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People. Stop. Think.

The GOP is SUPPOSED to lose some seats this year because the party in power usually does in an off-year election. Losing a handful of seats is an enormous victory -- for the profound reason that all of the attempts by the Democrats to create some impression of this being some huge tidal wave year would be proven false.

This is all just normal politics that is no different than the vast majority of other off year elections. 1994 was an aberration. That's not the norm. The norm is the party in power has more seats to defend and tends to lose some of them.

So relax. If the GOP loses 1-2 Senate seats and up to 10 House seats, it means the American people AGAIN indicate support for GOP policies and elected to return the GOP to power.

So stop with any sort of negativism and focus your intensity towards making your hotel reservations in vulnerable districts so you can help the GOTV effort in the final 72 hr push.

"This is all just normal politics that is no different than the vast majority of other off year elections. 1994 was an aberration. That's not the norm. The norm is the party in power has more seats to defend and tends to lose some of them.

So relax. If the GOP loses 1-2 Senate seats and up to 10 House seats, it means the American people AGAIN indicate support for GOP policies and elected to return the GOP to power."

THAT IS THE GOOD SCENARIO.

The bad scenario is 20 seats lost, losing the Majority in the House, which in turn flips a lot of insitutional power over.

Moreover, losing too many governorships now wil influence the 2010 redistricting in ways that can influence how well we do in next 10 years ... example: Ohio, Colorado, etc.

In the 1980s, Reagan won majorities but had to deal with gerrymandered Democrat majorities and other institutional disadvantages... they reversed when we took the House and took many statehouses, like in the south and west.

If we lose that edge, it creates harder battles down the road. It also means that the "GOP realignment" we hoped for is not happening.

ONE BRIGHT SPOT IS CA. If Arnold stays as Gov and returns again in 2010, we can expect a fairer shake on CA redistricting ... we are screwed out of 5-10 seats in that state alone.

Owen, you speak logically. But we are dealing with hysteria here (of the same sort I had to bash down on election day, 2004) and also with rampant media bias.

The fact is, if we lose so much as ONE house seat (we'll easily hold the senate, and may gain a seat), the media will portray this as a Dem "avalanche." We cannot cede one METER of territory to these creeps, and the people around here need to understand that and GET TO WORK.

(Churchill: "Wars are not won by evacuations.")