Some questions for our many political pundits:
Which seats in the House and Senate are up for election in 2006?
Which ones are vulnerable?
Which ones can either side make vulnerable?
We Dems can dramatically lessen the blow of this election if we take back Congress in 2006. Is it possible? I’d think this would be an important issues for both side of the political debate, but obviously it’s important to those of us who are disappointed by Tuesday’s results.
No need to worry about Senator Byrd’s seat sigh
People around here would elect him even if he were dead.
Realistically, Byrd’s health is bad. It’s just possible he might retire in 2006.
Anything is possible.
However, the Democrats will not get a net gain of six seats in the Senate without a dramtic shift in approach.
If the reactions of the SDMB partisans are any indication, the resistance to such a change is large. People are much more comfortable here continuing to point out that Bush lied and people died. There have been a few voices counseling change, but the crowd is still sticking with the standard approach.
Good.
All House seats are up in 2006.
Isn’t Norm Coleman, Repulican from Minnesota, up in 2006? I’d say he’s not safe.
A third of the senate and half the house is technically up for grabs this election, but of course only a few of those seats are vulnerable. From the rightwing blog restate, these are the seats in the senate supposedly up for grabs:
TOP RETIREMENT POSSIBILITIES:
Demoract Incumbent (7)
Republican Incumbent (3)
TOP PICKUP POSSIBILITES (with no retirement):
Demoract Incumbent (8)
TOP LOSS POSSIBILITIES (with no retirement):
Republican Incumbent (7)
The first number is the precent of the vote they got last election, and the second number is how much that precentage exceeded the precentage that was recived by Gore in that state in 2000 pres election. Keep in mind I don’t know what the methodology was in coming up with these, and they may or may not involve some Repub wishful thinking (notice the two most liberal Repub senators are on the list to possibly loose seats, despite the fact that Olympia Snow won her seat by a good margin last time).
If the Dems gain 5 seats they will tie with repubs for control of the senate. If they loose six, I belive they loose the ability to filibuster, basically their last source of power to influence what goes on in congress.
It’s 3 days after election day, and the new Congress and Senate haven’t taken office. You can’t possibly be serious that you’re predicting behavior on emotionally-based posts resulting from the election, are you?
Or should I consider the reactions of the Republican partisan posters on the SDMB to indicate that we shouldn’t expect anything but gloating for the next 2 years?
Doh!!, of course I mean the entire house of reps.
Here’s a complete listing of senate seats that are up for grabs:
Demoract Incumbent (17)
Republican Incumbent (15)
IF THE REACTIONS OF THE SDMB PARTISANS ARE ANY INDICATION…
If they are not any indication, then who knows?
As I said before in another thread, my studly prognosticating skills won’t come into play next time until I have a clear picture of what faction is going to take the reins of the DNC (and the Senate minority leadership posts!) The Democrats can some very tough choices to make. If they stay with the Nancy Pelosi crowd, I’ll be VERY confident about offering some wagers that control of Congress stays with the GOP. If there is a gobear-ish influence that starts to assert itself at that level, I’ll be very worried.
I actually think a few good guesses can be made right now, regardless of who takes over at the DNC, what happens with Senate Democratic leadership, or what Bush does in the next two years. As we have seen since 2000, Republicans tend to pick up Senate seats in states that are heavily Republican, especially if an incumbent retires. It does not matter who is running as a Democrat or what is going on in the country. So looking at the list of seats, it seems clear that there really isn’t much of an opportunity for many Republican pick-ups. Most of the states with Democratic incumbents are Kerry states, and the incumbents that aren’t in Kerry states (Nebraska and Florida, for example) have moderate Democrats in office. I don’t see either Senators Nelson as being threatened.
In fact, the only seat that I could see as being picked up by Republicans is West Virginia, but only if Byrd retires. It may also be possible to pick up the Massachusetts seat if Kennedy retires and Romney runs. Similarly, there is an outside chance that if Sarbanes retires then Governor Ehrlich in Maryland would run, and I think he’d have a good shot at it.
I don’t see Conrad retiring in North Dakota, so he’s safe. Ditto for Bingaman in New Mexico.
As for Republicans, I also don’t see any losers there. If Chafee retires (though I don’t see why he would, he’s very young), his seat will definitely be Democratic, but he votes with them anyway, so no big loss there. Santorum in Pennsylvania will have a tough race, but he won’t lose.
So I really see it as a status quo election, with maybe one Republican pick-up.
