What would your 2006 U.S. Senate strategy be?

[nini2287]

I know we have some optomistic goals (AZ, VA, MS, ME, OH, NV) but barring a retirement, I don't think we should invest our resources on those races, since the GOP has seasoned incumbents who aren't likely to have Bunning-like collapses.

TX, UT, IN are safe seats even with retirements, no need to invest money there.

As stated before, PA should be our #1 target, I would make sure Casey runs, because I think he would be the only candidate to beat Santorum, with another candidate (Hoeffel, Hafer, etc.) this race is downgraded to tossup/slight lean to Santorum.

RI should be an easy pickup, though I would prefer to have Chafee switch parties rather than running Langverin/Kennedy against him.  Switching parties would embarass the GOP and keep a decent guy in Washington and further secure the House seats (though I wouldn't worry about losing them anyway).

Although the MT Dems are resurgent, I think Gov. Schweitzer could be the only person capable of taking down  Burns, which may be possible considering 2000 wasn't an off-year election and Schweitzer has some experince now.  However, if Schweitzer doesn't run, which he may not considering he just got elected governor, I wouldn't spend many resources in this race.

If Craig Thomas retires, a Cubin vs. Freudenthal race could make WY interesting and considering the state's population, we wouldn't need to spend too much money to make the state competitive.  Granted, this is a state that went nearly 70% for Bush, it may be worth looking at.

I like Ike Skelton to challenge Talent in MO, but he is probably too old/well-respected in the House to run.  Claire McCaskill remains a possiblity, but if neither of them choose to run, I would throw this in with Arizona in the "nice but unrealistic" category.

On the Dem side, MA and CA are safe even if Kennedy and Feinstein retire.

CT is rock-solid Dem with Lieberman, but if he retires, I'd be worried about this seat with 3 popular GOP representatives plus an incredibly popular governor.  However, I don't think Joe will retire anytime soon.

MD and WV will stay Dem if Sarbanes/Byrd run for re-election, but I'm not sure how likely that is.  MD has a good chance of staying Dem with Martin O'Malley, although Michael Steele might "steal" this seat.   WV on the other hand, I'm worried about, as I expect Rep. Capito will run for the Republicans and I would encourage Wise/Mollohan/Rahall to run for us, and in that case we'd have a decent chance of defending the seat.

NJ is an interesting race, with a Corzine retirement.  I don't know how more times the NJ Dems can afford to shoot themselves in the foot (Torcelli, McGreevey), but I wouldn't be afriad to spend resources to make s u re that Andrews/Menedez defend this seat.

I throw DE, NY and HI in the category as "safe unless a certain Republican runs" with Delaware being Rep. Castle, Rudy Guiliani for New York and Gov. Lingle for Hawaii, but I think those seats still lean Democratic, and I'd only spend money there if those Republicans ran.

FL and MN scare me, as they will probably be complete toss-ups, and in fact the Florida seat will lean Republican if Jeb Bush runs.  I would invest a lot of resources into defending Nelson and Dayton regardless of who runs.

NE also scares me though with Gov. Johanns probably out of the picture, I feel like it may lean towards Nelson unless Osborne runs, in which case we're in trouble.  Regardless, I would invest resources on this seat.

I think Conrad will be okay in ND, but if the Republicans find a Thune-type candidate, Conrad may be in trouble, but with this being an off-year election, I wouldn't get too carried away in spending money on this race.

WI and NM fall into the same category of unaccomplished incumbents who will likely be easily re-elected.  I don't think it's worth spending any money on these races unless Kohl or Bingaman retire, in which case I would try to get Dave Obey to run in WI (he may be too old), in which case it should be easy to defend, otherwise WI is a tossup and NM may lean Republican with Heather Wilson likely running for the GOP.  I wouldn't spend resources on these races unless there's a retirement.

WA and MI fall into the category of "Lean Dem for now but tossup if certain Republicans run".  In Washington, Cantwell is vulnerable to Rossi or Jennifer Dunn, and if they run the race becomes a tossup.  With MI, Candice Miller or some other high-powered Republicans run, Stabenow becomes vulnerable, but I think she will probably survive.  Regardless of the GOP candidates, I would invest resources on these races as neither are rock solid for re-election.

[nini2287]

I agree with just about everything you said except....

I like Ike Skelton to challenge Talent in MO, but he is probably too old/well-respected in the House to run.  Claire McCaskill remains a possiblity, but if neither of them choose to run, I would throw this in with Arizona in the "nice but unrealistic" category.

If we run Jay Nixon or Joe Maxwell I think we have a great chance of defeating Talent.

MD has a good chance of staying Dem with Martin O'Malley, although Michael Steele might "steal" this seat.

If Sarbanes does retire and Steele decides to run, we can run Mayor Martin O'Malley and have a good chance of keeping that seat.  Or we could run Kwesi Mfume and lock that seat up for sure.  Either way I dont see the Republicans picking up this seat.  To much money will be focused on getting Ehrlich re-elected in 2006.

FL and MN scare me, as they will probably be complete toss-ups, and in fact the Florida seat will lean Republican if Jeb Bush runs.  I would invest a lot of resources into defending Nelson and Dayton regardless of who runs.

If Jeb runs I would write Nelson a thank you letter for his years served in the senate and wish him luck in the future.

I'll concede to you and Akno's better j udgement on Maryland, but I think Missouri may have moved too far to the right to elect a Democrat (look at the 2002 results, Talent beat an incumbent Democrat with emotions over Mel Carnahan's death still fairly high).

I forgot to add...

I wouldn't bother to challenge Jeffords in VT, he is basically a Democrat and a challenge from the left may split the vote enough to have a Republican take the seat.

I think TN should be a high priority for us, as it would possibly elevate Ford to national status (maybe a notch below Obama) and this may be the best chance to elect him to higher office (Gov seat is fill until 2010, and I don't think he could unseat Alexander in 2008 or whomever the new Republican senator (Zach Wamp?) would be in 2012).  However, I think if Ford runs, Tennessee will be a tossup with maybe a slight lean against us, but certainly a winnable race.

[nini2287]

TX, UT, IN are safe seats even with retirements, no need to invest money there.

That's a really crappy way of thinking.  Indiana has one Democratic Senator already; it's not impossible to get another one.  Utah could run either of the Matheson brothers and probably win unless the Republicans could pull someone really great out of their bag.  And Texas is not as Conservative as people want others to think.  It is somewhat likely that we could win a Senate seat in that state--I mean, cmon, North Dakota has 2 Democratic Senate seats!

Bayh was the son of a popular governor and used the family name to become highly repsected on his own right.  Indiana also seems to pretty devoid of any feasible Dem candidates (we lost the Governorship and a House seat in the last election), while there seems to be a few potential GOP noms in a state that went over 60% for Bush

The Republicans would have to pull something great out of their bag to win Utah?  I was in Utah this summer and there is nothing even remotely liberal about it.  With regards to the Matheson brothers, Scott would not win the seat (he lost by 15 points in the governor's race-why would he be competitive in the Senate?) and Jim has a slight chance of winning, but I doubt he would run since he represents a highly Republican seat and he's starting to settle into safety.

I do agree that Texas is not as Conservative as anyone thinks, but like Indiana the Dem bench is very shallow while the Republicans have a plethora of candidates they could put up and win with.

With respect to North Dakota, Dorgan and Conrad are both experienced incumbents who have long voting records of moderation (I'll be it people like Jim Matheson are very moderate as well, but he's not the incumbent), and once they retire the seats will probably fall to the Republicans.