The Battle for America 2010: Are the Dems Making a Comeback?
Over the summer, Republicans enjoyed signs of significant gains in this November’s midterm elections. Generic polls, which ask voters if they are more likely to vote for the Republican or Democrat in their district, showed historic advantages for the GOP.
Across the country, Republicans led dozens of races for congressional seats and statehouses currently held by Democrats. And enthusiasm among those paying attention leaned heavily toward the minority party.
Then came the fall, and, fueled by an occasional poll showing a smaller Republican lead in generic ballot tests, the media and Democrats alike began floating the idea that perhaps the Democrats had turned the tide. Perhaps the GOP had peaked too soon. Perhaps the election would not be the bloodletting so many political observers foresaw in July and August. For sure, in this toxic political environment, Democratic candidates would love to see the trends move in their direction.
On September 1, Election Projection, which aggregates polls and pundit ratings to project electoral outcomes, had Republicans winning seven seats in the Senate, a net of 36 seats in the House, and a net 8 governorships. These are solid red wave numbers, but not enough to win either chamber of Congress. In light of the oncoming GOP wave, well-publicized before then, and the alleged Democratic resurgence since, that’s a projection Democrats could live with, right? Maybe not. I’ll tell you why in a bit, but first, let’s look at why a slight uptick in Democratic poll numbers was inevitable.
Throughout the spring and summer, Republicans nationwide were excited looking toward Election Day, energized by a large and growing GOP storm on the horizon. On the other hand, those not particularly keen on a Republican tide were more interested in Tiger’s performance or Lost’s final episode than who was winning the primaries. Closing in on Election Day, however, they’ll become more and more engaged, and, hence, there should be more non-Tea Party, non-Republican voters in pollsters’ likely voter pools. So, as the election nears, the politically less-interested will become more interested, and these folks will likely be more Democratic-leaning. All this should produce less overwhelming generic ballot deficits and more favorable prospects for Democrats. But has it?
While it is true that an ebb in Republican polling advantages soon after Labor Day moved my projections toward the Democrats, the shift was so slight that it could hardly be described as a comeback. In the House, for every poll that has hinted of Democratic gains, there has been another showing Republicans increasing their lead. In the Senate, for every race where the Democrat has seemed to pull ahead (California Senate, for example), other races (Wisconsin and West Virginia) have given Republicans unexpected pick-up opportunities. Moreover, if Democrats have been enjoying a resurgence, how has Tea-Party favorite Sharron Angle pulled ahead of Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid? How has Mark Kirk been able to maintain his small lead over Alexi Giannoulias in the Democratic stronghold of Illinois?
I have been predicting 80+ seats for some time. I expect 11 more seats in the Senate. Control of both Houses. (Can we start a pool here?)
Then we should see investigations of all the corruption and malfeasance, which should lead to another slaughter in 2012.
There should be investigations of corruption etc. but I really don’t believe the incumbent Republicans have the intestinal fortitude to do anything toward retribution of the Dems who rammed so many bills down throats. They seem to refuse to take the gloves off aka John McCain and want to play fairly and just be re-elected and get along comfortably. I hope and pray the newly elected Republicans maitain their passion to change the status quo in Washington and that by the 2012 election, restore some sense of sanity to our government. Take the gloves off PLEASE!
I lot of the most recent polls I’ve seen have been skewed towards the advantage of Democrats. And remember, the main stream media has a huge vested interest in NOT seeing Obama kicked in the teeth. Remember, the main stream media did everything in their now limited power to get this jerk elected.
And now the American public can see what this man is, a lying socialist. Americans just don’t like being lied to and this guy claimed to be a “pragmatic centrist,” like Bill Clinton. Bunk. If the fight for Obamacare proved anything, it showed that Obama is a rigid socialist with a definite agenda. He really doesn’t care what you think and is really offended when you don’t acknowledge the “many socialist benefits” he’s trying to dole out from the Federal government. So now that the mask is off, the mainstream media is going to do everything it can to save this guy because they know that, if they don’t, they’re going down with him.
Well, on November 2nd, both Obama AND the main stream media are going down. Obama will suffer a huge election defeat and the main stream media will lose even more influence with their shrinking audience. Couldn’t happen to a more rotten bunch of people.
The best thing is when the republicans take over the house and with some hope also the senate then they can say to Obama hey we don’t care what you want us to do “we won and you lost”!
