I awoke this morning to hear it suggested that the Democratic election landslide was good news for enemies of the United States. Apparently Iraqi insurgents are popping the bubbly.

This time though it wasn't President Bush or Vice President Cheney making the connection, but NPR's Daniel Schorr, the thoughtful, veteran political analyst. He's certainly no GOP partisan. Here's what he said on Weekend Edition Saturday as part of his answer to host Lynn Neary's question, "How is the rest of the world reacting to the news of this election?"

I suspect that the insurgents are probably sitting around drinking champagne, and saying, 'Hey look, we drove a cabinet secretary out of office, we got the president all upset' and so on. This must look very good in terms of the rebels in Iraq.

If Bush, Cheney, Rush or O'Reillly had said that I bet there would be outrage from Democrats.

Bush said the week before the election:

"However they put it, the Democrat approach in Iraq comes down to this: The terrorists win and America loses. ... That's what's at stake in this election. The Democrat goal is to get out of Iraq. The Republican goal is to win in Iraq."

That prompted Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid to say the President "resorted to the same tired old partisan attacks in a desperate attempt to hold on to power."

And there was a great outrage when Cheney said in August:

The thing that's partly disturbing about it is the fact that, the standpoint of our adversaries, if you will, in this conflict, and the al Qaeda types, they clearly are betting on the proposition that ultimately they can break the will of the American people in terms of our ability to stay in the fight and complete the task.

Dan Froomkin wrote then in the Washington Post:

By insinuating that the sizeable majority of American voters who oppose the war in Iraq are aiding and abetting the enemy, Vice President Cheney on Wednesday may have crossed the line that separates legitimate political discourse from hysteria.

But by saying that rebels were celebrating the election victory, wasn't Schorr making the same point? Certainly it was in a much more sober and non-partisan fashion. And he's not saying that was Democrats' objective. But he's clearly saying that Iraqi insurgents fighting U.S. forces are cheering political developments here. And when he says it, it seems to make sense and does not come with the tinge of arch partisanship and questions of patriotism inherent in what Bush and Cheney have said.

Here's the fuller excerpt of Neary's conversation with Schorr:

Neary: Well, how is the rest of the world reacting to the news of this election?

Schorr: Well, on the whole, quite favorably. I mean, American popularity was at a very, very low ebb under the Bush Administration. I suspect that a little of that will be abated because it'll be seen that Americans have talked back to the president, talked back to the government, and that things are going to change.

Neary: And in Iraq, I get the sense there is a little bit of nervousness.

Schorr: Well, Iraq, what we have there is, those people who want American troops to stay and are worried that now with Rumsfeld gone they're going to try to do something about that. And there are also those, I suspect, that the insurgents are probably sitting around drinking champagne, and saying, "Hey look, we drove a cabinet secretary out of office, we got the president all upset" and so on. This must look very good in terms of the rebels in Iraq.

You can listen to the full segment here.