what part of the country will the democrats do best in in 2012

[cinyc]

I'm expecting a pickup of about 2/3 in NY with 2 more in NV.

Gross or net?  New York is losing 2 seats.  Downstate Democrats will lose one seat for sure when the new map is drawn.  Upstate Republicans will likely lose the other seat.  That leaves you with 6 Republicans - King in NY-03, Grimm in NY-13, Hayworth in NY-19, Gibson in NY-20, and two of Hanna in NY-24, Buerkle in NY-25 and Reed in NY-29.  (It would 7 Republicans if Corwin wins the NY-26 special election. - 7 out of 27 post-redistricting seats)  

Which 2 or 3 of those 6 or 7 are Republicans going to lose in 2012?  New York State Senate Republicans will try their hardest to shore up the districts held with Republican voters, which shouldn't be too hard since they only have 6 or 7 seats to shore up, and all but NY-25 are traditionally Republican districts with R+ PVIs.

New York Republicans are not overstretched.  If anything, the 2010 election reverted representation back to the norm.  2006 and 2008 were the aberrations.

[cinyc]

Yeah, maybe I was being to ambitious.

The obvious target would be Buerkle.

If I had to chose 1 other potential pickup, I'd say Hanna in the 24th.

Before Lee decided to post quasi-pornographic pictures of himself on Craigslist, conventional wisdom was that Buerkle would be redistricted out of her seat.  Now, it's not as clear, but if Corwin wins the special election, I still think she'll be the odd Upstate Republican out.

[cinyc]

I'd figure Corwin would have a better shot at retaining a seat, since she's in the Assembly. Friends that could influence redistricting and all.

Assembly Republicans are pretty powerless, but if Corwin were smart, she wouldn't have run in the special election without getting assurances from state Senate Republicans that they wouldn't redistrict her out of a job.

Carving up NY-25 makes the most sense because parts of the Syracuse area could be used to shore up Democrats in NY-23 and the rest could shore up the remaining Republicans in Central and Western New York.   Carving up NY-26 doesn't seem to help Democrats much at all.