Official Post your 2006 Senate Election Prediction Maps

[TexasGurl]

[Mr. Paleoconservative]

My latests predictions...

[Jake]

Maryland...LOL

[Sam Spade]

I'm moving Ohio to toss-up, just because of the Mason-Dixon/SUSA split in opinion of the race.

[Harry]

This is my gut feeling.

[MAS117]

[© Tweed the Younger]

Connecticut and Rhode Island races depend entirely on the primary.  Obviously the Republicans can't win in Connecticut, but it could go Independent or Democratic.  Rhode Island is a dogfight with Chafee in the race and a walkover if he loses to Laffey in the primary.  Chafee really should run as a Democrat.  Hawaii also has an interesting primary with Ed Case being a little bitch but it'll go Democratic easily either way.

Changes from last time:

Minnesota from R --> D: Kennedy hasn't led in a poll yet.  If this race is just going to be generic democrat v. generic republican, which it is starting to look like, it's going to be very hard for Kennedy to win.

Montana from R --> D: Burns is clearly trailing at this instant.  He has time to catch up, but in reality, he has to be the underdog at this point.

Pennsylvania from R --> D: I decided to be sane for the hell of it.

[Harry]

Glad to see you've come to your senses, Boss.

[Sam Spade]

I'm going to move Arizona back to Likely R.  This really has little to do with Rasmussen, but the BRC poll which said otherwise didn't look correct in terms of crosstabs or answers and without another poll saying anything concurrent for a while, I'm going back to my gut (Virginia will be much more in play than Arizona).

About Virginia, if another poll comes out saying what Rasmussen does, expect me to move it to Lean R.  Unlike any other state where an incumbent is running, what I'm stating below could happen.

Frankly, Webb could reach 45%-46% (the Kerry number), if Virginia Democrats treat Allen as if he is Bush and register anti-GOP sentiment against that (which is possible).  The last 4% is what would be a bitch to get for Webb, if it settles into a Presidential-like contest.  Potentially, this is what I see shaping up.  It would be interesting.

Just as an overall viewpoint, expect me to be more conservative on Senate races until the end, because there will be a lot of polls after Labor Day to gauge the races on.

I will be more liberal on House races, because national trends tend to impact these races more.  Also, there is simply less polling, so if a wave is growing I'd like to be on top of it, rather than rushing to correct. 

[Harry]

Sam:  wanna make some sort of wager on Arizona?  I'll wager on Pederson and you on Kyl?

[Sam Spade]

Sam:  wanna make some sort of wager on Arizona?  I'll wager on Pederson and you on Kyl?

I don't wager on politics unless I have seen both candidates publicly, but I'm curious as to what your terms are.

[Downwinder]

June 2006:

Again, this is based mostly on my gut feeling, and it has changed a bit since my predictions in March.  I still believe that negative ratings for Bush and the Republican Congress will swing several toss-up seats to Democrat, and hold the margin of victory down in a Safe Republican seats.  I'm not basing anything on certain polls, but rather on accumulation of polls and other media, and the aforementioned gut feeling.


Maryland:  Cardin wins the open seat versus Steele, 56%-43%.

Pennsylvania:  While not the blow-out that it might have been, Casey still defeats Santorum, 54%-45%.

Montana:  Tester burns Burns, 54%-44%.

Rhode Island:  After a close primary win over Laffey, Chafee loses to Whitehouse, 53%-46%.

Minnesota:  Klobuchar takes the open seat over Kennedy, 52%-46%.

Missouri:  McCaskill beats Talent, 52%-47%.

New Jersey:  Menendez wins over Kean, 51%-48%.

Ohio:  Brown edges out DeWine, 51%-49%


Other interesting races:

Arizona:  Kyl 54%, Pederson 44%

Washington:  Cantwell 55%, McGavick 43%.

Tennessee:  Corker 57%, Ford 42%.

Virginia:  Allen 58%, Webb 42%.

Nebraska:  Nelson 59%, Ricketts 41%.

Michigan:  Stabenow 59%, Bouchard 40%.

Nevada:  Ensign 60%, Carter 40%.  (I move it to safe republican, now that Goodman is not in the running.)

Florida: Nelson 64%, Harris 30%.  (Only included because it was supposed to be interesting, and is embarrasingly not.)

Connecticut:  Assuming Lieberman survives his primary challenge from Lamont, Lieberman 75%, Schlesinger 20%.  If Lamont is the Democratic nominee, and Lieberman runs as independent:  Lieberman 53%, Lamont 35%, Schlesinger 10%; but then who does Joe caucus with?  Right now, I go with Lieberman winning the primary and general.


R 50
D 49
I 1

[○∙◄☻¥tπ[╪AV┼cVê└]

I assume you put the wrong color in WV, Downwinder?

[Downwinder]

I assume you put the wrong color in WV, Downwinder?

Dammit, I did.  Sorry, that.  WV is just so easy to forget!

[Inks.LWC Supports Chuck Hagel]

How do you create these maps?

[Downwinder]

Sorry to ask a question, probably asked many times before, but how do you generate these senate maps?  In any event, the GOP drops Pennsylvania and Montana, and picks up New Jersey, for a GOP loss of one seat.

