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Certainly give us a lot of food for thought. Well done.

I think if a old line Establishment Liberal like Chaffe loses in RI, that will be a serious wake up call to the Party Establishment. Dump Chaffe NOW.

I wish I had better news from MN. While the likely Republican for US Senate, Mark Kennedy, will certainly be far more a Conservative then the current Democrat Mark Dayton, he still is likely to be a pretty establishment Senator if he wins the Seat. He will be a reliably Republican Senator given the proper leadership. A disappointment if lead by the get along/go along who are the current Republican Senate Leaders. I think the key here is WHO is the Senate Leader going to be after Frist?

If we can hold the Senate with more then a 1-2 seat Majority we have a golden opportunity here. With Frist leaving we have a solid shot at a serious Senate Leader for the 1st time. Dole-Lott-Frist were too get along/go along types who would not fight on Conservative principals. Get a solidly Conservative leader, such as Tom Coburn (R-OK) who will use his leadership powers to lead the fight in the Senate for Conservative principals and that would be a HUGE boost to our side.

Excellent anaylsis, though I'd suggest two changes.

First, I'd replace Graham or Gregg with John Warner, he's more of a backstabber who "crosses over" to the Dem side than Graham or Gregg. The latter two might have some freepers foaming at the mouth to get rid of them (mainly due to people who decide how "conservative" someone is based on their fantatical hatred of John McCain and fawning over a candidate's ablity to make folksy, patriotic mom-and-apple-pie speeches), but that doesn't change the fact their Senate record shows they vote the "right" way about 90% of the time.

The American Conservative Union gave "RINO" Graham a 92% conserative rating in 2004, but "conservative" Warner was 20 points lower, having voted conservative 72% of the time.

I'm also guessing Murkowski (AK) and Shelby (AL) voted to the left of Gregg and Graham. IMO, any Republican Senator who can't muster a conservative record at least 80% of the time (4 out of 5 votes) is a "weak sister" and could be replaced with a better candidate. Any Republican from a solid GOP state who can't muster a 80% rating is a squishy RINO who NEEDS to be replaced. No execuse for that.

Second, I'd upgrade ol' Snarlin' Arlen MacSpecter from "moderate" to "liberal", seeing as he couldn't even must a 51% "conserative" rating (his lifetime average is 44% I believe, so this RINO actually votes with the liberals MORE OFTEN than us. The Clinton impeachment revealed that the uber RINO quadrent of Senators was Snowe, Collins, Specter, and Chafee, and everything since then have pretty much proven these jokers can"t even be reliabled upon to vote with us "when it counts", let alone vote with us on big issues.

In short, the conservative movement needs to stop tilting at windmills and whining about the Peter Fitzgerald and Rick Santorums of the world (90% conservatives elected in statse that went Gore/Kerry twice), and instead focus on truly awful RINOs elected in "safe" GOP states and ultra-liberal Dems elected in "safe" GOP states.

The way the U.S. Senate is designed, we SHOULD easily have a 60 seat advantage over the Dems. We don't because the Dems don't run around proclaiming "only DINOs can WIN!!" in Bush states like North Dakota, and the GOP fails to run competative candidates in states they should carry "by default". There are far more hard core Dems in Bush states than hard core Republicans in Kerry states. Tsk, tsk.

I wrote the same analysis, more or less, after 2000.

The problem is that, since then, we have allowed leftist RATs to run and win essentially unopposed in ND, MT, NV, LA, AR.The Dems NEVER let a possible win go without a candidate. The Republicans do this all the time.

Nelson (FL) is one of the most unpopular US Senators, according to a recent survey. There should be several strong candidates trying to take that seat away.

Instead, in a rising red state, there's no one willing to run who can win.

There are serious, serious problems all across the country with candidate development and recruitment.

If the party roles were reversed, the RATs would have 70 Senators. It's pathetic.