Key House Races - 14 August 2010 Update - We Have Primary Winners in CO, CT and MN

KeyHouseRaces.com ^ | 14 Aug 2010 | Interceptpoint

[InterceptPoint]

This weeks news:

Current Republican Net Pickup Projections:

• Saboto: 32
• Election Projection: 34
• CQPolitics: 29
• KeyHouseRaces: 32

STILL SHORT OF THE 39-40 NEEDED FOR A REPUBLICAN MAJORITY IN THE HOUSE - BUT THE NUMBERS KEEP EDGING UP

We have made major improvements to the KeyHouseRaces.com Home Page - our 1-Stop-Shopping Page for the Races on our Master List.

• We've added CASH ON HAND to the funding data for the Republican and Dem candidates. Not a pretty picture yet - Dems are still ahead
   
• We added a YouTube Link for each Republican candidate. The videos are a mixed bag - some are very professional and some definitely not. But they are the best we could find. We'll gladly  take inputs in this area. If you see a better video of a Republican candidate than we are using let us know.

We have primary winners in CO-03, CO-04, CT-04, CT-05, MN-01 and MN-06. No really big surprises.

In MI-01 Dr. Dan Benishek has won the recount with a 15 vote margin over Jason Allen. But since Allen has a few more hours to ask for another recount we cannot call the race for Dr. Dan.

The Master List has been updated to include all the winners with exception of the MI-01 Republican. The "Race at a Glance" entries on the Home Page have also been updated to include the CO, CT and MN districts.

There were a fair number of changes to the Experts Ratings this week - 1 from CQPolitics,  8 from Election Projection, 3 from Cook and 1 from RCP. The last update we have from Sabato was July 8th (come on Larry - get with it). Rothenberg is also overdue - his last update was July 19th. The good news for Rothenberg is that he has a very nice new format for his ratings. A big improvement.

Here's the summary of the changes to our Experts' ratings:

• There were a total of 13 updates this week to the 93 Congressional races that we believe are truly in play this year.
• 9 were favorable to the Republicans
• 4 were favorable to the Democrats

Those changes moved our index to -.289 from last weeks -.301. So the Trend is Still Our Friend - the "Experts" keep revising their projections to be more favorable to the Republicans.

Note that you can always see the latest changes and the current state of the "Expert" evaluations of all of the races on our Master List and an explanation of our methodology on the KeyHouseRaces Experts Page.

Just a reminder: Here is the schedule for the remaining August Primaries:

August 17: Washington and Wyoming

August 24: Alaska, Arizona, Florida and Vermont

August 28: Louisiana

[BCEagles]

word here in NY is most expect Hayworth (NY19) to take the seat- Hall is brain dead, the district is conservative and he can’t run on the anti-Bush campaign that got him elected the past two elections, despite his attempts...

NOTHING would make me happier. I looked up the campaign finance reports last night; Hayworth has more dough in the bank than he does. She'll give that preposterous communist Hall a good run.

[Clinging Bitterly]

The Republican party itself damaged the prospects in NY23 by not running a Republican last fall. Really it is a phenomenon that has repeated itself many times in many districts over the years but it was more noticed in NY23 last fall. Republican candidates need strong appeal within the base or they won't win, then Democrats benefit from incumbency.

But take heart. Incumbency is the only thing Democrats have this cycle, and that advantage will at lest shrink this November!

[InterceptPoint]

? We’re not to the point of getting the House yet?

Disgusting.

We're just reporting what our "Experts" think at this point. There are also people analyzing the "Generic Ballot" that pollsters like Rasmussen conduct that are currently in the range from R+4 to R+9. Numbers like that, if they hold, are likely to mean a +40 to +60 seat pickup by the Republicans. As we get closer to November's election all these guesstimates will merge and will, IMHO, predict a takeover of the House by the Republicans that will, in fact, be achieved.

[Tennessean4Bush]

We will take the house. Question is will it be plus 50 or plus 75 or more. There is no way that it is really plus 32 if the GOP is plus 6 on the generic ballot. Chances are it is going to be 75 or more. There are many not on this list that no one is thinking about that will flip. It is just hard to follow it on the house side since there are so few public polls out there yet. Sep and oct you will see the big shift as more races are polled.

[lovesdogs]

Thank you. I look forward to this chart every week.

