# U.S. Senate Elections Thread (and House too, if you want) **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [November 5, 2008, 4:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/u-s-senate-elections-thread-and-house-too-if-you-want/471198 "2008-11-05T04:05:16Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2008, 2:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/u-s-senate-elections-thread-and-house-too-if-you-want/471198/41 "2008-11-06T14:44:16Z")
To summarize the Senate picture: 1. the Dems are +6 so far (NH, VA, NC, NM, CO, OR). If they were in the BCS, they’d be bowl-eligible. 🙂 2. In MN, Franken’s a few hundred votes behind, out of a few million, pending a recount. Not good, but also not over. 3. In AK, Begich is a few thousand votes behind, with an indeterminate number of votes, probably in the upper five figures, still uncounted. A lot of these are early ballots which would probably skew Dem. A lot of them are absentee ballots, which would probably skew GOP. And a number of them may be provisional ballots, which would probably skew Dem, but ‘provisional’ means that they need to be checked to verify their validity, and not all of them will be valid. So who knows? 4. In GA, Jim Martin will go up against Saxby Chambliss in a runoff on December 2. The absence of a conservative third-party candidate favors Chambliss; the fact that it’s a special election favors whoever can get their supporters more fired up (and ready to go), which probably means the Dems. Obama staffers were already booking travel to GA on Tuesday. So the Dems could wind up anywhere from +6 to +9. Should be interesting. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2008, 2:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/u-s-senate-elections-thread-and-house-too-if-you-want/471198/42 "2008-11-07T14:31:57Z")
Updates: OR: Merkley’s margin of victory is now over 50,000. MN: Coleman’s lead over Franken is down to 236. I haven’t seen any new information about the Alaska race since yesterday morning. ---
**Author:** ![Tom\_Scud](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/f08c70/32.png) [@Tom\_Scud](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tom_Scud)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2008, 3:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/u-s-senate-elections-thread-and-house-too-if-you-want/471198/43 "2008-11-07T15:29:12Z")
> [@RTFirefly](#): > > To summarize the Senate picture: > 4) In GA, Jim Martin will go up against Saxby Chambliss in a runoff on December 2. The absence of a conservative third-party candidate favors Chambliss; the fact that it’s a special election favors whoever can get their supporters more fired up (and ready to go), which probably means the Dems. Obama staffers were already booking travel to GA on Tuesday. Another factor in Chambliss’s favor is the question of whether without Obama at the top of the ballot the Dems be able to turn out the black vote the way they did during the main election. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2008, 9:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/u-s-senate-elections-thread-and-house-too-if-you-want/471198/44 "2008-11-07T21:21:15Z")
[The Anchorage Daily News:](http://www.adn.com/front/story/580342.html) > [@](#): > > Alaska’s voter turnout numbers won’t be clear until all the absentee ballots are in. But it’s not expected to reach the 66 percent turnout of the last presidential election year, 2004, and there’s dispute over whether it even makes the 60 percent of 2000. > > Given that the state’s governor was the vice presidential nominee and that Stevens and Young were fighting for their lives, political watchers like Michael McDonald, an associate professor who studies voting at George Mason University in Virginia, were scratching their heads over the Alaska turnout. Me, too. The WaPo’s Derek Kravitz [notes that](http://voices.washingtonpost.com/washingtonpostinvestigations/2008/11/alaska_turnout_results_raise_q.html?hpid=news-col-blogs)"This is especially odd given that Alaska’s Board of Elections saw a 12.4 percent hike in turnout for the August primaries, before Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin was selected as the Republican Party’s vice presidential nominee." [The Anchorage Press adds:](http://www.anchoragepress.com/articles/2008/11/05/news/doc491252041a0c6224027129.txt) > [@](#): > > In spite of the historic factors of this election in Alaska—Governor Palin running for vice president, the unprecedented Democratic campaign operation by Obama up here—voter turnout was low. Assuming the number of uncounted ballots is around 60,000, the turnout percentage is about 57.2 percent, compared with 66.6 percent in 2004, when George W. Bush was running against a lackluster Democratic ticket, Stevens had no serious challenger, and Young faced Democrat Diane Benson. Nationally, the Associated Press reported that there was an estimated 64.1 percent turnout this year. > > The current returns, without the uncounted ballots, show the McCain/Palin ticket fetching 136,348 votes in Alaska, while in 2004 Bush/Cheney garnered 190,889, a significant disparity. These numbers only add to the oddity of this election in Alaska; in the run-up to Tuesday, Alaskan voters seemed energized to vote for a ticket with our governor on it, despite the barrage of criticism Palin faced. Apparently they weren’t, though. You’d think that, one way or the other, there’d be anecdotal stories from polling places, giving some clue whether people were voting in droves, or staying away in droves. But with Palin on the ballot, and hotly contested races for Senate and House, a big drop in turnout makes no sense at all. I don’t believe it. ---
