Talk Elections

The Senate is all that's standing in the way of the Marriage Protection Act right now, with a weak GOP lead of 53-47 (that's counting jumpin' Jim as a Democrat).

Three GOP seats are open; one of them will belong to Obama soon; two are close.

Meanwhile, there are five open Democrat seats, ALL in the deep south (though one is Florida)! I think Republicans will pull that one off too, but Alan Keyes will hand them a net gain of only 4.

But the Daschle factor could bring it back to five, should Thune be successful in unseating the anti-Bush minority leader.

This could be big. The GOP has a better than 50-50 shot at most of these seats.

My prediction: GOP 58-41-1

It's not going to get them the 60 procedural votes, but they may be too close for Democratic comfort.

Your thoughts?

Follow the leader. I'm a believer in coattails, and this year the Senate is doing battle on Bush turf.

It's like home field advantage. If you are otherwise even, you probably will win in your own house.

If there is a strong Bush win- say he marginally wins the debates and nothing of significance transpires otherwise- I think there are going to be a lot of crying Dems come Election Day.

The current Senate is 51-49, not 53-47. It is highly unlikely that the Republicans could make a net gain of 5 seats, and even less likely that they could pick up 7. They'd have to win every single race that is even remotely competitive. Assuming they lose Illinois, they'd have to gain North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Louisiana, and South Dakota, plus hold all of the rest of their own competitive seats (Colorado, Oklahoma, Alaska). Gaining 7 would require them to also score upsets in places like Wisconsin and Washington in addition to all of the above.

All of those seats are in the south (except South Dakota), and one of them is in Oklahoma.

They're going to win at least 3, and will probably win 5.

You're correct that the lead is 51-49, though. My mistake.

Philip, do a little research before you post.

My take on the senate races is:

Republicans seats switch to Dem - Alaska, Oklahoma, Colorado and Illinois. Net gain of 4 seats.

Democrat seats switch to Republican - South Carolina, Georgia,

3 seats too close to call - all 3 of them are currently Dem seats - Florida, Louisiana, North Carolina.

I really can't see a scenario where the republican net gain will be more than 2 seats.

Sure, if you think Dems are going to win 3 tossups that are in Bush territory (CO, OK, AK). But they aren't going to win all 3... they'll be lucky to win 1.

To GOP:
South Carolina
Georgia
South Dakota

To Dems:
Illinois
Colorado
Alaska
Oklahoma

South Dakota is staying Dem.  Where have you been man?  I need more Dem support for our district in here! WOOT WOOT!

I think Thune is too strong of a challenger + Bush on the ticket + Daschle alienating Dem base with Bush ad = GOP pickup :(

Oklahoma
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA

No way possible.
CO maybe
AK good chance
OK no way

Dems pick up Illinois, Oklahoma, Alaska, Colorado

Reps pick up Florida, South Carolina, Georgia

So 50-49-1?

There's no way Oklahoma, Alaska, and Colorado will be Democrat pickups. It's not just GOP territory; it's 60% Bush territory in two of those states.

I revise my prediction to 56-43-1

Colorado has a growing hispanic population.  Salazzar is VERY popular among hispanics.  Coors has his own probblems.

Murowski its been well documented what her poorous situation has been and Knowles is VERY popular in the state.

Coburn's situation is just getting uglier by the day.

So while 2 of these 3 states are safe Bush states, that doesn't mean it will equate for Rep victories.  In the 2 safe states the Republican candidates have problems of their own, Corburn of a legal variety, Murowski people just don't like her.  Salazzar and Knowles are well liked in their respective states.

Colorado-On election day, barring a complete blowout, Colorado will be closer than some people think and that is because Salazar is on the ballot who will help to bring the 17% Hispanic population to the polls.

Oklahoma-Coburn keeps shooting himself in the foot, and while Kerry has no chance in OK, Carson does and I think he'll pull it out.

Alaska-Once again Kerry has no chance here, but Knowles is a lot more popular than Kerry and Murkowski hasn't won too many supporters

Yeah, they all said things like that about Spencer Abraham. Incumbent, no-name opponent. And he lost. Said the same thing about Jeanne Shaheen and Max Cleland. They lost.

The Senate is very much undecided at this point.    It's possible the Democrats could end up with a net +2 or the Republicans could end up with a net +6, or anything in between.  The toss up states favor the Republicans, but its by no means a sure thing they'll win those Senate seats.

3 seats are almost cetain to change hands:
GA and SC to the Republicans, IL to the Democrats

But 7 other seats really could go either way depending on how the local campaigns develops and if Kerry or Bush open a significant lead.

The Republican pick-up opportunities, from most to least, among the toss ups are:
SD
FL
NC
LA

Not a toss-up now, but possible depending on the campaign is:
WI

Very unlikey are
WA
CA
 
The Democratic Pick-ups among the toss-ups are, again from most to least likely, are:
CO
AK
OK

Scandal ridden OK Republican candidate is down in the polls

Graph of Carson's chances according to tradesports:
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Tom Daschle will be re-elected this year.

