Sam Spade's 2010 Predictions

[Sam Spade]

A little pruning around the edges today.

[Sam Spade]

a little more massaging around the edges.  Should probably move my House call back down to 40-45, just imo.

[Sam Spade]

A few more changes to House - dropped to 40-45 seat call, but added a few more Watches.

[Sam Spade]

AZ-06? Did Jeff Flake switch parties while I wasn't looking?

oh f-it!  big error there.

[Sam Spade]

Changes on all three fronts...  Updated

[Sam Spade]

couple of changes.

[Sam Spade]

SUSA poll has a close race in NC-7, 'parently.

The NRCC throwing large sums of money at this race pretty much confirmed to me that it was not a runaway in the first place.

[Sam Spade]

Senate changes (10/9/10)
- moving NY (Gillibrand) back to safe because of polling.
- am tempted to put Delaware in safe Dem and Connecticut in Likely D based on polling, but based on fact DSCC is actually spending in Delaware and has put a good bit of money on Connecticut will make me pause, for now. (also because they are not early voting states)
- put Washington back into pure tossup because of polling.
- put West Virginia in tossup/lean R because of polling.
- put Missouri in Likely R based on polling and DSCC decision to leave.
- put Louisiana and North Carolina in Safe R b/c no one seems interested, which usually means...  If there's greater than a 10% victory in NC, count me surprised, but still.
- put Ohio in safe - Portman has been consistently polling at 50% or over, Fisher has no money, DSCC not interested, etc.
- put Indiana in safe for same reasons as Ohio (Ellsworth does have money, but I see no evidence of closing, and its getting late) and it's getting late for early voting states when behind by more than 10%.

[Sam Spade]

Changes in the Governor's column mainly just consist of me moving races to Safe that probably should be considered such based on the polling (candidate consistently over 50% and ahead by 10%, especially if not incumbent).

There's a bit of shifting around otherwise, nothing major.

[Sam Spade]

Haven't updated it in a while, Lewis, so you're placement is a little stale.  Will probably get to it tomorrow.

[Sam Spade]

Haven't updated it in a while, Lewis, so you're placement is a little stale.  Will probably get to it tomorrow.

Yah, there's a handful of seats where Silver's figures changed considerably with his last update and your placements fit his former numbers more closely than his current ones.

Gotcha.  Anyway, it's gonna have to be until tomorrow.

Btw, I'm thinking about changing House (and maybe Senate/Governor) for the last couple of weeks to...

Lost (10 or so)
Lean R (20 or so)
Tossup/Lean R (10 or so)
Pure Tossup (10 or so)
Tossup/Lean D (10 or so)
Lean D (30 or so)
Watch (20-30 or so)

and ditto vice versa for Dems, but a lot less obviously.

for still a 45-50 call.

I'm hoping things clear up a little in the next week because my call range is pretty wide right now (even though I average it out at 45-50).

[Sam Spade]

I'm basically about done with the House revisions.  When you see a House seat with this ^ in Lean D or Watch List, consider that I think it is either on the outer edge of Lean D (probably Likely D when I have the category) or on the outer edge of the Watch List.  There's *still* a few more seats that could be watched, but if I see an inkling of anything there, I'll note it.

[Sam Spade]

You have 27 seats in lean and 33 in watch list, yet the total for either is given as 30.

Also, PA-03 is listed twice but it seems clear that it belongs in Gone, not lean R.

That's just me deciding whether I want to move it back down to 85/35 or 85/30.  I've been debating on this a bit.  PA-03 is a mistake. 

Right now - NRCC/DCCC is advertising in roughly 60 seats outside the ten I've listed as gone.  I have good reasons for including 15 more (outside spending high, polling close, not just internals, etc.), but 5 more than that may be pushing it.

[Sam Spade]

Delaware is only not Safe D b/c DSCC keeps spending money there (another expenditure today btw) which makes me hesitate.

[Sam Spade]

Made some changes in the House arena.  Decided to go with 85/35 split also.

[Sam Spade]

Gonna put up some changes narrowing the field in both Senate and Governor this weekend, as well as changes in the House as we reach the two-week mark, a good time to really start narrowing the playing field (though in the House, that seems hard).