**Author:** ![Spoke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a88e57/32.png) [@Spoke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoke)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2008, 9:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/u-s-senate-elections-thread-and-house-too-if-you-want/471198/45 "2008-11-07T21:36:26Z")
I have my doubts whether folks in Georgia will turn out to vote for Jim Martin. First of all, he’s just not a very charismatic candidate. Secondly, a lot of new voters showed up on the 4th specifically to vote for Obama. Martin was an afterthought. The only hope is if Obama can get his turnout machine in gear to get out the vote for Martin. Martin has little or no such machinery of his own. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2008, 10:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/u-s-senate-elections-thread-and-house-too-if-you-want/471198/46 "2008-11-07T22:02:37Z")
> [@spoke-](#): > > The only hope is if Obama can get his turnout machine in gear to get out the vote for Martin. Martin has little or no such machinery of his own. Obama’s turnout machine was very much in place until just a few days ago, so if his campaign has any money left over, they can keep it in place for another three and a half weeks. ---
**Author:** ![Spoke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a88e57/32.png) [@Spoke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoke)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2008, 10:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/u-s-senate-elections-thread-and-house-too-if-you-want/471198/47 "2008-11-07T22:17:14Z")
Oh I’m well aware of Obama’s machinery, having seen it up close. I expect Obama will do his best to stir voters to action. That is Martin’s best hope. But even with that assist, I don’t know if voters will turn out (certainly not with the sense of purpose they had on the 4th). I’ll say this, though: If Martin wins, he owes his seat to Obama, and Obama would surely have a loyal ally. ---
**Author:** ![Cervaise](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cervaise/32/16693_2.png) [@Cervaise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cervaise)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2008, 10:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/u-s-senate-elections-thread-and-house-too-if-you-want/471198/48 "2008-11-07T22:32:55Z")
> [@RTFirefly](#): > > MN: Coleman’s lead over Franken is down to 236. If this trend continues, and Franken goes up by, oh, say, one vote, Coleman will step back, right? Right? ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2008, 1:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/u-s-senate-elections-thread-and-house-too-if-you-want/471198/49 "2008-11-11T01:59:20Z")
What’s new? In **Georgia** , the runoff campaign’s already underway. In **Minnesota** , the [unofficial (and still changing) tally](http://electionresults.sos.state.mn.us/20081104/ElecRslts.asp?M=S&R=all&P=A&Races=%27%27) currently has Coleman leading by 206. But you should really read “[More Minnesota Madness](http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/2008/11/more-minnesota-madness.html)” by Nate Silver to hear about those 34,916 Senate undervotes, how they might be distributed, and how that would affect things. He thinks Franken’s the slight favorite to be the ultimate winner. And FWIW, apparently the swing of over 500 votes, net, between the initial unofficial count, and the present version, is [pretty small potatoes by MN standards](http://mnpublius.com/2008/11/as-counting-continues-pursuant-to-mn-law-franken-may-be-ahead-by-this-evening/). In **Alaska** , this Anchorage Daily News story muses about the low turnout, and notes that a large number of ballots are yet uncounted: > [@](#): > > With 81,000 uncounted absentee and questioned ballots, some of which will be disqualified, the total vote cast so far is 305,281 – 8,311 fewer than the last presidential election of 2004, which saw the largest turnout in Alaska history. That was the election where Alaska’s selection of George Bush for a second term was a foregone conclusion, though there was an unusually hot Senate race between Sen. Lisa Murkowski and former Gov. Tony Knowles. And then goes on to point out what small potatoes the Murkowski-Knowles race was, next to the 2008 menu. > [@](#): > > [Pollster Ivan] Moore said he’s seen anecdotal evidence of both strong support for Democrats, and also low turnout at the polls, so he’s waiting for the final count before reaching any conclusions. > > Still, with the increase in registration and population since 2004, the total vote this year should have been around 330,000 to 340,000 had it been just an ordinary election, Moore said. They’ve also got a good [map of the election results by voting district](http://media.adn.com/smedia/2008/11/07/12/7senateVote.source.prod_affiliate.7.pdf), which will be useful in gauging Begich’s chances for overtaking Stevens if we should learn where all the early votes, absentee ballots, and questioned ballots are from. ---
