If I recall correctly, right after Obama was elected in 2008, the Republicans started winning all of the special one-off elections, and that led to the 2010 mid-term. Funny how the media has forgotten all of that.
No, actually they didn’t. That was a serious complaint at the time that the National Chairman, Michael Steele of Maryland, wasn’t lifting a damn finger to help our candidates in the specials. They ignored the race to replace Rahm Emanuel (a fellow FReeper, ChicagoLady, was the nominee, and she can attest to the fact they offered her no help, despite the fact the GOP had won the seat as recently as 1994). That followed by 2 disastrous losses in NY, for the Gillibrand seat (which was historically Republican) and for an open Republican seat held by John McHugh (in which a closet Democrat was nominated, and she quit the race and endorsed the Democrat before the election, who won).
It wasn’t until the Virginia statewide races a year later (Nov 2009) that they won anything (sweeping the Governorship, Lt. Gov, and Atty General offices). Other than that, the only 2 contests the GOP won between then and the November 2010 elections were the marquee race in Massachusetts in January 2010 (Scott Brown), and a House special in Hawaii in May 2010 (Charles Djou), which was then promptly lost in November (and Brown’s seat lost in 2012).
It took the independent Tea Party movement for the GOP to recoup its losses that started in 2006, but that was no thanks to incompetent GOP leadership then of Steele, Boehner and McConnell. Had there been no such movement and if the party had had to rely on its normal operations, its unlikely the GOP would’ve made more than desultory gains in 2010, and not enough to win the House or Governorships and legislatures.