Primaries in Florida Today     Permalink

There are a number of primaries today. Let's start with Florida as there are two very hotly contested ones there. The Democratic one features Rep. Kendrick Meek (D-FL), a black congressman who was willing to offer himself up as a sacrificial lamb at a time when everyone assumed Gov. Charlie Crist (R/I-FL) was going to win the Republican senatorial primary and then the Senate seat opening up as a result of the retirement of Sen. George LeMieux (R-FL), who was appointed by Crist. When the polling got bad, Crist dropped out of the Republican primary and is running as an independent where he thought he would face former Florida house speaker Marco Rubio (R) and Meek. However, a sleazy billionaire, Jeff Greene, unexpectedly jumped into the Democratic primary and figured by spending $20 million or more of his own money on TV ads, he could buy the nomination. Initially it looked like that might work, and for a clean billionaire it might have. It worked for Meg Whitman in the California governor's race, for example. But Greene is no ordinary billionaire. He made his money by shorting mortgages--essentially hoping people would default on their mortgages and lose their homes. He also has a yacht only slightly smaller than the QE2 on which he holds parties featuring paid female "entertainers" who, well, entertain Greene's gentlemen guests, including the likes of Mike Tyson. As this stuff leaked out, Greene began to nosedive in the polls and Meek may well yet pull it off. If the nomination if worth anything remains to be seen. In reality, Meek's only hope is that some huge scandal causes Crist to crash and burn, leaving the voters a choice between the far-right Rubio and himself, b

Two Kentucky Polls, Very Different Results     Permalink

We have two different polls today for the Kentucky Senate race between Rand Paul (R), the son of Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX) and Kentucky Attorney General Jack Conway (D). The Rasmussen poll puts Paul 15% ahead while the CNN/Opinion Research poll says it is an exact tie at 46% each. What's going on here? Is Rasmussen fudging the numbers? Hard to say but there is one major different between the polls. The Opinion Research poll is of registered voters and the Rasmussen poll is of likely voters. That could account for the huge difference in a year when Republicans are much more excited about voting than Democrats. Midterm elections are all about getting your own base to vote--not about winning over independents or people who support the other party, and many Democrats are dispirited with President Obama's refusal to stand up to the Republicans. They may show this by telling the pollsters that they support Conway (in the Opinion Research poll) but also tell Rasmussen that they probably won't vote this year. Of course, they could change their minds come November.

One could ask why Opinion Research polled registered voters instead of likely voters, but it is possible they didn't thnk they could come up with a good enough screen to figure out who would vote. As we get closer to the election, it is important that all pollsters try because midterm turnouts are much lower than presidential year turnouts, and the people who don't vote are disproportionately younger voters and minorities, all of whom are strongly Democratic. So it is at least possible that both polls are correct because they are samplying different populations.

How the House Would be Won     Permalink

Politico has an interesting article on what a Republican takeover of the House would look like. It divides Democratic seats in the House into "must win" (like CA-04), "majority makers" (like IA-03) and "landsliders" (like AZ-08). If the Republicans can't win nearly all of the first category, they won't make it. They also have to win a large fraction of the second category to get a majority. The third category is icing on the cake. It is often reported that the Republicans need 39 seats to take over the House. This statement is only true if the Republicans suffer no losses of their own. But they are virtually certain to lose DE-AL, HI-01, and LA-02, all of which are heavily Democratic. This means they have to win 42 Democratic seats, assuming no other losses.

Also worth considering is the difference between 218 seats in the House and a working majority. A number of new representatives are probably going to be tea partiers who are running on a platform of cutting the federal deficit. If the first thing a new Republican-controlled House does is bring up a bill to cut taxes--without cutting spending, which is always difficult to do because every li

How the House Would be Won     Permalink

Politico has an interesting article on what a Republican takeover of the House would look like. It divides Democratic seats in the House into "must win" (like CA-04), "majority makers" (like IA-03) and "landsliders" (like AZ-08). If the Republicans can't win nearly all of the first category, they won't make it. They also have to win a large fraction of the second category to get a majority. The third category is icing on the cake. It is often reported that the Republicans need 39 seats to take over the House. This statement is only true if the Republicans suffer no losses of their own. But they are virtually certain to lose DE-AL, HI-01, and LA-02, all of which are heavily Democratic. This means they have to win 42 Democratic seats, assuming no other losses.