**Author:** ![Spoke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a88e57/32.png) [@Spoke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoke)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2008, 3:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/u-s-senate-elections-thread-and-house-too-if-you-want/471198/50 "2008-11-11T03:48:02Z")
Georgia’s vote total was lower this year than in '04 as well, in spite of all the excitement and all the newly-registered voters. Georgia had an anti-gay-marriage amendment on the ballot in '04, which I suspect is what drove turnout that year. That mechanism was used by Republicans in several states that year, as I recall. (Wonder if Alaska had anything similar?) Another possibility is that conservative voters were just disspirited and unenthusiastic this year, resulting in lower turnouts in generally conservative states like Alaska and Georgia. Either way, I am not prepared to call shenanigans just because Alaska has a lower-than-expected turnout. I’m also not prepared to call shenanigans on Minnesota’s undervoting. If I understand the term correctly, that means there are fewer votes for Senator than the overall number of voters. That shouldn’t be surprising, since a lot of people registered this year for the sole purpose of voting in the presidential race. I know that in the precinct where I was working in Georgia, there were a lot more votes in the Presidential race than in the Senatorial race. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2008, 7:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/u-s-senate-elections-thread-and-house-too-if-you-want/471198/51 "2008-11-11T19:39:29Z")
> [@spoke-](#): > > Georgia’s vote total was lower this year than in '04 as well, in spite of all the excitement and all the newly-registered voters. > > Georgia had an anti-gay-marriage amendment on the ballot in '04, which I suspect is what drove turnout that year. That mechanism was used by Republicans in several states that year, as I recall. (Wonder if Alaska had anything similar?) The [Alaska page from CNN’s 2004 coverage](http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2004/pages/results/states/AK/) isn’t showing anything like that - only one on legalizing marijuana. > [@](#): > > Another possibility is that conservative voters were just disspirited and unenthusiastic this year, resulting in lower turnouts in generally conservative states like Alaska and Georgia. Hard to imagine that, with Palin on the ballot. > [@](#): > > Either way, I am not prepared to call shenanigans just because Alaska has a lower-than-expected turnout. Me either, yet - but the lack of questions about it is disturbing to me. If nobody asks what’s going on, then you never find out whether there were shenanigans or not. > [@](#): > > I’m also not prepared to call shenanigans on Minnesota’s undervoting. I don’t think anyone’s even suggesting there might be. That’s more a question of, did people do things like put an ‘X’ through one place where they’d filled in the wrong circle on the optical-scan form, then fill in another dot? Or did someone circle a name on the ballot, rather than fill in the circle on the optical-scan form? That’s the sort of thing you find in a manual recount of undervotes. Nothing shady about it - just that the scanner treats either of those as a ‘no vote,’ and that’s how it’s counted unless the election is close enough to go back and look at that sort of thing. Which this one is. ---
**Author:** ![Spoke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a88e57/32.png) [@Spoke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoke)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2008, 7:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/u-s-senate-elections-thread-and-house-too-if-you-want/471198/52 "2008-11-11T19:51:21Z")
> [@RTFirefly](#): > > Me either, yet - but the lack of questions about it is disturbing to me. If nobody asks what’s going on, then you never find out whether there were shenanigans or not. Agreed. There exist grounds for investigation, but not yet for conviction. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2008, 5:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/u-s-senate-elections-thread-and-house-too-if-you-want/471198/53 "2008-11-12T17:45:31Z")
> [@spoke-](#): > > Agreed. There exist grounds for investigation, but not yet for conviction. OTOH, the [Wall Street Journal](http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122644940271419147.html) has decided to leap straight to accusing the Dems of trying to steal the Minnesota Senate election. Amusingly enough, they rely in part on the statistical expertise of noted con artist John R. Lott. (Wonder what Mary Rosh is up to, these days? :)) ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2008, 5:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/u-s-senate-elections-thread-and-house-too-if-you-want/471198/54 "2008-11-12T17:59:36Z")
The Minnesota GOP has started a blog, [http://minnesotarecount.com/](http://minnesotarecount.com/), to supposedly “keep a watchful eye on Minnesota’s Senate recount.” It doesn’t actually seem to be doing any of that, though. Instead, it’s just reprinting the gossip of wingnut ignoramuses about the certification and recount: RedState, Townhall, Powerline, “Minnesota Democrats Exposed,” Fox and the WSJ of course, plus some chatter from the mainstream media. But nothing that could be described as adding to what people know about the recount. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2008, 10:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/u-s-senate-elections-thread-and-house-too-if-you-want/471198/55 "2008-11-12T22:01:07Z")