[Political Junkie Too]

Using the expert ratings above, the results of 32,000 simulated elections are listed in the table below. The definitions of the columns are:

• "GOP House Seats P10” – the value where the probability of the actual number being lower is 10%.
• ”GOP House Seats EV” – the expected value (mean) or probability-weighted average of the simulation.
• ”GOP House Seats P90” – the value where the probability of the actual number being lower is 90%. Or, it is the value where the probability of the actual number being higher is 10%.
• ”Probability of 218” – The probability associated with value 218 (the House majority goal).
• ”GOP Gain” – The difference between the GOP EV and the current number of seats (179), rounded down.

Week	GOP House Seats P10	GOP House Seats EV	GOP House Seats P90	Probability of 218	GOP Gain
09-Apr-10	199	204.77	210	0.18%	25
16-Apr-10	199	205.09	211	0.22%	26
22-Apr-10	200	205.28	211	0.37%	26
01-May-10	201	206.22	212	0.73%	27
08-May-10	201	206.33	212	0.66%	27
19-Jun-10	203	208.44	214	2.29%	29
10-Jul-10	203	208.49	214	2.43%	29
17-Jul-10	203	208.49	214	2.34%	29
24-Jul-10	203	209.25	215	3.37%	30
31-Jul-10	203	209.06	215	2.96%	30
07-Aug-10	203	209.15	215	3.11%	30
14-Aug-10	204	209.33	215	3.33%	30

And over in the Senate...

Most of Rasmussen's polls have the races outside the margin of error, but for those within the MOE, here are the movements during the past week and the separation in the polls.

• California 1: No change (R -5%)
• Colorado 2: -1% (R +5%)
• Connecticut 1: +6% (R -7%) - Moved into the MOE this week
• Florida 1: +3% (R +5%)
• Illinois 2: +2% (R +0%) - Tied
• Kentucky 1: No change (R +8%)
• Missouri 1: +1% (R +7%)
• Nevada 2: No change (R -2%)
• Ohio 2: No change (R +4%)
• Pennsylvania 2: No change (R +6%)
• Washington 2: No change (R -2%)
• Wisconsin 1: -1% (R +1%)

Using the most recent Rasmussen polls, the results of 32,000 simulated elections are listed in the table below. The definitions of the columns are:

• "GOP Senate Seats P10” – the value where the probability of the actual number being lower is 10%.
• ”GOP Senate Seats EV” – the expected value (mean) or probability-weighted average of the simulation.
• ”GOP Senate Seats P90” – the value where the probability of the actual number being lower is 90%. Or, it is the value where the probability of the actual number being higher is 10%.
• ”Probability of 51” – The probability associated with value 51 (the Senate majority goal).
• ”GOP Gain” – The difference between the GOP EV and the current number of seats (41), rounded down.

Week	GOP Senate Seats P10	GOP Senate Seats EV	GOP Senate Seats P90	Probability of 51	GOP Gain
17-Jul-10	47	48.84	50	6.95%	7
24-Jul-10	47	48.95	50	7.69%	7
31-Jul-10	47	48.18	50	1.29%	7
07-Aug-10	47	48.13	50	1.46%	7
14-Aug-10	47	48.46	50	2.92%	7

-PJ

[InterceptPoint]

You keep improving the site weekly. Pretty soon the experts and the RNC will be referring to you!

I hope you are right. The website has matured and it is pretty much set at this point. We don't see making many major changes since just keeping up with the data stream (polls, money, better video feeds, ratings) is a big job.

So our next big push will be to get the site noticed. We're not quite sure how to do that but but we have some ideas and we will be working on it (suggestions welcomed). I think we have the best site on the net if you are looking for information about the House races in play in 2010 and, in particularly, if you want to contribute to a Republican victory and don't quite know how to place your bets.

[InterceptPoint]

We will take the house. Question is will it be plus 50 or plus 75 or more. There is no way that it is really plus 32 if the GOP is plus 6 on the generic ballot.

I agree. See my post above. If we hold the generic ballot we will take the House. It's not a done deal yet but I can smell the bacon.

[Political Junkie Too]

I wonder if there's any action/maneuvering/positioning among SF Dems who might want to run for her seat.

