Midterms and the Senate

[AuH2O]

Browsing around, I read Sabato's (or, more accurately, his grad students') latest article on the 2006 elections. Specifically looking at the Senate, they cited the usual figures with regard to off-year elections and how the party of the President loses seats.

They however were more specific, discussing "6th year" elections where a President has been reelected. The average loss in those situations was 6 seats (with that situation arising 6 times since 1948).

The problem is that this presumably conventional wisdom ignores the fact that basically that entire "sample," such as it is, is based around a very limited series of political events. The GOP lost 13 seats in 1958, exploding the mean. Two other election cycles occured 6 years after a Republican won the Presidency, possibly producing coattails in an electorate still dominated by Democrats.

Unfortunately for Democrats, they no longer dominate the electorate. Indeed, once you adjust for participation, they are at a marginal disadvantage. Whereas Sabato cites Democrat hopes for a "1994," it must be recognized how rare such realignments are (2 in the 20th century, with only 1932 being a perfect example therein). The gap between those alignments, which persisted primarily for structural reasons difficult for Republicans to overcome, is telling.

I am not convinced national "mood," such as it is, is even a factor worthy of significant discussion. House members are substantially safer than members of the Soviet Politburo were, while the Senate is friendly to incumbents as well. Open seats change the calculus, of course.

In terms of 2006, the GOP is defending seats in 3 states Bush lost. Democrats are defending 5 Bush won, and 3 that were decided by 2% or less. Unlike in the past, the GOP does not need Democrats to cross over... base mobilization and effective campaigning at the local level are more than enough to be highly competitive in virtually every race, with some particular differentiation.

In the 2 most Democratic states Bush won, the GOP appears to be in good shape... Snowe is virtually unbeatable and challengers to Chaffee in Rhode Island are fading faster than challengers to the Twins in the AL Central will. Pennslyvania, which promises to be a bruising battle, is the Democrats best (and basically only) hope at this point.

To make matters worse for Democrats, they face a very real nightmare in New Jersey that is only growing worse. Recently released tapes have shocked even citizens who assumed their state was easily the most corrupt in the Union, as Democratic party bosses are heard admitting they own even independently-wealthy Corzine, portraying him as a dog that laps up their milk.

Corzine will still probably win his race for Governor, but at the extreme least, Democrats will have to pray Corzine picks a reasonable fill-in and, even then, will have to throw money into the contest. Making this nightmare worse is that even Maryland is a scene of possible intrigue.

On the plus side for Democrats, the GOP has blown Michigan (whether this needs to be repeated every cycle is debateable, but seeing as elections are every 2 years it may as well be pointed out each time) and Nebraska is not looking good either. On the other hand, Nelson is now the most conservative Democrat in the Senate, so perhaps that small and possibly temporary consolation is worth little.

Most races remain very much up-in-the-air, depending on who enters the race going forward. The landscape favors the GOP on a state-by-state basis, so as of now I project a net GOP pick up of 2, primarily because I'm not buying Casey, though GOP +.5 (ML -130) or +1 (ML +120) would be a proper Vegas spread. I don't see many realistic scenarios where the Democrats gain more than one-- though 2 is not without reason; at this stage, there are scenarios that would be apocalyptic for Democrats (Hoeven, Thompson, Johanns all running, Byrd dies or retires, etc.), and those scenarios are very much a possibility. Washington is a wild card and a Rossi candidacy would be devastating insofar as it would stretch Democrats very thin financially (Cantwell has a decent amount of money but appears generally unwilling to use it on her campaign).

Those are my thoughts for now. Things to look for:
- nastiness in MD primary for Dems (or Mfume winning it)
- top challengers to declare or withdraw (NE, ND, WA, WI, FL, maybe ME, Jesus to return and run in MI)
- LaRouche supporter set to run against Lott. And you thought Akaka was safe.
- Democrats in MT, MO... well, you can always quote The Big Lebowski... "if you will it dude, it is no dream."

[Moooooo]

Those are my thoughts for now. Things to look for:
- nastiness in MD primary for Dems (or Mfume winning it)

Great post by the way.

The MD primary was looking like a bruiser at first, but the candidates are starting to drop like flys.  Its down to...

Mfume (He's in.)
Cardin (He's waited his whole life for this seat.  He will be in before summer.)
Van Hollen (He's young. I think he'll wait for Mikulski to retire.) 

