110th Congress Stats

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

Absolute worst case scenario for the GOP in the Senate:

- GOP doesn't pick up any seats
- Dems pick up RI, PA, VA, MT, MO
- Sanders (I) - VT sits with the Dems

Republicans - 50
Democrats - 50 (including Independent Bernie Sanders)

Control stays with the GOP because of VP (Senate President) Cheney.

Phil, if the GOP does that bad in the Senate, Collins will likely pull at least a Jeffords and go Independent to save her political hide when she runs for reelection in 2009 and thus give the Senate Majority Leader Reid by a 50 to 49 vote with 1 abstaining, or possibly even do a full party switch and become a Democrat.  I don't expect that happening, tho.  If the 2006 elections were held today, I'd expect at most a 2 seat change in the Senate, and despite all the sound and fury over Social Security and judicial nominations, I don't expect an issue to come up that would produce a major shift either way.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

Collins? No, I don't think so.

If Chafee can't hold onto RI in 2006, then it will indicate that New England will have joined the rest of the country in voting for Senators based on national rather than local politics, and have done so emphatically enough to bounce Republican incumbents with a proven trak record on the issues for the sole reason of being a national Republican.  In that atmosphere, Collins’ only hope of being re-elected in 2008 is to depart the GOP and become an Independent or a Democrat.  She probably would go the independent route since New Englanders are used to and have shown a willingness to support such candidates, and I don’t think that at the level of Maine politics that she would be a comfortable fit with the Dems.