It's quite simple, actually: go here, set the winner of each state and the percentage you want, then click "Show map link" at the bottom, and finally copy and paste the text you see into the post in which you want the map to appear.  To make a state grey, just set it to "toss-up" (the T column).

As a more advanced thing to do, if you want to set Vermont to be green (for "independent"), look at the thing you copied and pasted for something that looks like this:

VT=#;#;#

where "#" is some number.

To make it green, change the first number to "3", which is the number for "independent", so it then looks like this:

VT=3;#;#

[Smash255]

[Smash255]

You can also go here and click to create your own map

http://uselectionatlas.org/PRED/SENATE/2006/pred.php

[Inks.LWC Supports Chuck Hagel]

Lt B: R hold
Dk B: R gain

Lt R: D hold
Dk r: D gain

Lt G: I hold
Lt G: I gain

[Sam Spade]

I decided to give an August 1 update to be nice.    Little has changed, though.

Safe Democratic
California
Delaware
Florida
Hawaii
Massachusetts
New Mexico
New York
North Dakota
Vermont (I)*
West Virginia
Wisconsin

Likely Democratic
Connecticut (whether it's Lieberman or Lamont, it's still a Dem seat.  I'm just waiting until the primary is over to see if the Republicans attempt to put up a better candidate).
Michigan
Nebraska
Pennsylvania (D)

Lean Democratic
Maryland*
Minnesota*
Montana (R) (still waiting on more polling)
Washington

Toss Up
Missouri (R) 
New Jersey (D)*
Ohio (R)
Rhode Island (R)

Lean Republican

Likely Republican
Arizona
Nevada (one poll does not make a major move for me, unless M-D.  So, I'm leaving it here until more polling comes out)
Tennessee
Virginia

Safe Republican
Indiana
Maine
Mississippi
Texas
Utah
Wyoming

[AuH2O]

Me, bold indicates change in party (if tossup, I still project):
+= open seat

Safe Democratic
California
Delaware
Florida
Hawaii
Massachusetts
New Mexico
New York
North Dakota
Vermont (Socialist)
West Virginia
Wisconsin

Likely Democratic
Connecticut-- this could change to lean D if a rich, moderate GOP business-type replaces Schlesinger.

Nebraska

Pennsylvania

Lean Democratic
+Maryland-- I still don't think Mfume can win the primary. If he does, Leans GOP.

Michigan-- Bouchard has definite upside. I think DeVos wins narrowly as does Stabenow.

Washington-- by all rights, Cantwell should probably be considered a better Senator than Murray. But this is politics, and the GOP got lucky with a particularly strong candidate. Leans Dem by virtue of political environment.

Toss Up
+Minnesota-- DFL: how the mighty have fallen.

+New Jersey-- Lots of undecideds. Kean is running a smart campaign and this will go down to the wire.

Rhode Island-- going to be close.

Lean Republican
Missouri-- Polls are close, but. But Talent defeated an incumbent Dem in 2002. But he has lots of money. But Missouri is a GOP-leaning state. It'll be close, but Talent will win. 

Montana-- Rasmussen was off. It happens. Look, Burns is kind of a clown, but Tester is too liberal to unseat an incumbent Republican in Montana. He's no Schweitzer, and he couldn't do it either (now he could, but that's because he's been Governor).

Ohio-- Sherrod Brown isn't going to win. That's what it really boils down to.

Likely Republican
Arizona-- please...

+Tennessee-- the Ford that wasn't.



Safe Republican
Indiana
Maine
Mississippi
Nevada
Texas
Utah

Virginia-- dream on. Allen has more money in his couch than Webb does in his campaign coffers.

Wyoming

*********************

Overall, I don't think that many seats will change hands. The open seats probably will be split, possibly 3-1 either way but more likely 2-2. Democrats have a better shot at 3/4 than does the GOP. Democrats will take out at least 1 GOP incumbent but probably not more than 2. Burns and Chafee are the two most likely victims after Santorum.

Cantwell and Stabenow are the only 2 Dem incumbents with serious challengers. Both are currently favored but there's around a 25% chance one of them will wind up losing, Cantwell being more likely.

[© Tweed the Younger]

Updated

[Frodo]

Key:

Deep Red -Democratic gains
Pink -Democratic holds

Dark Blue -Republican gains
Light Blue -Republican holds

Light Green -Independent/Third Party holds (Bernie Sanders)



------------------------------------------------

In short, Republicans will end up with a 51-48-1 majority in the Senate. 

[Kevin]

Here's my prediction



I have areally good feeling that the Republicans will pull it out in MD and NJ. With MI I feel Stabenow is vunerable because 1. she is not a strong canidate at all 2. She was listed as one of the most incompentent Senators in the Senate 3. The Republicans picked a good canidate.     

[Nym90]

No chance of Michigan going Republican. Stabenow isn't the most dynamic Senator but she has voted the way her constituents would want her to vote. Bouchard is too conservative to win in any event. Add in the national Democratic tide and it won't be close.