The person who most stands out in my mind is Mark Leno, who is openly gay and trades on that politically in California. He's been pretty aggressive in moving up from San Francisco Board of Supervisors member to State Senator, by knocking off incumbent Carol Migden after she had some health and traffic problems..

-PJ

[WOSG]

“How in the world can “D” incumbents be considered favorites in races where the economy has truly tanked and unemployment is insanely high?”

People need to connect the dots between the Democrat policies of massive new regulations and spending and higher taxes with the lousy economy.

” Are the voters in those districts really that stupid?”

Yes. Media keeps them stupid and so does Democrat spin.

“IF so, then maybe the deserve what they get!”
No, because they are inflicting their bad decisions on the rest of us.

[CPT Clay]

I agree, you have created the best sight on the net.

I’ll try not to keep it a secret any longer.

[daisy mae for the usa]

I really appreciate this list. As soon as my children return to school, I plan to get active for a couple of candidates that I have been watching who are still dem leaning. If others could do the same, word of mouth could tip these things.

[ArmstedFragg]

We have some opportunities, but if we’re not going to commit suicide once again this November, we need to grasp that primaries are tactical and general elections are strategic. It’s better to vote for someone who only shares 60 percent of your ideology than to see someone who shares none of it elected. At the moment, judging from the comments on several threads, there are a lot of one-issue freepers who don’t grasp that. The opportunity this year offers us is the opportunity to do a wonderful job of being our own enemies. Hopefully we’ll avoid taking it.

[GVnana]

Nice work! Thanks for the ping.

[Political Junkie Too]

I am experimenting with a model that uses the most recent poll instead of the expert assessment when there is one. I "expire" the poll if it is greater than 60 days old and revert back to the expert assessment until a new poll is taken. If the trend is moving downward, I suspect it is because a poll expired and the expert asssessment is lagging public opinion.

Using the expert ratings above, the results of 32,000 simulated elections are listed in the table below. The definitions of the columns are:

• "GOP House Seats P10” – the value where the probability of the actual number being lower is 10%.
• ”GOP House Seats EV” – the expected value (mean) or probability-weighted average of the simulation.
• ”GOP House Seats P90” – the value where the probability of the actual number being lower is 90%. Or, it is the value where the probability of the actual number being higher is 10%.
• ”Probability of 218” – The probability associated with value 218 (the House majority goal).
• ”GOP Gain” – The difference between the GOP EV and the current number of seats (179), rounded down.

Week	GOP House Seats P10	GOP House Seats EV	GOP House Seats P90	Probability of 218	GOP Gain
31-Jul-10	207	212.12	217	8.64%	33
07-Aug-10	206	211.07	216	4.66%	32
14-Aug-10	206	211.04	216	5.02%	32

-PJ

[InterceptPoint]

I like this one. When Sabato takes over a month to update and Rothenberg isn’t much better I think we are going to have to depend more and more on the polls. And I expect them to trend in our direction.

[Political Junkie Too]

I agree. But the problem is that with 435 House races, polling is spotty and inconsistent in its coverage of which races to poll and which polling organization does the poll. It's not like on the Senate side with 36 races, and only a dozen within the margin of error. Rasmussen rotates through the races every few weeks (except for Alaska and South Dakota which has not been polled).

It seems like House races will be a one-shot deal, so they are waiting until closer to election day to poll the key races.

-PJ

[InterceptPoint]

A little back of the envelope analysis of today's chart is in order.

Anything that is RED or PINK in the Experts column of today's chart means that the Republicans are favored to win. That's 38 races, 8 of which are Republican seats that we very, very likely to hold. A 'poor-mans' instant analysis would tell us that a 30 seat pickup is pretty likely (38-8) and that is about what we are hearing from "Experts".

So a reasonable person who wants to do the maximum to help the Republicans win the House back from the Pelosi crowd would start helping candidates who are 39 and below on the list: Martha Roby, Rick Crawford, Adam Kinzinger, Randy Hultgren, Kristi Noem, Charles Djou and so on down the list. That would seem to be where the payoff is. If you check out the current MONEY IN THE BANK for these candidates (just go to KeyHouseRaces.com and scroll down the list) you will see that, in general, the Dems are far ahead. We need to make up that differential.

[manic4organic]

Thanks. Bookmark.

[NoGrayZone]

Thanks for the update!!!