According to the television networks on election night, a sea of red swept across the Deep South and flowed over the states of the Rocky Mountain West. That brightly colored presidential election night graphic made for easy viewing but it grossly over simplified the diversity of our political choices.

Montana's Big Sky turned bright "blue" on Nov. 2. We elected a Democrat governor, a state Senate with a clear Democratic majority, and our state House moved from a six-vote Republican majority to a tie of 49 to 49.

Democrats enjoyed a near sweep in the other state races as well, winning four out of five from attorney general to superintendent of public instruction, and now hold a clear advantage on both the important Public Service Commission and State Land Board.

These gains for Democrats are not limited to Montana, but are also found in other of the so-called "Red" states of the Rocky Mountains. In the past two years, western voters have chosen Democrats as governor in Arizona, New Mexico, Wyoming and now Montana. More than half the states of the Rocky Mountain West are now led by "blue" chief executives.

The same picture emerges in our local elections. Democrats hold the mayor's office in most of the major cities in the Rockies from Santa Fe and Phoenix to Salt Lake City and Missoula. The largest city in Republican Idaho, Boise, now has a Democrat mayor. Every strategist understands the importance of building political strength at the local level.

The vibrant political hues and often schizophrenic choices of Montana and other Rocky Mountain states demand attention. To consider us as "red" is not only incorrect, but also limits understanding of our political choices and thus our aspirations. Throughout our history Montana's election night results have reflected our ticket-splitting independence. Two notable examples from almost 50 years ago are: Montanans chose a conservative, Zales Ecton, as U.S. Senator by 54 percent, while in the same election sent the Democrat Mike Mansfield to the U.S. House with 58 percent. In 1952 we voted for the Republican Eisenhower for president but chose the liberal Democrat Lee Metcalf for the Congress. Every election since, Montanans have split our ticket between red and blue.

No state in America is all one or the other, and nowhere is that more evident than here in the Rocky Mountain West. Even while voting heavily for Bush, Montanans, Coloradans, and others resoundingly chose Democratic candidates up and down the ballot. Is there a lesson in this move to the political left, however moderate? There are two lessons and Bush should give close attention to them both: first, Republicans on the far right have overreached for more than a decade. We observed the determined and vocal rejection of the policies of right wing zealotry most clearly here in the Rockies. Voters in Colorado turned both houses of their state legislature over to Democrats and the state's journalists and politicos cite the voters' rejection of far right policies imposed by hard-line conservatives as a main reason for that dramatic shift.

In Montana's heavily populated Flathead Valley, moderate Republicans took it upon themselves to publicly ask voters to reject "the extremists" who had taken over the Republican Party and instead cast their votes for Democrats. That was virtually the same surprising message that was delivered by the former state Republican Chair, Susan Good, who also encouraged Montanans to cast their ballots for Democrats.

The second vital message sent by western voters is that people out this way have a deep, visceral respect for the environment. To us the land is not an abstraction; rather we live, work and play on it and we are determined that this place -- the air, water and land -- be protected. On that, too, the right, most notably the Bush administration, has overreached and in doing so turned much of the West from red to blue.

Pat Williams served nine terms as a U.S. Representative from Montana. He is teaching at the University of Montana, where he also serves as a senior fellow at the Center for the Rocky Mountain West.