I’ve been saying for a while that if he steps down, odds are that Moore would have a better than evens shot at winning Lott’s Senate seat… good to know that Novak’s caught on
It all depends firstly on weather Lott steps down or not, if he doesn’t the seat is as in play at Hatch or Kennedy’s births.
However if Lott steps down, Moore has huge potential, he’s about the most popular politician in the state while Pickering is less well known and can’t hope to match Moore personal popularity amongst Mississippi voters.
But most importantly while Tony Knowles, Chris John and Brad Carson where, to a grater or lesser extent, robbed of victory in their senate races largely by virtue of being Democrats in red states in a presidential year… this will not be a problem for Moore in 06 (should he even decide to run).
Also unlike in the 04 elections Presidential Bush’s coattails are not what they once where nor is the GOP as robustly positioned as before loaded down with minor scandal, economic mismanagement (though not serious), the social security impasse and a deteriorating situation in Iraq and on top of all of this having been in the majority for, in effect, for over a decade all this contributes to a desire for change and a weakened position for the GOP even in states like Mississippi and especially against popular local Dems such as Moore.
It should be remembered though that the Democrats have no concerted national strategy, as the GOP did in 1994 for example, and IMHO are unlikely to develop one in time for next falls elections… but while that will mean that nationally the Democrats are probably unable to generate any kind of uniform trend or wave, it won’t hurt powerful local candidates such as Moore who only needs the GOP at both the national and state level to be weak rather than for the national Democrats to be strong.
The though did occur to me that Moore is going to be able to raise a huge amount of cash where he to run, trial lawyers and Democrat donors know who he is and are more importantly very enamoured of him thanks to his campaigning during the late 90’s… he’ll have no problem with cash what more there will be plenty of independent Mississippi based interests which will be likely to back an established figure such as Moore.
But lets remember Lott still hasn’t said what he’s going to do… it could well be that Novak is just flying a kite as part of the effort to keep Lott in place, but the way Lott has been behaving I don’t think he stands much chance at regaining the majority leadership in 2007, so that would seem to suggest that he is indeed leaning towards retirement… but as I say I’ll wait till I hear it from someone other than Novak [spits]
