Being that the only thing that is clear is that Speaker Pelosi will hand over the gavel to a slightly orange man from Ohio, there are many questions left to resolve.  While the common wisdom, both in DC and San Francisco, was that if she lost the gavel, she would retire in the near future, that doesn’t seem to be automatic at all.

David Dayen has a great post on the subject at FireDogLake wrapping up some of the tea leaves:

This doesn’t totally break precedent, Sam Rayburn stuck around after losing the Speaker’s gavel in 1947 and 1953, and he eventually got it back both times.

The only people who don’t want her back are some scattered Blue Dogs who don’t like the way she passes actual legislation and gets things done. Heath Shuler wants to run for Minority Leader against her, and Jim Matheson (D-UT) thinks she should step down. But the Blue Dogs are decimated after this cycle, and can’t really dictate the actions of the caucus.

The second interview Pelosi gave after the election was to Ryan Grim of the Huffington Post, which says quite a bit there. She said she has received a positive response from members who want her to stay on.

As Robert pointed out, while she hasn’t been able to accomplish everything we would have hoped, her record is stellar.  She pushed every major goal, with the exception of immigration reform, through the House. And honestly, by the time we got around to immigration reform, she had been burned by the Senate one too many times.

This is the Speaker that practically carried health care reform on her back. This is the Speaker that fought George W Bush, honestly but voraciously.  It’s hard to point to any other House member that can do what she has done for so long, so effectively.  In fact, when you take a look at the Democratic roster, it is hard to imagine anyone else being as effective as her.  2012 is a different environment, but Nancy Pelosi is our best choice to lead Democrats back to the majority.

DailyKos has a set up a petition to retain Speaker Pelosi in leadership.

UPDATE by Robert: Pelosi has indeed announced she will run for minority leader:

Driven by the urgency of creating jobs & protecting #hcr, #wsr, Social Security & Medicare, I am running for Dem Leader.

This is great news. She has almost certainly counted the votes. It’s a sign that the Democratic caucus plans to keep on its path instead of turning to the right as some idiots suggest.