E-Mail This Article to a Friend SILVER LININGS It wasn’t all bad BY DEIRDRE FULTON

True, the Democrats came up short for the presidency and most congressional races. And yes, 11 states approved bans on gay marriage. But progressive voices still managed to gain traction here in Massachusetts, if not in the nation, on Tuesday. With Ed Augustus’s victory over Robi Blute for state Senate, Worcester became the most progressively represented city of its size in the state. Liberal state representative Karen Spilka succeeded in her bid to move into the Second Middlesex District Senate seat. And over in Somerville and Medford, Carl Sciortino defeated incumbent representative Vincent Ciampa once and for all.

The second taste of triumph was even sweeter than the first for Sciortino, who is now officially a member of the newest class of state representatives. Sciortino had already savored one win, in September’s Democratic primary. But Ciampa lingered like an aftertaste, and announced he would run a sticker campaign in a last-ditch attempt to keep the 34th Middlesex District House seat he’s occupied for eight terms. On Tuesday night, Sciortino supporters relished an especially meaningful conclusion to a race that had become increasingly ugly and divisive leading up to Election Day.

Leaning in to talk to her friend about Ciampa, one woman whispered: "I almost feel sorry for him for being such a loser — twice."

Early in the evening, as Sciortino’s friends and campaign volunteers waited for election results at Orleans, in Davis Square, they talked about the negative tone of the rematch. It was a "smear campaign," they said, complete with "funny business" at the polls (including pushing, shoving, and name-calling) and "hate mail" in their mailboxes (one group sent out fliers calling Sciortino a "militant homosexual activist." See "Ciampa’s Little Helpers," This Just In, October 22). When Sciortino arrived to announce his overwhelming victory (the write-in votes were still being counted, but he said he had more than 60 percent), he too made a pointed reference to the rough campaign.

"We ran a campaign based on real issues. We stayed positive.... Most importantly, we ran a respectful campaign," he said to the adoring assembly of supporters. "Ciampa’s campaign was willing to manipulate and lie about our campaign," he added later.

But the win represented much more than a moral victory in the 34th Middlesex District. It was also an integral piece in the disintegrating puzzle that was Governor Mitt Romney’s plan to chip away the legislature’s Democratic majority. Combined with Augustus’s win in Worcester, Spilka’s step up to the Senate, and a few other victories (Therese Murray and Robert O’Leary on Cape Cod, Susan Fargo in Waltham, James Timilty in Walpole), Sciortino’s victory signals a "new progressive expectation," says Harris Gruman, the state director for Neighbor to Neighbor Massachusetts, a grassroots policy organization.

And he’s not talking solely about gay marriage, as Ciampa would have had voters think. Gruman’s organization backed Sciortino only when it became clear that his campaign could galvanize a coalition between gay-marriage and economic-justice advocates. Neighbor to Neighbor is more concerned with economic justice and progressive-taxation policies — issues where Gruman says Ciampa came up short. And the new set of lawmakers elected Tuesday is part of a center-left coalition that could make real advances in state policy — especially with new House Speaker Sal DiMasi holding the reins. Members like Sciortino and Augustus are considered "net gains," Gruman explains, because while their predecessors were nominally Democrats (Augustus’s seat opened up when Guy Glodis left to become county sheriff), their policies were far from progressive. And this means more work for Romney, whose goal was to minimize that center-left alliance.

"These defeats for Romney and Ciampa are really part of the same package," Gruman says, and they indicate voters’ acceptance of both socially and economically progressive issues. "This election shows where we’re really at."