Posted on 02/05/2013 9:23:06 PM PST by neverdem
The odds are against Senate Democrats this cycle. But, of course, they were against the party two years ago at this time, and Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee Executive Director Guy Cecil didn’t merely beat the odds — he slaughtered them.
This time, Democrats face better prospects of holding onto their Senate majority next November than they did two years ago (after all, they begin with 55 seats instead of 53), but a net loss looks inevitable and a big loss is quite possible. Cecil, who is back for a return engagement this cycle, has his work cut out for him.
The biggest factor in how the cycle turns out probably isn’t candidate recruiting, fundraising or the number of open seats, though each will affect the fight for the Senate next year. It is almost certainly going to be President Barack Obama’s popularity and the electorate’s sense of how he is doing.
Democrats went into the 2012 cycle defending 23 Senate seats to the GOP’s 10 seats, and the landscape of that Senate class — races in Massachusetts and Maine, but also in North Dakota, Missouri, Virginia, Florida and Montana — certainly favored Republicans.
This cycle, the numbers aren’t quite as asymmetric, but with 21 Democratic seats and only 14 Republican seats up for election, the GOP once again begins with an advantage.
Unlike 2012, when Democrats started with at least two serious takeover opportunities, in Massachusetts and Nevada , this cycle the party lacks any good takeover opportunities (before retirements). That reality, combined with a landscape that includes a number of Democratic seats in very conservative states (West Virginia, Louisiana, Arkansas, Alaska and South Dakota), makes for an ever greater initial Democratic headache than at the start of last cycle.
With Senate contests next year in four strongly anti-Obama states, Democrats can’t afford a second Obama midterm election with a national electorate that wants to send a message of dissatisfaction with the president.
Obama carried just 35.5 percent of the vote in West Virginia, 36.9 percent in Arkansas, 39.9 percent in South Dakota, 40.6 percent in Louisiana, 40.8 percent in Alaska and 41.7 percent in Montana last year. While voters were able to split their tickets in 2012 and vote against Obama but for Democratic Senate nominees such as Joe Manchin III in West Virginia or Heidi Heitkamp in North Dakota, voters won’t be able to do the same thing in 2014.
The president isn’t on the ballot next year, so the only way for anti-Obama voters to express their opinion of the president is to vote against his party’s Senate nominees. And that makes Senate seats in anti-Obama states in 2014 much more difficult to hold than Senate seats in anti-Obama states were in 2012.
An overly ambitious — and overly liberal — agenda coming from the White House, which looks like a distinct possibility, could undermine the Democrats’ chances of holding onto Senate seats in states where Obama performed poorly in both 2008 and 2012.
Still, last year’s elections certainly proved that candidates and campaigns matter, and if all else fails for Democrats, the party can probably figure on Republican primary voters screwing up in at least a couple of states and producing nominees so weak that Democrats can steal a seat or two, as they have done during the past two elections.
You can almost see the writing on the wall in the newly open Iowa Senate race, where GOP primary voters easily could select a doctrinaire conservative over a mainstream conservative, lessening their party’s chances of picking up an already difficult opportunity.
Anyway, the cycle starts off with eight vulnerable Democratic Senate seats and not a single vulnerable GOP one. Republicans need to net six Senate seats to have a majority in the next Congress. Though not impossible, that is a very difficult task, especially given the current standing of the two parties.
At the Rothenberg Political Report, we start off by giving Republicans a slight edge in West Virginia’s open seat. South Dakota looks like a problem for Democrats with or without Sen. Tim Johnson’s retirement, while the politically conservative, anti-Obama natures of Louisiana and Arkansas put them at great risk for incumbent Sens. Mary L. Landrieu and Mark Pryor.
The cycle could deteriorate dramatically for Democrats if most or all of the next group of potentially competitive contests — Alaska, Iowa’s open seat, Montana, North Carolina and even New Hampshire — become really serious Republican opportunities. Of those five, Obama carried only two, Iowa and New Hampshire.
Obviously, this year’s special election in Massachusetts and additional retirements on both sides of the aisle could have a big effect on the final results next November.
No two cycles are exactly alike. The GOP’s failure to net three or four seats last time, as many initially expected, doesn’t mean the same will happen in 2014. Personally I don’t believe in jinxes, whether in second-term midterms or because the Boston Red Sox sold Babe Ruth to the Yankees. But voter fatigue with a president after six years is a very real danger for Obama, and that, more than anything else, may make 2014 more challenging than last cycle for Guy Cecil.