The only way I can see Byrd retiring is if he’s in a coma. He is not going to leave voluntarily.
Thanks for the list, Malodorous.
Demoract Incumbents:
Florida - Bill Nelson
1st term Senator in a swing state - that’s a recipe for vulnerability.
*New York - Hillary Clinton *
Given that hard-core Republicans hate her so much, this must be considered a risky seat.
Republican Incumbents
Mississippi - Trent Lott
I have a suspicion that Lott will retire; if so, the Dems will probably try to make it competitive.
Ohio - Mike DeWine
For the same reason that Nelson’s seat will be competitive.
Virginia - George Allen
Allen’s win over Sen. Robb in '00 wasn’t massive; given that Gov. Warner is almost certain to enter the race, this will probably be close.
Pennsylvania - Rick Santorum
If the Dems run a strong candidate and are able to make an issue out of Santorum’s complete fuckwittedness, they’ve got a chance.
If this was going to keep her out of the Senate, I think it would’ve done so in 2002 when she was also dealing with charges of carpetbagging and the Monicagate scandel was still fresh in everyones minds. Given that Monica is old news and the carpetbagging thing doesn’t really work the second time around, I doubt pure Repub hatred in Dem dominated NY is likely to keep Hillary out.
Ohio Democrats haven’t run a plausible statewide campaign since Tony Celebrezze lost the gubernatorial race in 1990. (That’s not including John Glenn’s final re-election bid in 1992).
See: Tim Hagan, Lee Fisher, Rob Burch, Ted Celeste, Joel Hyatt, Eric Fingerhut, Mary Boyle …
The party is in complete disarray. I can’t imagine that they’re going to have their act together by 2006.
Hillary ran in 2000, not the mid-term in 2002. And Hillary won because Guiliani withdrew from the race late in the season due to testicular cancer. If he had remained in the race, it would have been extremely close. Pataki will give her an extremely interesting run for her seat.
New York—Republicans would love to see Hillary Clinton go down, but she’s too strong an incumbent, what with New York being such a strongly Democratic state. Pataki is her most likely opponent, but New Yorkers are a bit weary of him, and are satisfied with having a Clinton still serving them. Often you hear the nonsense about a Hillary Clinton run for the presidency in 2008, but that ain’t gonna happen. Hillary Clinton would take New York and maybe five other states in such a race, but she’s such a polarizing figure she’d never make it to the White House, and I’m sure she knows it. Pataki’s possible presidential bid won’t go anywhere, either; the man’s problem is that he’s both too conservative and too liberal.
New Jersey—Jon Corzine has been speculated on this week as a possible candidate in New Jersey’s gubernatorial election next year. If he wins (which would be likely,) he’ll have to appoint a replacement to finish the last year of his Senate term. I’m not sure who that would be, nor am I sure whom the Republicans would be likely to put up. Come what may, that would make for a competitive seat in New Jersey that year.
Pennsylvania—Rick Santorum is a fundamentally weak candidate who really doesn’t sit too well with many Pennsylvanians. He’s been lucky, though. In 1994, the Year of the Angry White Male, he was elected during the Republican Revolution, and it was something of a squeaker then. In 2000, he was challenged by Democrat Ron Klink, who ran a lousy, disorganized campaign—and it was still close. If the Democrats can put up a strong candidate, Santorum could be bumped right out of there. Joe Hoeffel ran a decent campaign this year, with his big problem being that he was up against Arlen Specter, a popular moderate Republican who’s widely respected by all Pennsylvanians of both parties. As a native son of Pennsylvania and a partisan Democrat, I have to say I’d have trouble voting against Specter, myself. Santorum, however, is quite another story.
Florida—As someone else pointed out: Ben Nelson is a first-term incumbent in a swing state. I haven’t looked into who the candidates might be, but this one’s probably going to be tight, just based on that fact.
Tennessee—I know it’s a very Republican state, but last year Bill Frist announced his intention to retire after his term ends in 2006. Frist is probably going to run for president. Regardless, that makes this seat an open one. If the Democrats run Harold Ford, they might have a good crack at winning it. I don’t know who the Republicans have waiting in the wings.
Ohio—Mike DeWine, as others have pointed out, is a first-term incumbent in a swing state, which makes this race possibly competitive. He’s also a Republican shill in a state with plenty of Democrats in it. Fingerhut might run again, and I think Tim Ryan would make a good candidate. The Democrats definitely have a chance here.