That leaves a Cardin vs Mfume primary.  I really cannot see any scenario where Cardin would lose head to head vs Mfume.  Unless, Af-American turnout was 110%.  And Cardin is by far the strongest General election candidate.   Probably unbeatable.  His CD stretches from Ann Arundel County (A Rep. strong-hold) all the way through Baltimore City (A Dem. Strong hold).

[falling apart like the ashes of American flags]

now some Republican will pop in and say Steele can beat Cardin. LOL

[Moooooo]

now some Republican will pop in and say Steele can beat Cardin. LOL

I mean, Steele could beat Cardin, but the odds are stacked very much against him.

[falling apart like the ashes of American flags]

Steele would beat Cardin if Cardin was caught in bed with opebo and a Thai hooker. Not much of a chance otherwise.

[Fmr. Gov. NickG]

Who is Thompson?  Fred or Tommy?  I haven't heard anything to suggest either is running.

This year looks like a push to me barring some seismic national mood shift.  Probably Dem +0.5 if I had to pick.  Republicans gain almost all their Senate seats through Dem retirements, and they only have one to worry about right now (Minnesota).   As for Hoeven, Johanns, Rossi, even Capito and Steele...I doubt they will run.  I don't think most big-name Republicans will see 2006 as the year to make their move.   The Republicans are placing all their hopes on very uncertain candidates; at least the Dems got already their man in PA and TN.

I can't see PA as anything but a pure toss-up right now, and I think there is better than 50% that Chafee either (a) loses in a primary, (b) loses to Whitehouse, or (c) just makes things easier on everyone and switches parties.  Not a >50% chance of any one of those in particular...probably 20-25% chance of each, but a high probability of a Democratic pickup in sum.

[Akno21]

Those are my thoughts for now. Things to look for:
- nastiness in MD primary for Dems (or Mfume winning it)

Great post by the way.

The MD primary was looking like a bruiser at first, but the candidates are starting to drop like flys.  Its down to...

Mfume (He's in.)
Cardin (He's waited his whole life for this seat.  He will be in before summer.)
Van Hollen (He's young. I think he'll wait for Mikulski to retire.) 

That leaves a Cardin vs Mfume primary.  I really cannot see any scenario where Cardin would lose head to head vs Mfume.  Unless, Af-American turnout was 110%.  And Cardin is by far the strongest General election candidate.   Probably unbeatable.  His CD stretches from Ann Arundel County (A Rep. strong-hold) all the way through Baltimore City (A Dem. Strong hold).

Given the state of our voting system, that's quite possible

I'm not sure Cardin would be so safe against Mfume. I need to get racial population figures on this, but if MD is 25% African-American, and turnout is high, that's a pretty nice base. What Cardin needs is for Cummings to jump in and split the black vote.

[Sam Spade]

Those are my thoughts for now. Things to look for:
- nastiness in MD primary for Dems (or Mfume winning it)

Great post by the way.

The MD primary was looking like a bruiser at first, but the candidates are starting to drop like flys.  Its down to...

Mfume (He's in.)
Cardin (He's waited his whole life for this seat.  He will be in before summer.)
Van Hollen (He's young. I think he'll wait for Mikulski to retire.) 

That leaves a Cardin vs Mfume primary.  I really cannot see any scenario where Cardin would lose head to head vs Mfume.  Unless, Af-American turnout was 110%.  And Cardin is by far the strongest General election candidate.   Probably unbeatable.  His CD stretches from Ann Arundel County (A Rep. strong-hold) all the way through Baltimore City (A Dem. Strong hold).

Given the state of our voting system, that's quite possible

I'm not sure Cardin would be so safe against Mfume. I need to get racial population figures on this, but if MD is 25% African-American, and turnout is high, that's a pretty nice base. What Cardin needs is for Cummings to jump in and split the black vote.

Akno is quite correct here.  Maryland's AA population is 27.7% as of 2000.

I'm also loving the ridiculous partisan enthusiasm here 18 months from any sort of election. 

I'm not going to really make any comments on most of these elections until I know which incumbents are running or who the challengers will be, but the natural odds say that if this country stays at its roughly 49-49% split (which has become a minor change of 51-47% GOP split over the last 2 elections), then fundamentally the numbers at the outset say that the GOP has the ever so slight advantage (0.1 or 0.2 in the betting halls for me) because only 15 of their seats are up for re-election, whereas 17 of the Democrat seats are up for reelection.

Just injecting a little realism into the thing.