I thought the president's party usually loses out in Midterm elections.
It varies a lot more for Senate elections than House elections. Look at '02 and '98. The individual seats at stake matter much more, and in 2010, that favors the Democrats because the Republicans had done so well in 2004.
Yes. Because only a third of the Senate is up each cycle, the political climate matters far less than the class of Senators up. Democrats are lucky that they have a cycle coming up where Republicans have pretty much maxed out their gains(the last time Democrats made gains in this class was 1986). Republicans had similarly lucky cycles in 1970 and 1982, where the party gained seats despite having an otherwise tough environment. Democrats got lucky here in 1962.