[Sam Spade]

Senate Notes

*Eliminated Likely Categories

- Decided to move DE to Safe.  DCCC still throwing in a marginal amount, Obama going there to campaign and nuts tend to underpoll a little.  However, no poll has had Coons under 50 for a long while.
- CA was moved to Tossup/Tilt D.  Most recent polls have been +1, +3, +4, +3 and +4.  Normally, I wait for an actual tied poll, but it just makes sense here.
- WA was moved to Tossup/Tilt D.  We see two tales of the race - my suspicion is that it's in the area of what SUSA says, but both parties are putting a lot of money here, just FYI.
- IL stays in Tossup, though my gut still says Kirk is up by a point or two.  For now.
- NV stays in Tossup, though my gut still says Angle will win here just because...  Not by a lot of course, but I don't expect it to be under 1%.
- WV stays in Tossup.  Both parties are spending a lot of money here and WV voters are strange.  The uni poll was, well, a uni poll..
- CO stays in Tossup/Tilt R.  Rasmussen's poll for both the Gov and Sen released today and yesterday has some funky internals, but they don't lean one way or the other.  Buck is probably ahead within MOE though.
- PA was moved to Tossup/Tilt R.  Just something I smell about the race.  Though Toomey may well still be ahead outside MOE.
- AK moved to Lean R.  Alaska is a strange state, one of the 3-5 US states that will actually elect a 3rd party without it being a de facto party candidate.  Of course, Murkowski is going to stay a Republican if elected (just watch) and I've never seen a Dem overpoll in Alaska, so this may not matter in the end.  I just see the prospect for some wildness here.  And watch - Miller will win it easily now.  
- FL moved to Safe R.  Rubio now in the low-mid 40%, Meek at 20% = Crist dead.
- MO moved to Safe R.  Both parties are moving their things out.  I don't expect Blunt to win by a lot, but he hasn't been under 50% in legitimate polls in months and in Missouri, this means safe.
- NH moved to Safe R.  I see no interest by either party in getting into this race.  This is the one race where I'm leery of putting into safe b/c the polling does not exactly suggest it according to my standards, but there seems to be a lot of acknowledgment that it's not competitive.

[Sam Spade]

Governor Notes

*Eliminated Likely Categories

- Moved NH from Likely D to Lean D.  I feel uncomfortable with putting this as Safe, given NH's weird ability to throw incumbent governors out for no reason, without telling us in the polling, which is close to not being in Safe territory anyways.
- Moved CO from Likely D to Lean D.  As I said before, the recent Ras poll is weird, but it looks like Tancredo is starting to become de facto GOP candidate.  It is probably too late, but if that happens, the race cannot be classified Safe and it's close enough for me to err on the cautious side.
- Moved CA from Tossup/Tilt D to Lean D.  The polling suggests it.  Compare with CA-Sen.
- MN is in Lean D.  Personally, I think this one might be safe, but the polling is not convincing on this front, so I err on the cautious side.
- Moved HI from Lean D to Tossup/Tilt D.  I don't trust any polling from Hawaii.  That being said, the latest polls say this is what it should be.
- MA is in Tossup/Lean D.  The polling says Lean D (not by much), but I suspect Cahill is overpolling.  Just a gut feeling.
- FL is in Pure Tossup.  The polling is all over the place here.  Your guess...
- OR is in Pure Tossup.  The last polls have Kitz up 1 and 2.  Too close for me to move in any direction, yet.
- RI is in Pure Tossup.  I say this - but I'd bet good money on the Dem winning.  RI polling sucks though.
- VT is in Pure Tossup.  The polls say this is the correct designation.
- IL is in Tossup/Tilt R.  My guess is that Rasmussen is more correct than the polls with the high 3rd party candidate numbers (as usual), given that this is IL, but there's enough doubt for me to not move it to Lean R.
- ME is in Tossup/Tilt R.  Race has tightened, but no poll shows Mitchell ahead.  This is the correct call to me.
- MI moved from Likely R to Lean R.  I just don't feel comfortable enough to put the race in Safe R - Bernero is probably underpolling a bit, but the next week or two should give us notice whether all those undecideds are just Dem voters or not.
- NM is in Lean R.  If this wasn't NM, a good case can be made IMO to putting it in Safe R.  But not here.  Voters seem to be sending a message against Richardson here by going against Denish, and normally that does not change even by Election Day in NM.  Can't say I'm surprised either.
- OH is in Lean R.  That being said, I'd be very surprised if Strickland wins.  Pay attention to the U of Cincy poll here - it has a top-notch track record.
- PA moved from Likely R to Lean R.  Same as MI, I just don't feel comfortable enough here yet.  These open PA governor contests have a way of tightening right at the end (though the party ahead wins).
- TX and WI stay in Lean R.  However, both races look to be breaking open to me.
- SC goes to Safe R.  I know what the crappy polls say - this is SC though.

