FOLLOW THE MONEY

This is going to be a very interesting week.  I have been viewing several recent polls and a couple of patterns are clear.  No legitimate pollster, Republican or Democrat, is now predicting that Democrats keep control of the House.  Even the most die hard Democratic pundits are admitting that Republicans are going to win a lot of seats currently held by Democrats.  Some estimates are north of 90 seats changing hands.   In addition, those Democrats from Republican districts who do survive will have done so by running against Obama and against Pelosi.  Here is California virtually no one is running as a Democrat.  Even Barbara Boxer has avoided mentioning the stimulus, Obamacare or any other of his other great accomplishments.  Instead she is pretending to be a friend of veterans and she is slamming Carly Fiorina.

The real question is how bad will it be?  No one knows for sure, because recent polls have shown Republicans to be competitive in districts where no one thought that was remotely possible.  For example, even Dennis Kucinich is in trouble, with his Republican opponent now within 4 percentage points.  Unbelievable!

We already know some things because of reports from states that allow early voting.  No one is measuring actual votes, but they are measuring whether it is a registered Republican or a registered Democrat who is voting.  The following shows some of the results.   I have verified these results from several sources:

Following are the states where Republicans are doing very well. 

Arizona           Republicans 44%  Democrats 34%

Colorado         Republicans 42%  Democrats 37%

Florida             Republicans 53%  Democrats 34%

Georgia           Republicans 58%  Democrats 26%

Nevada            Republicans 42%  Democrats 42%

New Mexico   Republicans 47%  Democrats 44%

Pennsylvania   Republicans 56%  Democrats 37%

Democrats appear to be doing well in West Virginia, Maryland, Wisconsin and Iowa, but even Democratic pollsters expect the Republican candidate to win in all of those states, with the exception of Maryland.  It appears that this year Democratic registered voters, particularly in blue collar states, are not necessarily voting for the Democrat.

 West Virginia is very interesting, because the Democrat is the current Governor, Manchin, who is very popular.  He was way behind until he ran an ad where he came out carrying a rife, promised to repeal “the bad parts” of Obamacare and then literally shot at the proposed Cap & Trade legislation.  This is not exactly an endorsement of Democratic Party accomplishments.  If he wins, it will only because of his promise to break with the Democratic Party. 

 No current Republican Senator is considered to be at risk, and even Democratic strategists are predicting they will all be easily re-elected.  Remarkably only 4 Democratic Senate seats are considered solid Democrat as of right now.

 Here is what to expect and what to watch.  Barbara Mikulski in Maryland and Patrick Leahy in Vermont will probably coast to re-election.  Unless something changes, we should expect Schumer and Gillebrand in New York.  If either New York race is even close that would be significant.  For example Schumer is up by about 30 points and Gillebrand is up by about 19 points.  If either race is close, that is very bad news for Democrats. 

The early races to watch are the Senate races in Connecticut and Delaware.  The conventional wisdom is that Democrats are ahead in both states, but Obama recently campaigned in both states.  There must be some concern by the Democratic Party.  Even if the Democrat wins, but the margin is in the low single digits, the Senate is definitely in play.  If the Republican pulls off a win in either state, it is going to be a bloodbath for Democrats in the Senate.  Republicans have a better chance in Connecticut than in Delaware, but this year anything could happen.  In both states the Democrat is up by about 15% at the moment.  Normally that would be considered a safe margin, but a lot of tea party candidates surged more than just before the election.

I know a lot of people are really wondering about California.  It is too close to call.  The key factor is that in no poll has Barbara Boxer got more than 48% of the vote.  Usually, if an incumbent is not over 50% the week before the election, they lose.  If someone has not decided to vote for Barbara Boxer by now they are unlikely to change their mind.  There are a lot more Democrats than Republicans in California, and Boxer is up by about 3 points, but she has not put this away. As of 2008, 44% of voters were Democrats and 31% were Republicans with 25% independents.  So far, in early voting, 43% of voters have been Democrats and 39% have been Republicans.  That is a significant Republican trend.  If Independents move away from Barbara Boxer she will probably lose.

Bad news for Republicans would be a Feingold victory in Wisconsin.  If that happens, Democrats probably keep the Senate.  A Manchin victory in West Virginia would not necessarily mean much with regard to other Senate races because of his personal popularity and his strategy to run against the Democratic agenda.   Obviously if Rubio loses in Florida, that would also be bad, as would be a win by Sestak in Pennsylvania.

Final note:  There are a ton of Republican/Conservative groups out there that are determined to seize this opportunity.  The Chamber of Commerce has been very active and has been effective.  Other groups are targeting high profile states.  That has already been effective in Alaska and Nevada.  They are pouring money into Connecticut, Delaware, Nevada and Washington.  Right now it appears that the RNC thinks they have a chance at 82 seats and they are spending a lot of money there.  Previously they were focused on about 50 seats, so this is an indication they are going for the kill.

Democrats are screaming bloody murder and Rep Fazio has called for the impeachment of John Roberts for the Supreme Court decision to overturn McCain-Feingold.  That decision had a major impact on leveling the field, because in prior elections unions would always pour in tons of last minute cash and push Democrats over the top.  At the same time the business community was restricted from spending money during the last 30 days.  A lot of our problems are directly related to the takeover of local, state and federal governments by public sector unions.  I did another post over the weekend titled:  LOOK FOR THE UNION LABEL. 

TDM