Democrats Face a Grim Future -National Journal

[Skill and Chance]

This will all be resolved by 2022.  With Obama being reelected, that means Democrats will miss at most one chance to get the House back (2018 with a Republican president) before there are new lines and they have held up about as well as anyone thought possible in the Senate.  What would have been really bad is if Romney won and narrowly flipped the Senate in 2012.  Republicans could have easily held full control for 8+ years.  Also, there's plenty of executive branch officials and mayors/county executives who report to at least CD-sized populations to run statewide.  Don't worry about this until 2020.

[Skill and Chance]

It won't get better for Dems if Hillary wins in 2016...

That's unclear.  Working white women turn out much more reliably in midterms.  And even so, a Kennedy/Scalia retirement with a Dem president and senate could be worth 40 state legislatures and 230 R+5 house seats IMO.

[Skill and Chance]

It won't get better for Dems if Hillary wins in 2016...

That's unclear.  Working white women turn out much more reliably in midterms.  And even so, a Kennedy/Scalia retirement with a Dem president and senate could be worth 40 state legislatures and 230 R+5 house seats IMO.

Good point.  The worst scenario for Dems long-term is a narrow, narrow Clinton victory with the GOP keeping a strong hold on the House/Senate, followed by a 2019-2020 recession.  While improbable, this outcome is somewhat plausible and would make life very, very hard for the Democrats.

Yes, and the SCOTUS consequences of a Hillary win are limited because Democrats need a miracle to keep the Senate past 2018.  Democrats have gotten too excited about trends that are likely to help them in 2040, not now.  If/when the demographic tide does roll in, note that they probably just trade the House problem for a Senate problem.  AZ/FL/GA/NC/TX are all large states.