If Carson can hold on to his lead, he'll win. Seeing as the scandals seem to mostly be with Coburn, I think Carson has a chance.

My current prediction:

Rep Pickups:
FL
GA
SC

Dem Pickups:
AK
CO (Coors is a bad nominee, with the growing hispanic population, Salazar will win)
IL (Duh)
OK (As I said, if this sterilization stuff keeps going, Carson will win)

As for SD, Daschle could very well lose, but I think he has a 51-49 chance of staying right now. About the odds Johnson had in 2002.

Burr is running out of time in NC, Bowles will win.

As for LA, John is the one of the most conservative Dems in the house, but I don't think he's Zell Miller v2.0. He'll win, because after the election, the Dems will dump all of their resources left into that seat.

As for Wisconsin and Washington.... dream on.

So I think we'll gain a seat, making it 50-49-1, still in the GOP's favor. But Jeffords almost always votes with us so that's basically 50-50. Also, I've read speculation of Chafee switching parties, while I HIGHLY doubt he would it's something to think about.  

My Predictions:

GOP Pickups:
South Carolina
Georgia
Florida

DEM Pickups:
Illinois
Alaska
Colorado

Stays as is.

They never said that about Jeanne Shaheen. It became an up for grabs race the day Sununu got the nom.

The SC race is most definitely not in the bag for DeMint and the race is tightening.  The most recent poll I've seen http://www.inez2004.com/portal/files/phatfile/SC%20poll%20memo.pdf
was taken September 7-9 and showed Bush with a 54-38 lead over Kerry but only a 46-40 lead for Demint with definite voters and 44-41 with likely voters.  The Bush numbers are in line with other polls, so I'm willing to accept that the Senate numbers are in the ballpark despite it being a poll released to the public by the  Inez campaign.  DeMint still has the lead, but this race is close enough that it can be won by Inez.  The so-called Fair Tax has hurt DeMint badly.

I hope Inez wins.  DeMint seems like an @ss to me.

Well, that puts it closer than I thought, it may be closer, but my gut tells me Inez won't win.

It'd be great if she did, but right now I think it's a 70-30 chance of DeMint winning, still could change by Election day though, that's just how I see things now.

We are almost similar in ideology!  Hey do you have AIM?

Yeah, sn's in my profile. I'm not on that much though, pretty busy.

Go on.  I'm there!

Oh I'm PJg455 in there by the way.  Sorry I didn't metnion it. :)

If the election were held today I'd be content if either DeMint or Inez won as I think they would both make good Senators, but for different reasons.  This is unlike the Presidential contest where I will discontent no matter who wins as I have reasons to not be sanguine about either Bush or Kerry.

I want Inez Tenenbaum.  DeMint outright said "Stop whining about the economy".  That's assinine.  I'm sorry.  You guys in SC suffered HUGE from job losses.  

All Tenenbaum needs to do at this point is have commercials with that line from demint and he wins the election.  Pure foot in the mouth disease on that part similar to Corburn's I did that all the ime comment

You mean DeMint should win?? Sc's economy's been doing bad.  Tenenbaum SHOULD mop his face into the ground, but then again Ohio should not go Bush.

South Carolinians don't like baby-killing tax raisers. Sorry.

How dramatic are you?  No really!  It's no wonder in Northeast Philly only 15% of Roman Catholics attend Mass.

But what % consider themselves  pro life? I'll guarentee you it's much more than 15%.

Isn't tenenbaum pro-life?

Tanenbaum was endorsed by EMILY's list, but favors the war with Iraq.  I don't have much hope there considering South Carolina has the lowest SAT scores in the nation and she's the education czaress.

Exactly.  Even without that, it would still be tough for her, but with that problem it makes it almost impossible.

GOP pickups

- Georgia
- South Carolina

DEM pickups

- Illinois

Tossups

- North Carolina (leans Dem)
- Florida (leans Dem)
- South Dakota (leans GOP. Recent poll - though it was conducted by Thune's campaign - shows him up 3 points.)
- Colorado (leans Dem....for now)

It is more than 15%, I'll agree.  I think it's about 45-50% of all groups in Northeast Philly that are pro-life.  You also have to remember there is a significant portion of NE Philly Catholics that are pro-choice and the Jewish voters are solidly pro-choice.

A new poll released today in South Dakota:
Daschle   50%
Thune     45%

Still leans Dem.

Where is it from?

Mason-Dixon.

Click Here and scroll down (if you don't believe me):
http://www.ourcampaigns.com/cgi-bin/r.cgi/RaceDetail.html?&RaceID=3744

Well that poll was conducted before today's Meet The Press debate. Then again, I didn't see the debate. Maybe Daschle did better. We'll see in the next poll...

Eh, no poll is perfect.

I am convinced Daschle is finished. I feel better about SD than I do AK and LA.

