the vote every two years since 1994. And Childers' bears an uncanny resemblance to the Dudley Do-Right villain Snidley Whiplash, known less for his legislative prowess than his proclivity for tying damsels to the railroad tracks. But the Democrat pulled it out, winning in a "district no center-left party has any business winning"--and showing that the GOP is in for a disagreeable November. "Can it get any worse?" asked the pundits. We're screwed, said the panicked memo from National Republican Congressional Committee Chairman Tom Cole of Oklahoma--who, along with House Minority leader John Boehner (R-Ohio), is reportedly on the brink of getting canned. Apparently, it's three strikes--Cole also lost earlier special elections in heavily Republican Illinois and Louisiana districts--and you're out.

Clearly, the NRCC suspected this catastrophe was coming. How else to explain its decision to summon Vice President Cheney from the shadows of his cavernous, undisclosable lair and send him to the Memphis suburb of DeSoto Monday for a last-minute appearance on Davis's behalf? Desperate times, it seems, call for desperate measures. In case you're wondering, Cheney's job approval rating nationwide is about 15 percent, which, for the sake of comparison, is slightly higher than Eliot Spitzer's and slightly lower than Congress's--so it's no wonder that this week's Dixieland swing was his first of the season (McCain and the veep? Not BFFs.) Presumably the NRCC expected the shiny-pated scowler to excite the base in scarlet northwest Mississippi, where his positives are undoubtedly higher than in, say, the rest of the known universe. And judging by the scene at his DeSoto Civic Center rally, a few of the faithful were indeed swooning. "It's like a part of history to me," said Southaven resident Shirley Rodman. "It's an opportunity to see a leader of our country. You don't get those opportunities often."

Ultimately, though, history wasn't enough. A few weeks back, in a parallel effort to rile up Mississippi's far right, the NRCC launched a series of spooky, possibly race-baiting ads linking Childers to Obama and the Rev. Jeremiah Wright. But as the New York Times reported this morning, "tying the white Democrat to the black presidential candidate may have helped Mr. Childers more than it hurt him, as campaign aides reported heavy black turnout, heavier than in a vote three weeks ago when he came within 400 votes of winning." Cheney may have spurred similar backlash, as the vast majority of voters who disapprove of Cheney--even in Mississippi--may have been less inclined, not more, to support a candidate who welcomed the current administration's approval (instead of distancing himself from it).  “There’s a lot of people that are mad at Bush,” a DeSoto Republican named Jim Jennings told the Times. That's why the Davises of the world are in danger in the first place--and probably why Dick Cheney, of all people, is the wrong fellow to come to their rescue.

Before the returns rolled in last night, Cheney vowed to continue campaigning through November. "Neither the President nor I will have our names on the ballot this year," said Cheney in his remarks (Dubya recorded a get-out-the-vote robocall for Davis). "But we're still focused on the work at hand... and so we'll put our shoulders to the wheel for John McCain, and for [our] excellent congressional candidates." They may want to reconsider. Of course, that doesn't mean Cheney and Bush should stay home for the rest of the year. In the coming months, the dynamic duo could still boost the GOP's fortunes by headlining fundraisers, where they remain a reliable draw; the veep's Mississippi visit, for example, reportedly raked in $120,000 for the party. Even then, though, their efforts are not likely to make much of a difference. After all, the NRCC dropped $1.8 million, a quarter of its total funds, on the Childers-Davis title bout--and still got KO'ed.

Oh well. We hear Washington, D.C. is lovely in the autumn.