[Sam Spade]

Well I see Sam is slowly moving to the "correct" prediction of 50-60.  

I am off to the Big Apple today.

I am in no way up to that level because Republican messaging has sucked so much this cycle (no one wants to listen to me, in other words).  The opportunity for over 60 certainly exists in this election but has probably been thrown away, which makes 50-60 less likely (though certainly more likely than Dems keeping the House at this point).  Of course, for Dems, the problem is that right now I have a tough time finding only 40 aggregate seat losses unless a strong majority of the real battlegrounds go their way because there are so many of them.

[Sam Spade]

- MN is in Lean D.  Personally, I think this one might be safe, but the polling is not convincing on this front, so I err on the cautious side.

You're actually a bit more optimistic than I am then.

I think I see the point though, the polling seems to imply that Emmer's ceiling is in the high 30s, and with that you just can't win even with a third party pulling about 10-15%.

I also have a bit of stupid logic concerning Governor's races this year - I think people are simply voting against the party in power in these open races.  It certainly looks like it.

[Sam Spade]

House Notes

- Overall, I've moved to 50-55 seat gain.  Sounds about right.  88 Competitive/32 Watch List.
- I have moved 15 districts in total to Likely Gone.  I expect 1 of them to surprise (maybe) election night, but I feel over a 50% chance of getting them all right as of now, henceforth, I'm doing it.  There are probably at least 5 other seats that can go here (indicating the "20 gone" memo, I keep repeating), but am less sure about - CO-04, FL-02, NH-01 being the most likely suspects, but I'll err on the side of caution, for now.
- 35 tossups now instead of 30.  The numbers called for it.
- 23 Lean Ds for now.  I have a few choices for additions, and will increase to 25 probably at some point soon unless things change.  The numbers I see really say about 75 "really competitive" seats.

[Sam Spade]

Sam says 50-55, and I have said 50-60 for close to two months, but I am not clued in, because the GOP message skill sucks. Whatever.   Sam, the facts on the ground, make all of this message stuff very second tier. That is why so many nutters will win. It is send a message time.

I know.  What I'm saying is that more than 60 or even 70 is quite possible with the right message.  It may still be possible otherwise, but far less likely.  Whatever, a big shift is coming long term, if not this year.  The trick is figuring out where.

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A currency collapse is quite possible.  The tell is to watch for Japan, which will undoubtedly blow up before us, and will be the signal.  I still don't think we're there yet.  Right now, I see capital flight from the US into commodities, certain equities and into shorting the dollar, but a lot of parabolic patterns are being created which will likely collapse at some point - the crack-back from that will be enormous when it happens.  After that point, and only after that point, can any type of currency collapse happen.

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Of course, Japan has managed to keep its rates low all this time.  What's interesting about the past few months in the US though, is how the shorter duration bonds have made new highs,whereas the 10 and 30 year have not.  Those types of divergences are very disturbing for the long run.

The correct answer is to hike interest rates and cut spending drastically to force the holders of bad debt out of the system and incentivize saving.  Yes, it will be very painful, but currency collapses are catastrophic.

[Sam Spade]

A few changes.  As expected, the 89th seat in my competitive list appeared.  I am one poll (non-Rasmussen) from putting IL, NV and WV in Tossup/Tilt R.  PA is back in Toss-up.

[Sam Spade]

