Posted on 10/03/2014 7:19:41 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
Republicans seem to be pulling away in the race to win a majority in the U.S. Senate. At least this week.
In mid-September, several polls seemed to be going the other way. The well-informed Washington Post analyst Chris Cillizza wrote that for the first time in this election cycle, odds favored the Democrats keeping their majority.
Two weeks later, he was singing another tune. Analysts at the Post, the New York Times, and FiveThirtyEight, in addition to psephologists Charlie Cook, Stuart Rothenberg, and Larry Sabato, all agreed.
What may have happened is this: Over the summer, Democrats used their money advantage to savage Republican opponents. When spending got equalized in September, Republicans’ numbers rose.
So Republicans retain big leads to pick up three open seats in states carried by Mitt Romney –West Virginia, Montana, and South Dakota. Republican nominees have moved ahead of three Democratic incumbents in Romney states (Alaska, Arkansas, and Louisiana) and in two target states carried by President Obama (Colorado and Iowa).
Only in North Carolina, which Romney narrowly carried, has the Republican not yet overtaken the incumbent Democrat senator Kay Hagan — and her edge is narrowing in the most recent polls.
Psephologists used to have a rule that incumbents running below 50 percent against lesser-known challengers would inevitably lose. Everyone knows them, the logic went, and half aren’t voting for them.
That rule doesn’t seem to apply anymore, but perhaps another one does. The Real Clear Politics average of recent polls puts Democratic incumbents in these five states at 41 to 44 percent of the vote.
In seriously contested races in the last six Senate cycles, starting with 2002, only two incumbents polling at that level in September ended up winning. One was appointed to an open seat and thus probably was not widely known.
(Excerpt) Read more at nationalreview.com ...
For Democrats to have even the slightest chance of election means that this country is headed for disaster.
None of this even matters until I hear what Carl Rove thinks. /extreme s
TSUNAMI WARNING!!!! Ends up being just a slight ripple on the beach.
There will be no wave. The Reps will be fortunate to hold on to the House. Taking the Senate is a 50/50 proposition. You don't remove incumbents easily, especially senators.
Have the Democrats paid Barone to pitch this forecast so GOP voters don’t bother to vote because “the election is in the bag?”
for AMERICA to win, Political Correctness needs to die!
Barone is just recycling his commentaries from 2012 when he predicted a massive Republican win for both the Senate and the presidency.
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The GOP still has time to pull defeat out of the jaws of victory for 2014.
RE: Didn’t he call for a potential Romney landslide? Or was that Dick Morris? Or both?
BOth Barone and Dick Morris were DEAD WRONG in 2012. Morris at least has kept his mouth shut this year. But Barone is at it again.
zactly!!!! Remember there is no such thing as a good Democrat.
Exactly. And the more of these kinds of articles the low information types see, the worse the voter fraud is going to be.
The Republican wave, for me, is a wave good-bye.
Being called a racist by the GOP-e was the last straw.
Republicans will gain seats in both the House and the Senate. I am not sure that they will win control of the Senate, though. It is very true that changing demographics will make the currently-composed GOP less competitive in the future. However, in off-year elections, the typical dem voter is too busy smoking weed and playing video games to go out and vote.
The dem party has been openly, proudly, blatantly treasonous and anti-American and pro-communist, pro-vietcong, pro-terrorist, American-hating filth (again, OPENLY, PROUDLY, and BLATANTLY) for AT LEAST!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! AT LEAST!!!!!!!!!!!
FIFTY YEARS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! FIFTY YEARS!!!!!!!!!!
This country has been dying for quite some time.
Did you even thank them for giving you a least a little credit? They still haven’t figured out that if you’re gonna be inclusive, then maybe some of the tea party ideas should at least be looked at. Fear of losing their (so called) power keeps them from even considering that someone just might have a good idea.
That's a good point, and not taking that into consideration is a problem we all have understanding these elections .
It's about self interest, and not so much about the welfare of the Country.
When I get out of my neighborhood and get on a subway in a large city I feel like a white minority. About half of he voting adults don't pay Fed. Taxes so they don't worry about excessive spending on welfare programs..
They do worry about money spent on military operations since that means less money for them.
As I have said before on FR it comes down to this;
"Vote for me and I will get you someone else's money."
The Republican's have a problem overcoming that appeal.- Tom
The problem Barone and the GOP-e have is the attitude that the conservatives/Tea Party will vote GOP because they have no where else to go. I wonder what Mitt Romney thinks about that.
Your point on demographics is well taken. In the last presidential election, MR defeated BHO by about 20 points among white voters. Several decades ago, that fact alone would have been enough to guarantee a landslide victory and enough to win all but a handful of states.
Changing demographic factors help explain why the Dems have won the popular vote in five of the last six presidential elections.
Midterm elections, however, are completely different than presidential elections. Demographics are different. The electorate in midterm elections tends to be smaller, older, whiter, more disciplined, more conservative, therefore more Republican than is the case in presidential elections.
Further, the party out of power usually makes gains in midterm elections, and this tends to be especially pronounced in the 6th year of an incumbent administration. In addition the Dems have the added problem of having to defend so many US Senate seats in red states easily carried by both McCain and MR where BHO’s poll ratings are even lower than the national average.
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