I don't think one strategy fits everywhere. For example, in Georgia it's probably a better strategy to run on Obama's legacy, seeing as to how the Hispanic population is on the rise and general Black turnout is higher. Both of those demographics could help flip Georgia without much of a shift in candidates. However, in Arkansas or Louisiana, Democrats should look to cultural conservatives or moderates who are progressive on economics. They cannot be flaky on economic issues. Minimum wage increases are popular in places like West Virginia and Arkansas.
Democrats should actually be looking more at the Rust Belt states, including my home state Michigan. In midterm election years which are a wave for the White House's opposition party, and results in a pickup of the U.S. House, the trend on Election Night is immediately considered with the Rust Belt states. In 2006, it was obvious with Indiana (which closes its polls at 07:00 p.m. ET). In Michigan, 9 of the 14 U.S. House seats ended up in the Republican column as President Obama won that state with re-election by close to 450,000 raw votes and 9.5 percentage points. (The state is typically close to 6 percentage points more Democratic than the nation.)
The Democratic Party needs to perform routinely stronger in Core Democratic states on the eastern half of the electoral map. And the party needs to be doing that, at the U.S. Senate level, throughout all of New England (much more so now with Maine than the swingiest of those six states, New Hampshire). If the Democrats, going forward, fail to shore up these weaknesses, I would question whether they are actually bothered by losing in midterms. After all, since 1914 the White House opposition party gained congressional seats in 23 of the 26 elections with include as the most recent 2014. It's like asking the question, "Okay—no party wins everything. Or wins everything for long. So which would you prefer—President and maybe the U.S. Senate
or fail to win President but win U.S. House and U.S. Senate?" The Democrats, during the Republican presidential realigning period of 1968 to 2004, won Congress the majority of that period while the Republicans won the presidency. From 2008 going forward, we may be looking at the opposite. (Between the U.S. House and U.S. Senate, choosing just one of them to be in the column of the party of the president, it's typically the Senate which will fall in the column of the party of the president…while it is the House which goes first for the opposition. Refer to the midterm elections of 2006 and 2010 as examples of that.)
