Two things happened today. And although they are related, they are in fact, distinct.

One: The political power and authority of the Democratic leadership in the Legislature increased to an order of magnitude we haven’t seen in a long time – likely since the Wright era. Most of the backslapping and glass raising is focused on Speaker Smith – and as the catalyst for the power transformation, it is well deserved. But it doesn’t end there. There has been a synergy between the Senate and House that didn’t exist before, and that means Shumlin has earned a big slice of the victory pie as well. And Smith’s team – not just Majority Leader Floyd Nease, but folks like Reps. Larson and Heath join in that power enhancing glow.

And its not just about a two-thirds vote. Smith and Shumlin rolled the dice, and they won. They produced a budget nobody liked – certainly nobody on the left. But enough lefties held their noses and voted for it because they believed that it was the best budget they could expect to pass – or at least they did after last minute fine tuning from leadership during the session (such as backing off the Current Use program as a revenue source).

The fact is that no budget that would have been acceptable to enough lawmakers on the left to keep them onboard (which was important not just for initial passage, but as a show of caucus cohesion and strength) was going to leave the Governor’s desk un-vetoed. The equation then was an almost ridiculous one; pass a budget that was just progressive enough to guarantee a veto, and just centrist enough to hold together the override vote. By walking that line so precisely – and by managing the politics so deftly – Smith & Shumlin haven’t simply come out on top, but they come out looking like masters of the game. Had they lost the override, we’d be looking at a degree of compromise with the Governor that would’ve been unconscionable, given the shortcomings of the budget already. Since they won the override – especially since they won without a single vote to spare – all will be forgiven, as they will have seemed to thread the needle so precisely, that this was more or less the most progressive budget politically possible under the economic circumstances.

Which leaves Smith and Shumlin looking like game-masters, and Smith (as the change in the equation making all of this possible) looking like a hero. It’s something to think that, if not for a single vote, people would be feeling quite the opposite.

Two: The political power and authority of Governor Douglas diminished markedly.

Douglas’s reduced clout was already in full, stark display before the override vote was even cast. The most striking thing about today’s debate in the House chamber was how desperately each Republican who rose to speak tried to separate him or herself from this Governor. We’re voting against this budget, not for the Douglas budget was the steady refrain. Those GOP-ers didn’t like the legislative proposal that was sent back, but by-god they wanted it known that they didn’t like their own party leader’s offering any better.

It was something to hear over the VPR stream, and the only thing I can compare it to was the wholesale abandonment by the national Republicans of George W. Bush in the final weeks before the last national election.

Consider: two vetoes overridden, and not just any vetoes – the two most significant bills the legislature passed all session, reflecting the full political spectrum; the vision and values thing on one end, and the nuts and bolts of good public policy on the other.

The Governor, even by his own historical standards, has been lazy this year. So disengaged with the process of crafting public policy and engaging constructively with the legislature that even the press has turned on him, and now that he has suddenly and dramatically found his power to have his way with Democrats curtailed, he is beginning to look like an irrelevance. Poor policy and even outright incompetence seemed not to matter in the face of his unchallenged political muscle, but now that Douglas the bully has had someone stand up to him, he is looking very small indeed. Questions that were unthinkable a year ago will be asked openly: is Douglas finished politically? Should he opt not to run rather than face electoral defeat? Does he matter anymore?

Leaving question 2 aside, the answers to the the other two are clearly “no” and “no,” “yes” (woops) respectively, and people won’t be asking them for long – but the very fact that such questions are already being called speaks to the sea change. The second override has shown in dramatic fashion that the first was anything but a fluke, and that Douglas has unquestionably passed what will be considered his political prime when his era in power is looked back on. And in the face of a diminishing Douglas, many of those weeniecrats moderate Dems who keep supporting him for re-election may feel more inclined to consider the opposition in light of the fact that there are new, Democratic Party sheriffs in town. The ranks of the “Democrats for Douglas” crowd will begin to thin, and a press corps that smells blood in the water will have a new narrative to chew on going into next year: Douglas descendant.

What happens now? Well, we are moving into the annual period of Douglas’s greatest advantage – where any modest gains made by Democratic legislatures are quickly overwritten. When the Dems had a modest PR victory over Douglas with the passage of Catamount Health a few years back, Douglas wasted no time after legislators returned to their regular jobs in going on a self-promotional tour and putting his considerable staff of professionals to work taking full credit himself and rewriting history. Nothing has changed structurally to prevent history from repeating itself. Douglas is still a full time professional employing a staff of PR flacks who stay on the clock the day after legislators go home. It’s nearly seven months until the new session, after all, and seven months is a political eternity – especially in Vermont.

So in one sense, we’re in uncharted territory. In another, we’re moving into all-too familiar ground. What’s next? Who knows.

Still, we do have one other notable advantage that we haven’t had before in terms of maintaining a presence in the debate during the legislative off-season; a rapidly developing Democratic gubernatorial primary, which could serve to keep the dynamic of a weakened Governor very much in play through the coming months.

All in all, things could look a lot worse for the left, and a lot better for the Governor.