1. It's not quite possibel to score the 2012 House races yeat, because several states have yet to finish redistricting. Preliminary analysis indicates that dem gerrymandering, primarily in California and Illinois, may yeild the Dems 10+ seats. This is more than offset by the increases in electoral votes that red states received after the 2010 census. Two key states, Florida (+2 seats) and Texas (+4 seats) are still in the mix, but should yield 4-5 new GOP seats. Several blue dog Dems are in serious trouble, so it's probably more likely that the GOP majority in the House will INCREASE.
2. As many here have pointed out, it's not the fact of a GOP House that's important, it's what they actually DO with their majority. I think that the 2012 GOP Hoiuse caucus will be considrably MORE conservative than the current one, and able to exert greater pressure on the leadership. We shall see.
The important thing is NOT HAVING a democrat House.
It took a landslide year for them to win it in 2006. In my opinion it would take that again for them to win it back.
I don’t think the most the of GOP-leaning seats that they won in 2006 and 2008 (or the GOP-leaning seats they long held that we won last year) are likely to shift back to them. Without them they never would have had the majority.