If you take Joe Sestak‘s win over Arlen Specter in the Pennsylvania Democratic primary, Blanche Lincoln being forced into a runoff with Bill Halter in the Arkansas Democratic primary, and Democrat Mark Critz‘s clear victory over Republican Tim Burns in the Pennsylvania special election to fill Jack Murtha‘s House seat, the moral of the story seems to be that yesterday wasn’t a good day to be an ersatz Democrat, but it was perfectly safe to be a real Democrat.

Critz won in the only district in the country that switched from backing Kerry in 2004 to backing McCain in 2008, in a race where his opponent positioned himself as an outsider in the middle of an alleged wave of anti-incumbent anti-establishment fervor, a race where his opponent “specifically ran against Washington, Speaker Pelosi, and the Obama presidency” in a year that is allegedly going to bring us another huge Republican wave to rival the one in 1994, in an election where Republicans pulled out the stops because they saw it as a bellwether that would sap the morale of Democrats in November by showing them the writing on the wall.

Critz won despite all those factors, and prettily handily too, 53% to 45%. So reports of the imminent mass demise of Democrats in November may be somewhat exaggerated.

(As Steve Benen reminds us, there have been seven special elections during the Obama presidency, and the Democrats have won all seven.)