Here's what we learned for sure in Tuesday's national elections: Voters still seem to be worried about the economy.

Other than that, proceed at your own risk: As a number of commentators already have pointed out, off-year elections rarely are reliable predictors of what might happen in the future - but that sure hasn't stopped anybody from rashly going ahead and making a bunch of predictions.

Tuesday was a good night for Republicans, who claimed gubernatorial victories in Virginia and New Jersey. But it wasn't a night of unalloyed triumph for the GOP, who lost a New York congressional seat as a result of the internecine bickering that still could hobble Republicans as they attempt to regain some of the ground lost in the 2008 elections.

Victorious Republicans tried to paint Tuesday's results as a referendum on the performance of the Obama administration, but it's frankly too early yet to make that charge stick.

A year from now, though, if the economy isn't showing signs of life - and for most voters, that will mean jobs - it's a charge that will be increasingly difficult for the administration to sidestep.

The night did bring a couple of worrisome signs for Democrats: In general, independent voters bolted for Republican candidates - and some of those candidates, in particular Virginia's Robert F. McDonnell, pitched their campaigns toward the center.

And the younger voters who helped propel Obama to victory in 2008 stayed away from the polls in Virginia and New Jersey, according to an analysis of those races by The Washington Post.

But if the victories in Virginia and New Jersey could provide blueprints for additional Republican wins in 2010, the congressional race in upstate New York - in which a Democrat won for the first time in more than a century - shows how the GOP could toss it all away. In New York, the moderate Republican nominee was challenged on the right by a much more conservative candidate. The moderate Republican withdrew from the race over the weekend, but the Democrat, Bill Owens, won.

There's a long way to go until next year's elections and the state of the economy likely will be the crucial issue. But given a choice between a road that could lead to additional electoral success and a road that leads to dissension and defeat, it will be interesting to see which one Republicans choose.