I didn't see the MtP debate either, but from the coverage it's gotten, it sound like was a marginal victory for Daschle.  From the clips I've seen, it look like Thune may have gone a bid overboard in criticizing Daschle on terrorism.

SC has chonically had low SAT scores including under our previous Republican SoE, Nielsen.  There are a number of reasons for our poor performance on that measure, but our scores have been increasing for a number of years under both Inez and her predecesor.

Whining is assinine. About anything.

Basically saying a bad ecconomy shouldn't be talked about and isn't important  in a state really suffering economically is assinine.

Certain poeople like to take sh!t from their elected officials because they think they're tougher.  I have said this quote before...  "Republican voters are like abused women in a domestic dispute.  They allow themseves to get sh!t on by their politicians and don't want to do anything about it because they love them."

Yeah like that didn't happen in the 2003 Mayoral race with Dems who were going to go for Katz voting for Street because he was the innocent Dem. Remember that one, IrishDem? Atleast you had some courage to vote for Katz but too bad many in your party didn't do the same.

Now that I think about it I would have voted for neither.  

One uncertain factor is active campaigning by Bush,  If Bush has a good lead >5% the last two weeks in Oct, he will shift his campaigning to support candidates for the Senate in the strong Red states SD, OK,  FL, LA, NC, which could increase his coat tails.  

I predict the GOP picks up North Carolina's seat.

So once again, I revise my prediction: this time to 57-42-1, which is about where I had it originally. Close to 60 votes.

The RSC has concluded that the SC race is close enough that it needs to spend close to $1 million that it hadn't planned to before into the state to help DeMint.  The State had an article (http://www.thestate.com/mld/thestate/9816339.htm) on this in Saturday's paper.  Inez's campaign even claims to have polls showing her to be in the lead, but I haven't seen a publicly released one that does so.  The Fair Tax is killing DeMint.  He desperately needs to get the campaign shifted onto some other issue.  If not, then Inez will win this November.  Inez's recent ads on this issue are very clever as they quote a number of prominent Republicans who over the years have said that such schemes are goofy, thus helping to turn this into an Inez/DeMint race instead of an Dem/Rep race.

I say the Dems will pick up
IL, OK and AK

I say the reps will pick up NC, SC, GA, FL, WI and WA.
yes, WI and WA.

I haven't heard anything about LA so I don't have a feel for that state.

Hmm...what do the polls show in WI and WA?

If those are really in play, I believe a strong GOP turnout could give us 59 seats - one short of the 60 needed for an up or down vote in the Senate.

Wisconsin:
Newest Harris Interactive Poll shows-
Feingold   52%
Michels     39%

Washington:
Newest Strategic Vision Poll shows-
Murray        48%
Nethercutt  41%

Don't count on the Republicans getting 59 seats, maybe 49 seats.

I don't see Wisconsin happening.

More like 58. Washington could go GOP.

There is no possible way the Republicans will have any more then 54 seats.

51 + 4 > 54

I think the Democrats are in with a good chance. They are well on course to pick-up Illinois. They have good chances of picking up Alaska, Colorado and Oklahoma.

The Republicans are certain to pick-up Georgia and I think they'll pick-up South Carolina.

Louisiana is a 'tricky' one what with 3 Dems running against a single Republican in the open primary. It should go to a run-off and if they can unite, they should hold the seat.

I think Florida and North Carolina will stay Democratic.

Dave

Washington's senate race is even more competitive now with Nethercutt releasing the Osama Day care centers ad.  Murray calls everything she said a lie that she said it and she has turned down offers to rebut the Osamatalk from every news outlet. Shes in hot water and Nethercutt has her right by the tail.  Lets see the after ad poll before we make too many safe democrat designations for the race.

I dunno, I really like Michels in WI. He needs Bush to win handily there, of course, but look out....

WI: ABC News poll had the WI Senate race at 45% to 51% for Feingold.  The spread is probably greater than that, but the highest the incumbent democrat has reached in any poll that I've seen is 53%.  That's not good.  For Feingold anyway.

Considering Feingold reached 69% in 1998, you're probably right.

It's about time Nethercutt calls Kandahar Patty on that comment.  He should gain traction in the polls as there are a lot of conservative Democrats outside of Seattle.

'Patty, if you mark it Osama, you're entering a world of pain.'

'But, but...'

'A world of pain.'

I don't think Wisconsin or Washington is going to happen. I predict 56 or 57.

Wisconsin will be closer than Washington, though, imo.

I guess I was a little too optimistic on WA.  I would have loved to move Murray into a career as a Al-Quieda consultant (her true dream job).  Joking aside I like the Republicans with a gain of 3.

Gain: Georgia, S Carolina, N Carolina (that didn't look good a couple of weeks ago), Florida, & S Dakota (bye bye Daschle).

Loss: Illinois, Oklahoma (my upset special), & Alaska.

Louisiana is also very possible, but I still see a runoff there. That would be four. :-)

55 > 54

Nobody like a gloater ;P