Top House Targets in 2010

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Jim Marshall, Parker Griffith and Bobby Bright should worry about 2010.  They definitely have to be some of the most vulnerable. 

If Griffith can build up a personal following in the rural parts of his district he might be alright (Cramer was in the same situation in much of the '90's). I don't know about Bright. Marshall is a dead man walking.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Look, unless Obama's approvals are sky-high (I'll say above 65%) come Election Day in 2010, any Democrat south of the Mason-Dixon line not in a black-majority district or an affluent district should effectively start campaigning now.  Yes now.

What about Arkansas? Those guys aren't going anywhere.

I think it's hyperbole used to make a point clearer. The basic point is seems obviously true, though I wonder whether other areas (translation; places that swung hard to the Democrats this year because the troubles in the economy were causing particular problems locally) might cause more trouble than the group mentioned above in 2010.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

However, we must always remember that just because people appear safe now does not mean they will be safe in the future.

Very true; we only need to look at how plenty of Republicans who were "safe" in 2002 and 2004 lost in 2006 or last week. Or at 1994. Still, I think you can generally see certain signs of possible vulnerability under the surface (beyond "Presidential candidate x did badly there" and so on), though the way House elections work can make it harder than it might otherwise be.

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The amusing part is that the district in AR that seems least likely to fall in a hypothetical midterm nightmare is the one that voted for a Republican Rep as recently as 1998...

[Filuwaúrdjan]

However, we must always remember that just because people appear safe now does not mean they will be safe in the future.

Very true; we only need to look at how plenty of Republicans who were "safe" in 2002 and 2004 lost in 2006 or last week. Or at 1994. Still, I think you can generally see certain signs of possible vulnerability under the surface (beyond "Presidential candidate x did badly there" and so on), though the way House elections work can make it harder than it might otherwise be.

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The seats Democrats lost in 1994 were never very safe.  20 of the seats they lost were open seats and another 16 were freshman that were elected narrowly in 1992.  There were only a few Democrats that had been "safe" in earlier years that lost in 1994(Smith in IA-04, Price in NC-04, Bilbray in NV-01, and Brooks in TX-09 were the only "safe" seats the Democrats lost in 1994). 

A few is enough for this point I think.