Sam Spade's (FINAL, see p.10) Congressional and Senatorial prediction thread...

[MarkWarner08]

Sounds good. I see you have a 3 seat Democratic pickup that go up to  5 seats. What are your thoughts on Harold Ford?

[MarkWarner08]

I agree with you about IL-08. Rep. Melissa Bean (D) is going to lose reelection.

[MarkWarner08]

I challenge Republicans to give me a reason why Harold Ford will lose this election. He's running a nearly perfect campaign, he's got a COH advantage,  he's got an opponent who is too liberal on abortion and love raising taxes. Here are a some recent headlines from this race:

"Ford camp says Corker failed to pay taxes on 2 companies."

"Ford on offensive against Corker."

"President may bring Corker cash – at a price."

"Corker misses a chance not debating in Jackson."

"Public should see Corker's taxes."

"Ford says Corker did not respond to 911 concerns."

"DSCC Ad Labels Bob Corker "Big Oil" Republican."

Need a say more? The momentum has shifted in this race.

Ford is gaining because of his strong, positive message and because Tennessee will say no to a flip-flopping, tax-hiking, wishy-washy, prevaricator who will jeopardize America's security. People died in Chattanooga because Corker slashed the 9-11 budget. With America's security at stake, can we afford Bob Corker's dangerous incompetence?

[MarkWarner08]

Can someone explain why Melissa Bean will lose re-election?  I thought her constituiency service was quite good and she had consistently taken moderate positions on the issues.  Bush won 56% of the vote in IL-8 to be sure, but other Democrats are safer in much more partisan GOP districts.

Melissa Bean is a fluke winner who faces an angry base, a liberal 3rd party candidate funded by the unions and a well-funded opponent in a conservative district so conservative it once elected Donald Rumsfeld.

[MarkWarner08]

Although I'm not a Republican, the observation that I would make is that the geographical distribution of voters within Tennessee is what should theoretically give Corker an advantage in the race.

The growth of the Nashville suburbs and the impact it had on Central Tennessee in the 1990s fundamentally changed the dynamics of the Tennessee political spectrum.  After all, Eastern Tennessee has voted Republican for nearly forever and Western Tennessee has voted Democratic for nearly forever.  Central Tennessee was the swing area.

As the Nashville suburbs grew, Tennessee became more and more Republican.  As Al is fond of noting, suburbs in the South are much more Republican and conservative than rural areas, and the growth of the suburbs in Tennessee has laid Democratic chances bare for the last 12 years, with the exception of Gov. Phil Bredesen, who, not surprisingly, is from Central Tennessee.

To sum up, a candidate from Western Tennessee has a lot of geographical disadvantages to overcome, something not even a perfect campaign may fully eliminate.  It's one of the reasons why I consider Virginia a better shot than Tennessee, on the whole.

Thanks for your comments. What about Corker's failures as a candidate? Don't his failures as Mayor combined with the national climate put this race in play?

[MarkWarner08]

Great job, Sam Spade! Much credit for your excellent predictions.

Here's my view:

Prediction (as of Labor Day, September 4)

Democratic gains
AZ-08 Democratic Win
CO-07  Democratic Win
CT-04 GOP hold --- Chris Shays is officially running as a Democrat.
FL-13 GOP hold—This district is mostly Sarasota, a very conservative part of Florida.
IA-01 Democratic Win
IN-02 Democratic Win
IN-08 Democratic Win
IN-09 Democratic Win
MN-06  Democratic Win
NY-24 Democratic Win
NY-29 GOP hold—Eric Massa probably can’t win in this conservative a district.
OH-01 Democratic Win
OH-15 Democratic Win
PA-06 Democratic Win
PA-07 Democratic Win
TX-22 Democratic Win
WI-08 Democratic Win
WY-AL GOP hold - Isn’t Wyoming too right wing?


Democrats will pickup NM-01 and KY-04. I have Madrid winning because oif Wilson’s dogmatic support of an unpopular war. Lucas will be helped by a $2.7 million DCCC ad buy.

Republican gains
IL-08  GOP win

110th Congress

[MarkWarner08]

Another reason why Senator Talent is in trouble -- this is from a Bush speech in 2002 -- "Jim Talent will be a vote I can count on."

Jim Talent today: "I'm an independent voice for Missouri."

[MarkWarner08]

Update for September 17.  Still no moves to Safe D/R, taking races off the table.  FWIW, my total prediction stays the same:  Dems +4, with MT, OH, PA and RI falling.

Senate

Likely D
Michigan (from Lean D last week)
Nebraska
Washington

Lean D
Maryland
Minnesota - Still no polls here for a while.
Montana (R) - We get a Rasmussen poll, but what I want is M-D.
Ohio (R) - Not much happening here yet.
Pennsylvania (R) - No polls from here in a while either.

Toss-up
Missouri (R)
Rhode Island (R)
Tennesse (R) - From Lean R last week

Lean R
New Jersey (D) - I know, I know.  But it's what's the polls say (even with NJ bias).  I still think the Dems pull a Torricelli and pull it out.
Virginia - Didn't watch the MTP debate today, yet.

Likely R
Arizona

Lean I/D (as opposed to lean D)
Connecticut

You're right-- as usual!

[MarkWarner08]

I should add that I am removing NH-02 from the list of 40 most vulnerable and adding AZ-01.

Actually, I think your predictions are consistent with a "wave" with a net gain of 17 seats.  I'm finding it hard to believe that the Dems are going to win some of those, but maybe I'm putting too much stock in voting patterns of previous, probably more GOP-friendly years.

In a sense, you are correct.  My predictions do correlate with a wave, but a wave which occurs on a close-in "regional" sense, rather than a "national" kind of change.  The center of that wave, through my predictions, seems to be centered in the Ohio River Valley, in Indiana and Ohio and some Northeast suburbs.

However, I will readily admit that most of the polling information I see is not showing an Ohio Valley wave in Congress, rather just an Indiana-only wave.  And otherwise nationwide, the polling in a number of Congressional CD's has been pretty weak all told for Dems, unless you want to take the Constituent Dynamics numbers as gold and I don't, for a number of reasons I'm mentioned before.  It's kind of odd that this is opposite the Senate polling, which has not been good for Republicans of late.  I'm trying to reconcile it, but I can't.

Frankly, absent a mini-regional wave or a national one, I find it hard to give the Democrats more than 12 or 13 seats in House, and this is including other seats (KY-04 and NC-11, for example) that other experts think are going to fall that I don't.

As of September, there seems to a be a Midwest and Northeast centered wave. PA, IN, CT and OH have a combined 13 close House seats. The reason taking back the House is so hard for Democrats is that they will have to beat entrenched incumbents like Deborah Pryce in OH-15 and Nancy Johnson in CT-5.