Wisconsin—I’ve heard Herb Kohl talked about as a potentially vulnerable candidate, but I don’t know. Can anyone help me out with this one?
Missouri—First-termer Jim Talent will have served four years by 2006. He squeaked in in a tight race in 2002, when Bush was scaring everyone about Iraq. Some say that the demonizing of the mourners at Senator Wellstone’s funeral helped to put this one over the top. Who will die this time so that Jim Talent may stay in Congress? I don’t even know who the Democrats have to run, so Talent’s potential vulnerability may well be moot.
Nebraska—The very fact that Ben Nelson is a Democratic Senator in Nebraska necessarily makes his seat competitive. It’s Nebraska, so no matter how conservative Nelson may be, he’s effectively in a tight race.
Hawaii—Daniel Akaka is getting up there. I don’t know how his health is, but I keep expecting one of the Hawaiian senators to retire every time. I’ve been consistently wrong, but one of these years, I’ll be right. We’d probably see another Democrat follow him to Capitol Hill; it’s just a matter when.
There may well be other seats that are competitive, but it’s still early in the season, so my knowledge is still a bit patchy. I have no clue about House seats; I’m more of a Senate expert. I’ll probably read up on which seats are most vulnerable; there are some representatives I’d really like to see gone, not the least of which are Pennsylvania’s Phil English and Melissa Hart, Bush sycophants both who work against the greater interests of their districts.
We’ve had a lot of commentary on the Senate, so I’ll make some remarks on the House.
The following seats went from Rep to Dem in 2004:
CO-3
IL-8
GA-12
NY-27
Of these, GA-12 and NY-27 will probably not be seriously contested in 2006, due to the nature of these districts, but CO-3 and IL-8 most certainly will.
The Reps picked up two House seats outside of Texas: IN-9 and KY-4. Neither of these will probably be seriously contested.
Other seats that probably will be contested:
TX-17 (Chet Edwards, the only targeted Texas Dem to win this cycle)
UT-2 (Jim Matheson is always a Rep target)
KS-3 (Ditto for Dennis “Lupin” Moore)
OR-5 (And Darlene Hooley)
WV-2 (Shelley Moore Capito will probably run for the Senate)
PA-6 (Jim Gerlach has twice received 51% of the vote against rather weak challengers)
CO-7 (Bob Beuprez may run for Governor)
MN-6 (Mark Kennedy is the likely challenger to Mark Dayton)
That’s all, for now.
WV-2 (Shelley Moore Capito will probably run for the Senate)
Be still my beating heart!
I never considered her.
I think you’re confusing Missouri and Minnesota. Jim Talent defeated Jean Carnahan in 2002. Carnahan had been appointed to the seat to replace her husband, who was elected in 2000 despite having died shortly before the election in a plane crash. A special election was held in 2002, and Talent defeated Carnahan to fill out the remainder of the term through 2006.
Norm Coleman was elected to replace Paul Wellstone in Minnesota in 2002. Wellstone, running for re-election against Coleman, died in a plane crash weeks before Election Day. The DFL chose Walter Mondale to take his place on the ballot, but he lost to Coleman. Many attribute his victory to the infamous rememberance ceremony that many Minnesotans felt crossed the line into a crass political rally. Coleman’s seat will not be up again until 2008.
But speaking of Minnesota, Mark Dayton should definitely be on the vulnerable list. Depite the state going for Kerry this week, it has been trending more Republican for many years. And Dayton’s always been seen as a bit off his rocker, most recently with his decision to flee the Capitol in the run up to election day.
flurb—No confusion of Missouri and Minnesota. The demonizing of the Wellstone memorial rally as a crass political rally was a tactic used by right-wing commentators with success, and is said to have had effects on the race in Minnesota as well as the Missouri and South Dakota races (although Democratic Senator Tim Johnson won in South Dakota.) Republicans got a lot of mileage out of the Wellstone memorial, playing it up in several states, encouraging anti-Democrat feelings by misinterpreting what really went on there.
Talent’s special election status might prove relevant in 2006; we’ll see. It all depends on what kind of a candidat the Democrats can come up with. I just hope someone else doesn’t have to die so that the Republicans can have another winning season in the upper Midwest. Minnesota has been trending Republican, yes; I’m worried about Dayton being able to hold on to his seat. Governor Quinn mentioned that Mark Kennedy might be challenging him, and I think he’d be a strong candidate.