Dead Jackass bounce.
When you have the Generic Ballot swinging to favor the GOP and looking back to late last year up to the first part of 2010 the GOP was just a mere 4%-5% ahead of Democrats and that was a huge swing, remember ??? Now we have gained another 10% above that earlier gain so yes I’m with you Marc not because you say so but based on what I have been reading and from tracking of the Generic ballot for the last 2 years. We must also remember that with such a huge lead in the generic we in the end have made up significant ground which if I remember right we were prior to 2008 down 10%+ as much as 15% down in the generic Ballot so yeah we’ve come along way Baby & Yes it’s a BIG F$%^ing Deal as Joe “3 Lettered word” Biden would say !! We have a Media who in the last week have been trying to restore there credibility the most notable of them that I noticed is Matthew’s but it’s too little too late and the next BIG crash your going to hear is the LSM hitting the brick wall after the Tsunami sweeps there Democratic allies ashore !!! Lets just hope no one within the Conservative/GOP party does anything, anything so stupid that allows a significant number of Democrats to retain there seats….. Fingers crossed !!
I so want Scott’s forecast to be true, but what about the Dems argument that the Generic Ballot will not mean as much in actual races since it overemphasizes Republican numbers in the south. They say we have huge numbers in the south and some of the west, which makes the overall ‘Generic’ look so tilted in our favor. BUT, we still lag alot in the northeast and west coast. So, they say it won’t be so predictive in the end? ….thoughts?
2 thoughts: 1-never underestimate the Republican Party’s ability to throw away elections, and 2- be ready for an “October Surprise” by the DemoRAT-in-chief, The mighty “o”. . . .keep your weapons handy, and your powder dry. . .
I’d crawl a mile over broken glass for my chance to let “I won” and his lackeys (yes, you Dan Maffei aka Mr Nancy Pelosi) know how I feel. I’m reminded daily by the tax increases, furlough time, and my unemployed neighbors just what a job these clowns are doing. Where’s the budget, Congress?
The open enrollment for my healthcare arrives before the election. Maybe Obamacare will lower my costs, but I think I have better odds in the lottery.
When the Republicans lost control of Congress, unemployment was 5.5%, and the deficits were a third of what they are now. The stock market is going up, because the dollar is going down. The Democrats are 100% negative, because they’ve got nothing to campaign on. What can they honestly say? Vote for us, it’ll get worse?
I’m amused at the flip-flopping taking place by Sharon Angle in Nevada and Ken Buck in Colorado. All of a sudden, they’re not out to dismantle Social Security, Medicare and the VA as they advocated for during their primaries. Buck is backpedaling fast on personhood and his stand on abortion.
Call them tea party darlings if you want. For me, it’s more of the same old tired politics of pandering to whomever has their ear at a given moment. They must have taken flip-flopping lessons from the Kerry campaign in 2004.
You’re going to see a combination of things in November:
1) mass election fraud by the Dems
2) loss of a good part of both Dem and GoP votes (the legitimate, not the fraudulent, votes of course) to independents
3) some shifting between the parties, with left leaning GoP voters voting Dem, righ leaning Dem voters voting GoP, and some from both side going independent.
End result will be an election marked by major LOSS to the GoP, an increased number of independents, and a large victory for the Dems.
Instead of regaining control over even 1 house of congress, the GoP will see its presence in both houses reduced sharply, leaving the Dems with an even more secure majority (maybe even a majority large enough to pass constitutional ammendments without GoP or independent support).
But if that were true, J.T., would we not see polls showing conservative votes split between Republicans and third-party/no-party candidates? This sounds, frankly, a great deal like a desperate, last-minute attempt by the Republican wing of the Court Party to convince the voters to abandon their determination and their principles and meekly accept another two years of ruinous rule by the two wings of the Court Party.
J. T. don’t quit your day job, as your election analysis is the worst I have seen. Everything is trending towards the Republicans so you predict… a huge Republican loss! Outstanding!! LOL You are like a passenger on the Titanic when half the ship is already underwater, and the ship’s Captain and the ship’s Engineer are both telling you the ship is sinking, you reply “No, it’s not! It will be just fine, in fact, better than before!” Right now there is no big push for Independent candidates. There is no enthusiasm for Democrats. There is a big surge for Republicans. I don’t know how much the Republicans pick up, but they will not lose seats.