I don't know about teflon, but I do think the tea party (notice small "t") mindset has influenced elections at the local and state levels a lot. How many local and state legislators have switched parties in the last few years? Quite a lot.
State legislatures are being flooded with folks with tea party principles.
It will take a while for the cream to rise to the top, but it will. Conservatism will be reignited at the local and state levels out of necessity. Hopefully, the success of states and cities where conservatism has been applied contrasted with those where liberalism reigns will serve as a wake up call.
I’d say both. But we won’t be successful if we run candidates who are right on the issues but say things in a stupid way that allows them to be caricatured beyond all recognition by the media and the ‘Rats. In the political realm, there is a right way and a wrong way to say things, and there are times when you have to be smart enough not to be drawn into the no-win trap the media ‘Rats set.
I’m not convinced voting isn’t tampered with. No one could have been that stupid to re-elect Obama.
No arguments there.
But the women who fell for the whole "War On Women" canard deserve their share of the blame, too. "The low information voter" personified...
You may well be correct, but fraud only works on the margins. The sad reality is that there were an astounding number of people voting for Baraq despite the horrible economy. The entitlement society has come to America.
Does it really matter about Akin & Mourdock? It is only the votes that matter. If one loses an election, one becomes totally powerless and irrelevant to effect any positive change.
Akin was especially moronic in saying pregnancy will be deterred by woman’s body in case of a rape. Explain that to millions of pregnancies caused by conquering armies throughout history. Alexander the Great’s soldiers left behind a whole bunch of pregnant women from Persia to Hindustan. Ditto with Mughal invader Tamarlane in Hindustan.
But why should we expect Akin to know history?
Well... Hillary... it certainly DOES matter when the entire Vichy GOPe establishment turns against its own candidates to placate the radical left and the MSM.
Which proves we are no better than the Greeks, Spaniards, Russians or Chinese people who all fell for the socialist/communist propaganda at one time or another.
What sounds better to a "have not" than "soak the rich and distribute that wealth to all the poor" or "give every one a fair shot"? Nothing! It is very seductive prose.
Eventually they run out of other people's money and then they march back to capitalism. China now has 150 new Billionaires and One million new millionaires! China had almost none during Mao's regime.
Moral of the story is....do not nominate politically stupid candidates, no matter how pure. After they lose the election, their noble and pure philosophy is impotent, powerless to further any conservative agenda and they become totally irrelevant. Just Todd Akin.
politically stupid candidates like Romney?
“Pure” there is that word again. By that you mean he is really conservative and thats horrible.
Romney did not make any statements as stupid as Akin, but he was too mild mannered to counter attack the community organizer from Chicago. That is another quality which we must look for, some one who is not afraid to execute a counter-punch. Some one with personality of Newt, smoothness of oratory of Rubio, solid conservative as Palin, and most important...looks good on TV, looks young and energetic.
I have said this umpteenth time, only reason Romney won because the more conservative candidates fought among themselves. They acted selfish. They were not united.
Pure is good if accompanied by non-stupid.
Thanks for the ping!
It wasn't my intention to express support for Akin & Mourdock.
My intention was to establish that the women voters who were moved by their comments were just as thoughtless as they were.
What does LIFE stand for?
Louisiana Independent Federation of Electors, Inc.
A piece by Rich Lowry from 1997 explains about the chicanery of the Landrieu-Jenkins farce:
http://old.nationalreview.com/flashback/lowry200411021325.asp
You are correct about those low information women voters. The problem is they are a factor in deciding who wins. So the GOP needs to be message smart. Unfortunately it is not enough to have a message which will only appeal to intelligent voters.
“With the entire nation apparently drinking Obama’s Kool Aid, all bets are off.”
That’s about the size of it.
And, no matter what happens, Progressives will fend off any responsibility by blaming others for failed policies.
Absolutely freaking amazing.
(And one should not forget that the reason for so much violence is the 2nd Amendment of the United States Constitution.) /s/
IMHO
Ah, that makes sense. Well, it is difficult to defeat incumbents, especially now that we have so many more ways to expose people. John Tower probably would never have been elected if particulars of his personal life would have been known. Ditto for Goldwater if the stories of his daughters abortions (if they are true) were public.
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