Al Franken

[minionofmidas]

He was polling well as long as he had a Dem opponent... then he sunk.
Not sure what happened.

[minionofmidas]

He was polling well as long as he had a Dem opponent... then he sunk.
Not sure what happened.

The not paying taxes thing hurt and then the Playboy article hurt more.

Tell me more. I didn't really follow the campaign.

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Oh yes. Much as minority candidates tend to be under tighter scrutiny. Etc.

[minionofmidas]

He was polling well as long as he had a Dem opponent... then he sunk.
Not sure what happened.

The not paying taxes thing hurt and then the Playboy article hurt more.

Tell me more. I didn't really follow the campaign.

There have been numerous articles on it - a Google search would be quite effective (honestly I don't have time to look up everything  )

Not a problem. I thought maybe you could just throw out the story in two or three sentences, saving me the bother of reading.

[minionofmidas]

Arnold Schwarzenegger?

That race is the political definition of the word "aberration." How often is an incumbent Governor recalled and replaced by an action star/political novice? I don't think that can be used as a prime example of anything other than the nuttiness of CA politics.

Also, had this been a straight one-round contest, Schwarzenegger might not have won - the media focussed on the fact that Schwarzenegger received slightly more votes than there were no votes to the recall, but of course many people voted no/Schwarzenegger. One would assume that Schwarzenegger was their second preference after Davis (but ahead of Bustamante, McClintock, Camejo etc). Of course, some McClintock voters would have tactically voted Schwarzenegger under fairer rules, so *maybe* Schwarzenegger would have won nonetheless.

I'll reiterate here what I've said before. Al Franken cannot win this race. A majority of Minnesotans will not vote for a former SNL writer with no electoral experience. Besides a healthy Rolodex of Hollywood friends, Franken didn't have anything to offer as a candidate. The only way Franken can win is if Coleman loses.

Franken must run an aggressive campaign that makes the choice of Coleman so unpalatable to low information MN voters that Franken is the only option, albeit by default. Besides running a barage of negative ads blasting Coleman on Iraq and gas prices, Franken must establish a semblance of seriousness as a candidate. If he can handle himself with dignity and aplomb at the Senate debates (which is a huge if), he'll cross the basic gravitas threshold and can win this race.

In other words, neither candidate can win on his own record. Whoever this election is mostly about, loses.
And it looks like that will be Franken.

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I don't share your relative optimism on Oregon, but otherwise this looks right. Also, noted that you apparently don't think much of Allen either.

[minionofmidas]

I now rank this race as the eighth most likely GOP seat to flip -- behind VA, NM, NH, CO, AK, OR, and MS -- which is a far cry from the post-2002 prognostications that deemed this race the top Democratic take-over opportunity of the '08 cycle.

I don't share your relative optimism on Oregon, but otherwise this looks right. Also, noted that you apparently don't think much of Allen either.

That would be a fair inference. After the aforementioned eight, I rank Maine, North Carolina, and Kentucky as the top remaining Democratic pick-up opportunities. Kansas and Georgia are sleeper races. If Obama actually beats McCain by ten points (which I think is exceptionally unlikely), those two states will be competitive in the general, and that might be the boost needed to nudge the Senate races into the competitive category.

So, in other words, your rankings look exactly like mine, with Oregon and Mississippi flipped (and I expect that long-term you're more likely to be right).  I really argued with myself about putting MN in Likely R for many of the reasons mentioned above, but I'm choosing to play it conservative for now there.

I should add that if your theorized event occurs, it may be enough to do something about Roberts, but I really doubt it about Chambliss. (jmo - I have my reasons here)

For now, our rankings are quite similar.  I hope that's a good thing

Perhaps my lack of emotional distance from the Oregon contest is inflating my view of its competitiveness.  Of the two long-shot races, I agree that Roberts is more likely to lose than Chambliss. In the Roberts' race, the Democrats have a relatively well-funded candidate with a statewide network of supporters. The Chambliss race features a fragmented group of candidates, none of whom has the ability to self-fund against Chambliss, who is methodically adding to his burgeoning warchest.

Taking Rasmussen at face value, just call me leery of MS, where Wicker's only getting 76% of Republicans and is still tied.  That smells like a name recognition issue, which usually gets corrected as time goes on.

noting that Wicker's low name rec was one of the reasons Harry cited for considering this one competitive (before we had any polls)