I like the looks of this, but in the Senate the magic number is still 60.
Years of work yet to be done before judicial nominees can at least get a floor vote, and until important legislaiton can get out of committee.
The rules of the Senate are often times inconsistent with the (d)emocratic ideal of majority rule.
One election at a time, one seat at a time.
You get Daschle out of the Senate and that 60 vote rule might well go away. Especially if Hildabeast wants to run in 2008. If the dems continue to obstruct during the next 4 years she won't even make it though the first 2 weeks of the campaign.
In the best case scenario -- GOP holds OK, CO, and Alaska while picking up NC, SC, GA, FL, LA, and SD, and losing Illinois -- the GOP would be at 56.
Then there would be a chance of getting Democrats Nelson of Nebraska, Baucas of Montana, and Pryor of Arkansas to break with their party and vote to give all judicial picks an up or down vote from the full Senate. But that would still only be 59, and I'm probably being optimistic about Baucas and Pryor. I don't know where #60 would come from. Landrieu doesn't even have to make any pretense of representing the values of her state for then next 3 years, nor will Lincoln in Ark for the next 5 yrs. You'd think that the other 3 Dakota liberals could be cowed into place but it hasn't happened yet, so I don't see why it should in the future. Isn't there a former Gov or something willing to take on Conrad or Dorgan in ND? They should lobby Bayh of Indiana hard seeing as how that guy has to know his moderation on abortion makes him unacceptable on the national Dem ticket.
And of course the GOP must retain 51 seats so as to quell the temptation for Chaffee of RI to pull a Jeffords.
If they lose Alaska then the villain would be Gov Murkowski who apparently was unable to find a competent replacment who was also not related to him. What was he thinking?