…”Do Democrats Have a Shot at the House?”
Not particularly, but I write for a paper whose readers don’t want to see that.
I understand that the folks working for the regular media corporations have minimum output levels to consider, but come on. At this point in 2010 it was blatantly obvious that the Democrats were going to lose the House; the only question was how far the rubble would bounce. Today, we’re looking at… an election. The Democrats could net ten; the Republicans could net… I don’t know, five or so… and it’s probably going to be only a couple of seats, either way. We’ll win some, they’ll win some, Nancy Pelosi will not be Speaker of the House in 2013.
And thank God for that.
More or less via @CTIronman
I’m not so sure that five is the ceiling for Republican gains. With Obama dragging down the ticket and redistricting gains in so many red states (and losses in blue states), I think the GOP might possible net 15 or 20. Granted, I haven’t actually gone and counted race by race (which I should probably do), but that’s more of a gut feeling.
Remember, a lot of the seats Republicans picked up were those held by the few remaining blue dog Democrats, the very type of candidates that will find it nearly impossible to win a Dem primary as a non-incumbent if they waiver from the liberal orthodox on abortion, gay marriage, gun control, ObamaCare, etc. Most of those seats may stay red until another drastic economic meltdown or some vague sense of sanity creeps into the Democratic Party.
To be sure, the GOP will not net anywhere near 63 seat. But there’s no reason they can’t add 10 or more if Mittens wallops Hopey McChange.
The part I find laughable is the beginning. He rates the Presidential race as “Obama with a slight lead.” Which, if you look over @ Ace of Spades early electoral maps (and no one else is doing these yet, that I’ve seen), it is ONLY in the sense the popular vote will be close because Obama will win the SSRs of California and NY by large margins. Otherwise, what we’re looking at is toss-up states in the last election trending Red and a number of Blue States turning Purple.
Then he says the Senate is a ‘toss-up.’ That’s even more amusing. The Democrats are clearly playing defense in the Senate already, and it’s only going to get worse for them.
But hey, what does one expect from the Fishwrap of Record?