Senate
AK-SEN:  Miller has really, really sucked as a candidate.  And I've never seen a Dem underpoll in Alaska.  So the real question is whether it's Murkowski or Miller.  The national Republicans seem to think the same thing (and have for a while), henceforth no ads against her.  To add to this confusion, Alaska polling is notoriously questionable and underpolls Republicans historically.  I would not be surprised with a narrow Murkowski win, a 10-point Miller or something in-between, but something else would be surprising.
AR-SEN:  As expected, Blanche Lincoln should be able to close to somewhere near 40% if she campaigns halfway-competent, but just remember that Boozman didn't start active statewide campaigning until 2 weeks ago.  Which goes to show you how bad it is for Lincoln.
CA-SEN:  My best guess is that this ends up like 1994, just with less 3rd party votes.  Fiorina has closed the race in the past few weeks, that much is clear.  If Fiorina is going to have a solid chance to win, we should see a poll in the next week that shows her ahead, unless, of course, the turnout models are screwing us up.
CO-SEN:  No poll has shown Bennet ahead, except for PPP, in many months.  Of course, Vorlon comes by and tells us that internal polling shows it tied or Bennet very slightly ahead.  What is this, a reverse Strickland?    One thing's for sure, Colorado polling is always a bit questionable, so I really am just stabbing for a conclusion here, which I don't have.
CT-SEN:  Bet on the Suffolk poll being wrong and Blumenthal winning somewhere in mid to upper single digits.  McMahon has run a good campaign, but it isn't enough.  CT is a weird state in that they decide fairly early on who's going to win, and that actually happens.  Too bad for Republicans that Dodd didn't run again - he would have been toast.
DE-SEN:  I think O'Donnell is, in general, underpolling a bit, maybe by more than you think.  It's still over.
FL-SEN:  So Charlie Crist is going to finish in second, but Rubio will win by double-digits.  I'll take getting one out of two predictions from six months ago right.    As for Crist, I doubt I will find any other loss of this cycle so enjoyable.
IL-SEN:  One of two things is going to happen here: 1) The Dem undecideds break for G, Dems actually want G to win and G wins, narrowly; 2) Irregardless of whether the Dem undecideds do anything, the IL Dems decide that they don't want G in there and are fine with Kirk, a fellow Combiner, running things, and Kirk wins, narrowly.  There are pretty good odds at both conclusions, so place your bets.
IN-SEN:  I expect this race to be closer than the polls indicate, maybe even in single digits, but it's over.  Nice job throwing away an elected position, Mr. Ellsworth.
KY-SEN:  Repeat after me - the most likely outcome is that Paul wins by 5-10 points.  Second to that is that he wins narrowly - 1-5 points.  Third is that he wins by double-digits.  The chances of Conway winning come after that, but are probably too low for me to count seriously.  The Dems should have nominated Mongiardo, at least they would have had a serious chance at winning.
LA-SEN:  So Melancon has himself within 3.  I could even see him within single-digits b/c this is LA, but I do find that amusing.  Nice job throwing away an elected position, Mr. Melancon.
MO-SEN:  Even ignoring the fact that Blunt is generic Republican (i.e. a better candidate than Talent) and MO doesn't like Obama, doesn't one think that in this year, of all years, it would be best not to run another Carnahan.  Blunt wins by upper single-digits.
NC-SEN:  The real question here is not whether the curse is over, but whether Burr can best Jesse Helms 9% margin of victory in 1978, which stands as the biggest Senate victory in NC since Sam Erwin left.
ND-SEN:  What happened here should have been the tell that trouble was afoot (along with Scott Brown), but yep...
NH-SEN:  This race has been gone since Obama went so upside-down among Indys, but I'd personally be surprised if Ayotte won by more than single-digits.  Hodes has sure sucked as a candidate.
NV-SEN:  My gut says Reid is dead and that the final margin will be Angle 49-50, Reid 46-47.  I think it's now time to find a post of mine where I said Reid's ceiling would be 46-47% because it's out there.  
OH-SEN:  Told ya Fisher sucked as a candidate.  Sucks so much that Portman should win by more than DeWine or Voinovich their first time out.
PA-SEN:  Sestak's chances really depend, in large part, on turnout.  Keep in mind, this race was never going to "break out" no matter what the national circumstances, b/c of how Pennsylvania is, but Toomey will always have the inherent advantage b/c of the year.  Doesn't mean Sestak's odds of winning are not very reasonable, mind you.
WA-SEN:  Another race which will likely come down to turnout.  Washington is very predictable in this regard.  Much as CA, look for a poll which shows Rossi ahead, unless turnout is completely wrong (entirely possible).
WI-SEN:  Remember the recent Norbert College poll is an outlier to the previous unless proven as such.  My gut still says this race is over, but single-digits.  Wrong state, wrong candidate, wrong year.
WV-SEN:  The polling in WV, as usual, is all over the place.  As Al points out, though, Manchin has never won a competitive race.  Raese is a horrible candidate, but at least understands this year that the best message is - "I will stand up against Obama.  My opponent will stand up with him."  Thus, unless the larger message in this race changes to something else, my gut says Raese will win.

[Sam Spade]

WA-6?

It's on the next ten seats after the watch list.  Eh, who knows.  Looks like a push poll to me, though.  Wenzel is a Republican pollster, of course.