Moe Lane

Now that we’ve had some time to digest last week’s special election results – or, in the Democrats’ case, have the equivalent of a gallstone attack over them – I think that it’s a time that we look at some of the House’s special election results over the last two election cycles generally.  Partially because we’re starting to get enough samples to do a laughingly pseudo-scientific analysis of them; and partially because doing so will allow us to destroy the Other Side’s laughingly pseudo-scientific analysis.  Less cynically, there are general trends that might be discernible, down there in the muck.

Below the fold is a look at every special election to date in the 111th and 112th Congress.  I chose not to look at the 110th Congress because I’ll readily enough concede that the net +3 Democratic gain was part of that party’s generally successful 2008 election strategy -  although I note with some amusement that the three seats (IL-14, LA-06, & MS-01) all flipped back in the 2010 election, which means that it was a wash overall anyway.  I also didn’t include LA-01′s flip (and flip-back), mostly because while Cao’s win looked like a special election it really wasn’t.  Likewise, it was also a wash.

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I’d like to put the history of special elections in the 111th Congress to date in context of well, the 111th Congress.  Which is to say that, after all the drama and excitement that we’ve seen thus far, the end result is that… we’re right back to where we started.

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I’d like to unpack this paragraph from the Hotline, mostly because the assumptions behind it are in in large part why the Democrats all of a sudden have found themselves in trouble this election cycle.

But the elections present a problem for the NRCC, too. The 2 specials so far during Pres. Obama’s term have both been in GOP-heavy seats. Dems have won both. The DCCC knows how to run and win a race; special elections put pressure on the NRCC, which already has limited resources, to demonstrate they can too.

To begin: “The 2 specials so far during Pres. Obama’s term have both been in GOP-heavy seats. Dems have won both.”

Err. No. To quote a scientist friend of mine; that’s not even wrong. (more…)

A GOP retention in NH & a GOP pick-up in AL.  The second is probably more noteworthy: until quite recently, it took real skill for a Democrat to lose a state legislature election in Alabama.  Heck, the Democrats still hold a four-to-three advantage there, and their national party has been reflexively attacking Southerners for three decades now.

…I hesitate to call it a ‘meme.’ At any rate: somebody – presumably somebody from the other side of the spectrum – attempted to derail Mark Steyn’s observation that Adam Nagourney is sounding a little bereft-of-information these days by rhetorically asking:

You do realize that Democrats have won every single federal-level election since Obama’s election, right? Five.

Err… wrong, actually.  Eight.  And the attempt to eliminate the loss of NJ’s governorship (and pretty much VA as a whole) from consideration is both duly noted, and mocked. (more…)