Sam Spade's 2010 Predictions

[TheDeadFlagBlues]

Has this RCP House horse race utility that I just discovered hit anyone else's radar screen? It shows something like a 45 seat GOP gain, splitting the tossups. Some of the races have commentary to them.

How do they determine their race ratings? It seems that they base it too heavily on polling, which means that for many seats its based on internal polls.

Speaking of that, why haven't the Democrats released many internal polls?

[TheDeadFlagBlues]

You should move NY-19 to tilt R or lean R. The new PPP poll is brutal and it looks like your predictions about suburban/exurban areas turning the hardest against the Democrats/Obama are true. Obama only has a 39% approval rating for the district and Schumer has 40/50 favorables.

[TheDeadFlagBlues]

What do you think is the reason behind some of the strange latest Cook ratings changes? Oberstar being moved to Lean D? Carnahan being moved to Lean D? I suppose it has to do with the latest fundraising numbers but even then it seems like a stretch to say that Carnahan and Oberstar are in trouble based on how much CoH they have. They should be on a Watch List at best. The other changes that confused me were FL-12, PA-4, and NY-20.

Early voting in NV isn't looking bad for Reid.

[TheDeadFlagBlues]

There was an internal poll for Rep. Russ Carnahan's Republican opponent, showing Rep. Carnahan's lead shrunk to 9.

Uh, that's the kind of poll result that you move a seat from Lean D to Safe D for. Not the other way round.

I wouldn't give anything on such rumours (or more frequently "rumours".) That goes to the poster you replied to as well, of course.

I wasn't basing anything off the rumors, I was basing it off of the raw numbers. Democrats are edging the Republicans by 2,000 in early voting and this is before Reid's GOTV machine started busing in voters (this began today, I think) and Obama's Las Vegas event. Democrats are actually doing much better at early voting than they were in 2006.

[TheDeadFlagBlues]

There was an internal poll for Rep. Russ Carnahan's Republican opponent, showing Rep. Carnahan's lead shrunk to 9.

Uh, that's the kind of poll result that you move a seat from Lean D to Safe D for. Not the other way round.

I wouldn't give anything on such rumours (or more frequently "rumours".) That goes to the poster you replied to as well, of course.

I wasn't basing anything off the rumors, I was basing it off of the raw numbers. Democrats are edging the Republicans by 2,000 in early voting and this is before Reid's GOTV machine started busing in voters (this began today, I think) and Obama's Las Vegas event. Democrats are actually doing much better at early voting than they were in 2006.

This is what I was interested in seeing. The early vote info I have is about four days old now. How often is it updated?

Early voting: http://www.accessclarkcounty.com/depts/election/english/Pages/home.aspx
New registrations: http://media.lasvegassun.com/media/pdfs/blogs/documents/2010/10/21/CCVP-2010-Q3_FINAL.pdf (showing great things for Democrats)

[TheDeadFlagBlues]

Early voting: http://www.accessclarkcounty.com/depts/election/english/Pages/home.aspx
New registrations: http://media.lasvegassun.com/media/pdfs/blogs/documents/2010/10/21/CCVP-2010-Q3_FINAL.pdf (showing great things for Democrats)

Showing great things for Democrats?  Hardly.  In 2008, the Clark County Early voters were 52.0% registered Democrats, 30.6% Republicans and 17.4% independents.  If my math is right, Obama ended up winning about 64% of the two-party Clark County early vote.

So far this cycle, Clark County Early voters are 46.3% Democrats, 38.0% Republicans and 15.6% independents.  Democrats are down 5.7 points from 2008, Republicans up 7.4 points and Independents down 1.8 points - a major swing away from the Democrats in the early voting composition.  And if my math is right, in 2008, Obama did about 9 points better in the Clark County Early Vote than the election day tally.  If a similar pattern persists in 2010, Harry Reid might not even win Clark County, let alone the rest of the state.

Comparing 2010 to 2008 is not the best practice for a variety of reasons. These numbers are improvements for Democrats when comparing 2010 to 2006, which is very important. Besides there's still time for these numbers to shift and with an Obama event being scheduled, and Reid about to bus in voters I expect them to.

I think your problem is making the assumption that the patterns this year are going to be the same as 2008. Obama did so well among early voters and so poorly in comparison among same day voters because his campaign pushed unbelievably hard on early voting. If you look at the numbers for 2008, they are insane.

The numbers that worry me are the ones coming out of Washoe...