Swing State Project has an excellent feature where they track independent expenditures in the Congressional races on a week-by-week basis. Independent expenditures are mainly outlays from the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) and the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC), but it also includes money from Political Action Committees (PACs) like the National Association of Realtors (NARPAC), the National Rifle Association (NRA), etc. Here’s something to chew on:
In the last week, Democratic congressional candidates have received $1,569,476 in independent expenditures, while Republican candidates have received $358,363. Over the course of the year, the disparity is even more shocking: Democrats $19,521,99, Republicans $7,073,119.
Everywhere you look, from Alabama to Kentucky to Idaho to Alaska, the Republicans are being outspent by huge margins. This is a total turn around from prior election seasons, where Republicans have consistently relied upon a huge cash advantage to win the media war and sell unpopular ideas to their constituents. Not this year. And that is why I don’t put a whole lot of stock in early polling of congressional races. Republicans usually do an excellent job of closing…meaning that they outperform the polls or close polling gaps in the last weeks of a campaign. Another term for this (aside from fraud and suppression) is ‘cash advantage’. Not this year.
Even without the sharp downturn in the global economy, the Democrats were set up through their own cash advantage, strong recruiting, massive voter registration efforts, and greater party identification and enthusiasm, to outperform the polls. If you add to this the disparity in open seats to defend, the strength of Obama at the top of the ticket (he will do much better than Kerry in many of the states he ultimately loses), and the global economic meltdown, the opportunities for congressional pickups can reach as high as seventy seats and include some marginal recruits and some underfunded candidates.
I didn’t predict the economic collapse, but I did predict everything else. I also predicted that, in the end, this election would tilt decisively one way or the other, and not end up as a narrowly decided red state/blue state split. All of my predictions along these lines are beginning to look more and more accurate. Didn’t I say, in May, that that the Democrats would wind up with 61 senate seats sans Lieberman? As of yesterday, Nate Silver has the Democrats picking up seven seats (for a total of 57, sans Lieberman) with 3-7 more seats in play. If Franken, Musgrove, and Martin win, we’re at sixty. If Lunsford wins, we’re at sixty-one. Keep an eye on Kleeb, Rice, Noriega, LaRocco, Tuke, Slattery, and even Conley. Don’t be surprised if one or two of them begin to close the polling margins with abandon. It’ll take a perfect storm, but beating 61 is not out of the question.
With such movement in the Senate, House, and presidential races, it does, indeed, look like we’re headed for my long predicted realignment. The questions are, can we keep up the momentum, and how will such a realignment change the political culture of our country?
Hey, why don’t you pat yourself on the back. After all, you predicted it.
OK, fine. You did say all that stuff. But as someone who only remembers 92, 96, and 06 as good years, I will still feel like everyone’s 10 points down until there’s a massive Dem blowout on election day. I’ve just been trained that way, so it’s a hard mindset to break. But then of course I haven’t been watching numbers all the time.
“Didn’t I say, in May, that that the Democrats would wind up with 61 senate seats sans Lieberman? As of yesterday, Nate Silver has the Democrats picking up seven seats (for a total of 57, sans Lieberman) with 3-7 more seats in play.”
Yeah, and I chimed in and requested,” make that 62“
Dems will pick up 8 seats.
GOP and Rove. Not this year. No where to hide.
Up to October 25th, the swiftboating of Obama will be drowned out by the financial crisis…and other emergency measures. Go visit your bank.
Even W. is saying “it’ll take a while”
DOW drops below 9,700 as I write
Why are so many ex-Goldman Sachs people at Treasury? They should ALL recuse themselves, stand aside.
At the end of this tunnel plenty will be living in the Rebar hotel.
While the Realignment may be at hand, we need to be careful what we wish for. If it happens, Democrats inherit this economy on November 5.
It’s going to be a miserable economy. Much worse times are ahead. The best case scenario is that housing finally bottoms out end of next year, and unemployment will remain high into 2010 or 2011.
And that’s if the bottom doesn’t fall out of the global markets in the meantime.
The problem’s not going to be fixed by 2010, and the Republicans will have plenty of challengers to realign the Realignment right back to 1994…and gridlock.
McCain will lose Florida, Arizona in fact, all 50 states
The Wall Street Journal says
McCain Plans to Cut Federal Health – Medicare and Medicaid
Tomorrow’s debate will be a shoutout to seniors
Incredible. McSame is suicidal.
Providers generally break even on Medicare, and lose their shirts on Medicaid. Further cuts will cause some providers to just drop their participation in these programs. However, larger providers, especially hospitals, cannot afford to do so. Over 65% of our business is Medicare/Medicaid. If they are talking about savings related to fraud, the HHS has been cracking down on fraud and abuse for over a decade, and at best the Office of Inspector General recoups a few billion a year to the programs, chump change in the scheme of things.
One election does not a realignment make. One epically incompetent President does not a realignment make. You’re going to have to exhume Reagan’s corpse and drive stakes through it’s still beating heart before you can be very confident…and even then Obama and the Dems are going to have to navigate some awfully heavy storms to inspire a realignment that lasts more than one term.
True alignments usually involve two consecutive elections, including one presidential and one congressional. An example would be 1930 and 1932. That particular realignment was further bolstered by the 1936 elections, and lasted with some turbulence until 1984.
The 2006 and 2008 elections look to fit the mold.
Except that you actually need to at least create the perceptions of “success” in order to keep the ball rolling. These next 2-4 years will tell whether or not there’s a realignment…not the last 2-4 years.
My response is conditional agreement. On the presidential level, there really isn’t any such thing as realignment. A party may hold on for as long as 12 years (with FDR/Truman, it was twenty), but a lot depends on the candidates and the conditions at election time.
But, for Congress, it is very hard to do a realignment. If the Dems were to max out and win 12 senate seats and 70 house seats, and a bunch of state legislatures, then we’ll redraw the maps in our favor after the 2010 census. And, it will take forever for the Republicans to come back from a 305-130 disadvantage in the House. As of right now, the Dems are heavily favored to win the senate elections again in 2010, and in a reversal of fortunes that might not happen. But the Republicans will not be in a position to retake the senate until at least 2012.
So, yes and no. If you don’t show results you will begin to lose your margins. But it takes a long period of fucking up to give back a realignment. Sometimes it takes a half a century.
Musgrove, Martin, Kleeb, Rice, Noriega could use massive donations in the final days of the campaign.
Tuke, Slattery, and Crazy Conley (opposing Lindsay Graham) could use enough money to cause the RSCC to divert funds to defense.
And if you have a Democratic Congresscritter, make sure that their DCCC dues are up to date and they are contributing to even longshot Congressional races.
Running the table means running up until election day no matter how far ahead we are.
GOP 527s are kicking our asses. Your numbers don’t take into account that. It dwarfs the Dem 527s (because they are still getting off the ground, thanks Obama!).