Also worth considering is the difference between 218 seats in the House and a working majority. A number of new representatives are probably going to be tea partiers who are running on a platform of cutting the federal deficit. If the first thing a new Republican-controlled House does is bring up a bill to cut taxes--without cutting spending, which is always difficult to do because every l

Senate and House Tracking Starts Today     Permalink

The primary season is almost over. On Sept. 14 we have Delaware, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New York, Rhode Island, and Wisconsin. Then Four days later we have Hawaii and we are pretty much done with the primaries. Still, even with the candidates unknown in a few key races (Delaware and New Hampshire Senate races, for example), the big picture is pretty much clear now. Consequently, we are starting to track the House and Senate races on a daily basis, as in previous years.

The map above reflects the current state of all the Senate races except NYA, in which Chuck Schumer (D-NY) is going to coast to an easy victory, so the map will just show NYB (Kirsten Gillibrand vs. the winner of the GOP primary in New York). The algorithm used is the same as in 2008, which got 33 of the 35 Senate races right. The two it missed were Minnesota (Franken vs. Coleman), which ultimately was decided by the courts after 6 months of wrangling, and Georgia (Chambliss vs. Martin), which required a runoff. The algorithm is explained on the page linked to the "Map algorithm explained" link below the legend to the lower right of the map. Basically, the most recent poll is always used and if there are other polls within a week of it, all of the are averaged equally. The algorithm also did pretty good with the presidental vote, predicting all states correctly except Indiana (which Obama won by 1%) and Missouri, which McCain won by 0.1% The projected electoral vote was 353 to 174 (with Missouri projected as a tie). The actual electoral vote was 365 to 173.

The map is active, as in the past. If you put the mouse cursor on a state, you get a pop-up box telling what the score is there. Clicking on a state brings up a graph of all the polls for that Senate race for all of 2

Barnes Wins Georgia Gubernatorial Nomination; Runoff for the GOP     Permalink

In yesterday's primary election in Georgia, former governor Roy Barnes (D) easily bested half a dozen opponents to get the Democrat nomination to run for the open governor's seat. On the Republican side, the result was indecisive, with tea party favorite, Karen Handel, and former congressman Nathan Deal coming in first and second, respectively. Neither of them got 50% of the vote in a multiway primary so they will face off in a runoff in three weeks. The winner will take on Barnes in November. This race is important because Georgia is a large and growing state and both houses of the state legislature are dominated by Republicans. If Handel or Deal win in November, the legislature will be free to gerrymander congressional districts to its heart's content (something it already has a history of doing). If Barnes wins, he will veto any such plans and the new districts will have to be drawn in a way that favors neither party.

Update on Top Senate Races     Permalink

Updates will be a bit sporadic until September due to travel and the fact that most people aren't really tuned into politics yet, which makes the polls very suspect this far out. Here is a rundown of the top Senate races. For a rundown on all the Senate races, click on the "Senate Races" link under the map.

Regular Updates to Start Next Week     Permalink

Labor Day is the traditional kickoff for political campaigns in the U.S. so we will begin our detailed coverage of the 2010 midterm elections next week. Before September, most voters are more interested in hot dogs than hot air and don't pay a lot of attention to politicians. That will start to change next week. Accordingly, the site will be updated (almost) every day from next week to election day.

Party in the White House Nearly Always Loses Seats in the Midterms     Permalink

With very few exceptions in the past half century, the party occupying the White House loses seats in both the Senate and House during the midterm elections. The President's opponents see the midterms as away to register their unhappiness with him. But usually enough of his supporters are more disappointed by what he didn't do than by what he do and stay home, which makes a difference. Here is a chart showing the results of all the Senate midterms since WWII. Bars going down from the horizontal black line mean the President's party lost seats in the Senate. Bars going up showed that it won. Only three times in more than a half century has the President's party gained ground, and then only one or two seats. The colors indicate which party was in the White House at the time of the midterms. The average loss in the Senate is 7 seats.

Review of the Gubernatorial Rces     Permalink

While there are still primaries to come in half a dozen potentially competitive states, it is nevertheless worthwhile to take a look at the gubernatorial races that are already beginning to become clear. There are an incredible 24 open governor's seats this November, mostly due to term limits, but also a few due to voluntary retirements and one (NV) due to the sitting governor being defeated in a primary. Here is the list

Scott Wins Florida GOP Gubernatorial Nomination     Permalink