Meanwhile, up in Alaska, it looks like we have (a) some numbers to report, and (b) the prospect of a whole bunch more votes about to be counted: a) There are (PDF) [60,950 absentee ballots and 9,507 early ballots waiting to be counted, and 20,178 questioned ballots](http://www.elections.alaska.gov/files/08GENR/remaining_absentee_early_question_numbers.pdf) (plus maybe some more in 13 of Alaska’s 40 voting districts where they haven’t finished tallying the questioned ballots) that will have their eligibility determined, and then counted if eligible. That’s 90,635 actual and potential ballots, which gets us within a few thousand of the 2004 total. Glad to see it. The PDF breaks them down by district, which would be helpful if I had the time to correlate those counts with the voting totals so far in the different districts. Maybe later. b) (PDF) [54,051 of the absentee and early ballots](http://www.elections.alaska.gov/files/08GENR/First_ABS_Count_Potential_Totals.pdf) in 33 districts where the duplicate voter check is complete are supposed to be counted today. Since Alaska is west of the contiguous U.S., that means late tonight, for those of us on the East Coast. I think I’ll see what’s up with the counts in the morning. [As Kos points out](http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/11/12/11522/592/209/659818), the remaining 7 districts are all Begich territory, so while he needs to close the gap somewhat today, he certainly doesn’t need to pull ahead yet. [Short note about the counting](http://community.adn.com/node/134294) from the Anchorage Daily News. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Carrot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f0a364/32.png) [@Captain\_Carrot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Carrot)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2008, 10:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/u-s-senate-elections-thread-and-house-too-if-you-want/471198/56 "2008-11-12T22:59:43Z")
How the hell is it taking them this long to count the votes?! It’s been a week, and they’ve barely done anything! I’d think that they’d be done in Alaska, at least, seeing as how they have so many fewer ballots to look at. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2008, 11:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/u-s-senate-elections-thread-and-house-too-if-you-want/471198/57 "2008-11-12T23:06:13Z")
> [@Captain\_Carrot](#): > > How the hell is it taking them this long to count the votes?! In Minnesota the actual recount doesn’t start until next week; state law. ---
**Author:** ![Squink](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b5e925/32.png) [@Squink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Squink)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2008, 12:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/u-s-senate-elections-thread-and-house-too-if-you-want/471198/58 "2008-11-13T00:03:37Z")
Also, meanwhile up in Alaska, or in regard to Alaska: [Palin leaves door open on Senate run](http://www.politico.com/blogs/scorecard/1108/Palin_leaves_door_open_on_Senate_run.html) > [@](#): > > I believe that I have — I feel I have a contract with Alaskans to serve. I’ve got two more years in my term. I’m going to serve Alaskans to the best of my ability. At this point it is as governor. > > Now if something shifted dramatically and if it were, if it were acknowledged up there that I could be put to better use for my state in the U.S. Senate, I would certainly consider that, but that would take a special election and everything else. I am not one to appoint myself or a member of my family to take the place of any vacancy. ---
**Author:** ![Squink](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b5e925/32.png) [@Squink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Squink)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2008, 12:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/u-s-senate-elections-thread-and-house-too-if-you-want/471198/59 "2008-11-13T00:34:44Z")
[Stevens’ lead now under 1,000 as Alaska begins ballot tally](http://www.mcclatchydc.com/251/story/55789.html) ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Carrot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f0a364/32.png) [@Captain\_Carrot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Carrot)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2008, 12:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/u-s-senate-elections-thread-and-house-too-if-you-want/471198/60 "2008-11-13T00:36:55Z")
> [@Palin](#): > > I am not one to appoint myself or a member of my family to take the place of any vacancy. Good thing, too, because that’s no longer possible in Alaska. There has to be a special election, ever since Gov. Frank Murkowski named his daughter to the position. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/u-s-senate-elections-thread-and-house-too-if-you-want/471198.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/u-s-senate-elections-thread-and-house-too-if-you-want/471198.md?page=4)