State Legislative Chambers in LA, MS, and VA

[JohnnyLongtorso]

I'm going to wait until I see the new maps before I predict anything (beyond the Democrats getting wiped out in LA).

[JohnnyLongtorso]

Green district: 50.7 McCain.
Yellow district: 51.1 McCain.

Not that you would need to pack in exurby districts like that, since Obama way over-performed in Loudoun and Prince William. People think Fairfax is a uniformly Democratic county now, when it's not; the outer edges of it (particularly places like Great Falls, Clifton, and Centreville) are still pretty Republican.

[JohnnyLongtorso]

You're right, it's more the area between Centreville and Chantilly.

[JohnnyLongtorso]

There's talk of merging McLean (and possibly Great Falls) with one of the Arlington districts, which has gotten all of the Arlington liberals in a tizzy, because apparently it will take away their voice in the legislature. I guess they'd rather be in the minority as long as it kept their representative in Arlington.

[JohnnyLongtorso]

Yeah, something like that. I don't get it either, but then, I don't live in NoVa.

[JohnnyLongtorso]

I just noticed that two more Louisiana Democratic state legislators jumped ship, one in the Senate and the other in the House.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Billy_Chandler
The Senate is now 21R, 18D.

http://www.therepublic.com/view/story/3769860428dd4288aa3a8905a0fa1612/LA--Lawmaker-Party-Switch/
The House is now 53R, 46D, 4I, 2 vacant.

You're way behind the times, the latest Senator to switch parties is Norby Chabert, who was just elected two years ago. The Democrats are down to 17 seats. What I'm curious to find out is how many white Democrats will be left in the Senate come 2012; currently (and obviously this is subject to change) they have 9 of the 17 seats.

[JohnnyLongtorso]

I just noticed that two more Louisiana Democratic state legislators jumped ship, one in the Senate and the other in the House.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Billy_Chandler
The Senate is now 21R, 18D.

http://www.therepublic.com/view/story/3769860428dd4288aa3a8905a0fa1612/LA--Lawmaker-Party-Switch/
The House is now 53R, 46D, 4I, 2 vacant.

You're way behind the times, the latest Senator to switch parties is Norby Chabert, who was just elected two years ago. The Democrats are down to 17 seats. What I'm curious to find out is how many white Democrats will be left in the Senate come 2012; currently (and obviously this is subject to change) they have 9 of the 17 seats.

I wonder how the voters will react to the party switchers in the fall elections.  Sometimes, as well all know, party changers aren't treated well when they come up for re-election.

It (at least D to R) seems to be pretty common in Louisiana; I don't know that it will be as big a deal as Parker Griffith or Arlen Specter.

[JohnnyLongtorso]

Can't really say until the new maps come out, but Mississippi will probably be tough, since they're pushing to have at least 1/3rd of the districts in the House be majority-black. Louisiana will probably be easier to accomplish, since the Democrats are losing seats in New Orleans and the Republicans are gaining them in the Baton Rouge suburbs.

[JohnnyLongtorso]

-there are talks of running multiple Senate districts across Lake Ponchartrain; whatever the justification they may use this would be in practice a very harsh Republican gerrymander.

Is that really necessary? I'd expect all the black parts of New Orleans/Jefferson Parish to be stuck together to maintain the black-majority districts, and all the white parts of Jefferson Parish and the north shore would be safe Republican territory.

[JohnnyLongtorso]

The NJ primaries are tonight. Exciting!

Let me guess: all the party-endorsed candidates will win.

[JohnnyLongtorso]

I wrote a lengthy analysis of this year's Virginia State Senate elections.

[JohnnyLongtorso]

Republicans are targeting something like 20 seats in the House, so probably.

[JohnnyLongtorso]

It doesn't really matter; he's been fighting that ballot access case for months, I doubt he's actually had time to campaign in the district.

[JohnnyLongtorso]

I wonder if Carl Genthner can take out crazy ol' Bob Marshall in VA House 13.  It's 3 points more Democrat since redistricting, and now the combined precincts are close to the state as a whole in recent election results.

Probably not, the district still has Marshall's base in Prince William County, and Genthner hasn't raised enough money to be competitive.

[JohnnyLongtorso]

It was a safe Democratic seat in western Massachusetts (Pittsfield). The Green ran in 2010 and got 45% of the vote in a two-way race with the Democrat, while the Independent was a former Pittsfield City Council member.

[JohnnyLongtorso]

I'll have one more update prior to the election, once the final fundraising reports come out. Basically I see it as a tossup. It's really hard to predict, though, since there's no polling.

[JohnnyLongtorso]

NLS is ostensibly a Democratic activist/political consultant, but his site has become such a gossip rag in the past few years and he's developed so many random grudges against Democratic politicians that I find him hard to take seriously as a political analyst. Plus he likes to rate as many races as "tossup" as possible so he can maintain his "99.7% accurate" claim. After all, whichever side wins, he's right, it was a tossup.

That said, I really don't think anyone can accurately predict what's going to happen tomorrow; turnout in these off-off-year elections is wildly erratic, and there's been no polling.

[JohnnyLongtorso]

I'll have one more update prior to the election, once the final fundraising reports come out. Basically I see it as a tossup. It's really hard to predict, though, since there's no polling.

With an evenly split Senate and a two-thirds majority in the House of Delegates, do you think the Virginia Republican Party would have better off in the Senate if they had decided to hold off redistricting until next year?  Would they have won an outright majority in the Senate with the old districts? 

Wouldn't have been an option, it would have gone to the courts. A court-drawn map would probably have resulted in a Republican takeover of the Senate but Democratic gains in the House (but not enough to gain a majority).

[JohnnyLongtorso]

The Republican won in HD-87 by 51 votes.