Replies to post #103493 on Tornado Alley (PROG)

[StephanieVanbryce]

A Turning Point For Democrats?

It's too early to say for sure, but it's possible that the Republican wave has subsided.... BUT

Charlie Cook ..Saturday, July 31, 2010

Very few people watch political polls more closely than I do. (Whether that's a good thing or suggests that I'm slightly neurotic is up for debate.) When you monitor surveys incessantly, you occasionally see results that you're unsure how to interpret. You don't know whether they signal a key turning point in public opinion or whether they're just a hiccup, a passing blip. Or perhaps the odd results are from an outlier poll, a statistical anomaly that is the political equivalent of a false positive medical test.

We're currently experiencing one of those periods of uncertainty. One interpretation of recent results is that the momentum in this critical midterm election has shifted and the Republican wave has subsided. Another interpretation is that it's too soon to tell whether much has changed at all.

For the weeks of July 12-18 and July 19-25, the Gallup Organization's weekly aggregation of daily tracking polls showed Democrats ahead among all registered voters on the generic congressional ballot test question by 6 points (49 percent to 43 percent) and 4 points (48 percent to 44 percent), respectively. Each poll canvassed more than 1,500 registered voters nationwide. For the uninitiated, the generic ballot test question tries to approximate what the popular two-party vote will be nationwide and, over time, it has closely corresponded to the outcome on Election Day.

Gallup noted that this was the first time that either party has held an advantage of this size for two consecutive weeks. In the 21 weeks that Gallup has asked the generic ballot test question this year, the two parties have averaged a tie. It should be noted, however, that polls of registered voters inherently tilt Democratic by 4 or 5 points compared with polls of likely midterm election voters. Voter turnout for midterm elections is about a third less than it is in presidential years, and midterm voters tend to be whiter and older, two problem population groups for Democrats this year.

For the four previous weeks, the two parties were tied at 46 percent on the generic ballot question. For the four weeks before that, Republicans averaged a 3-point lead, 48 percent to 45 percent. So, if Democrats really have turned up the heat and are running 4 or 5 points ahead among registered voters, the practical result would be about an even proposition among likely midterm voters and the national popular vote. If that were true, it would mean a very, very close contest for control of the House.

The November 2 election is obviously the ultimate arbiter. But before we get to the real thing, Gallup and other respected organizations will take polls that will either corroborate these findings or show that nothing has changed. Gallup is the most trusted name in national polling and its results should never be dismissed lightly. But no matter how terrific a pollster is, some statistical noise periodically pops up.

Since the generic ballot tracking started for the 2010 election, each party has seen its number drop as low as 43 percent and rise as high as 49 percent. Basically, both Democrats and the GOP have been at 46 percent and have traded within a 3-point range. What we are looking for is whether either party breaks out of that range and begins to consistently record an advantage, with "consistently" certainly defined as more than two weeks in a row.

What make me skeptical is that no defining event has taken place that would have triggered a significant shift in this year's race. I don't think that passage of the financial services regulatory reform bill would have caused a significant shift, nor would the capping of the Deepwater Horizon oil well.

I canvassed several pollsters who see large quantities of data from around the country; none seems to have detected any shifts in the past two weeks, and all seem to be at a loss in figuring out what would have triggered a change. With the president's approval ratings stable -- 46 percent one week in the Gallup Poll, 45 percent the next -- whatever might be happening does not seem to be helping him.

For now, people will have to just sit tight, wait for next week's Gallup release, and watch how other reputable pollsters weigh in.

http://www.nationaljournal.com/njmagazine/cookreport.php

[StephanieVanbryce]

Adding Up The Democratic Math

A look at the case made by top Dem strategists that they'll keep their House majority.

Charlie Cook Saturday, July 24, 2010

This column has repeatedly -- some would say relentlessly -- argued since late last summer that Democrats are in real danger of losing their House majority in November. So it's only fair to analyze why top Democratic strategists, in an admittedly bad year for their party, think they still have a good chance to retain their hold on the chamber, albeit with greatly reduced numbers.

First, they figure they will pick up four seats held by Republicans. These include Michael Castle's at-large seat in Delaware and Mark Kirk's 10th District seat in Illinois (both men are running for the Senate). The strategists also believe they can defeat two incumbents in overwhelmingly Democratic districts: Joseph Cao in Louisiana's 2nd District and Charles Djou in Hawaii's 1st. They think a couple of other seats are vulnerable, including Dan Lungren's in California's 3rd and Charlie Dent's in Pennsylvania's 15th, but the first four are clearly their best shots. If Democrats can win that quartet, Republicans would have to grab 43 seats held by Democrats to score a net gain of 39, the number they need to claim the barest majority of 218-217.

Party strategists say Democratic incumbents will be able to use their financial advantages to set the terms of their races.

Next, Democrats look at their 16 most endangered open seats and believe, based on the party's strong performances in special elections over the past 18 months, that their worst-case scenario would be to lose eight. Those 16 are AR-01, AR-02, IN-08, KS-03, LA-03, MA-10, MI-01, NH-02, NY-29, PA-07, RI-01, TN-06, TN-08, WA-03, WV-01, and WI-07.

In the Democratic calculus, if the party picks up the four Republican seats and loses just eight of its 16 most vulnerable open seats, it would be down only four at that point. That means 35 Democratic incumbents would have to lose for the House to flip. Even with a large number of theoretically vulnerable Democratic members, say 70, at least half of them would have to lose for the GOP to regain the majority.

Democrats then point to several dozen of their endangered incumbents who hold significant funding advantages in their races and make the case that the GOP challengers and the National Republican Congressional Committee aren't likely to come up with the money needed to close the gap. Democratic Rep. Christopher Carney in Pennsylvania, for example, ought to be at the top of the NRCC's hit list: He sits in the most Republican district of any Keystone State freshman or sophomore Democrat and he voted for the health care reform bill, a move that would seem like political suicide in the rural northeastern part of the state. But his opponent, former U.S. Attorney Tom Marino, reported just $11,000 cash-on-hand at the end of June, which might buy him a few billboards in Williamsport but not much else.

Likewise, Republican Renee Ellmers, a nurse, was handed a gift when her opponent in North Carolina, Democratic Rep. Bob Etheridge, had to apologize for grabbing a young video tracker who tried to question him last month. But the GOP simply didn't seize the opportunity to divert resources Ellmers's way: She ended June with just $41,000 in the bank, not enough to introduce herself to voters in the pricey Research Triangle district.

If party strategists are right, these Democratic incumbents will be able to use their financial advantages to set the terms of their races and define their opponents before their opponents can define themselves. The most important thing to watch over the next several months is how these Democrats perform when they can afford to air ads while their opponents can't. If Democrats start seeing polling data move their way in head-to-head matchups during this period, all will be going according to their plan. But if polling is static, it will tell us that voters care much more about sending a message to President Obama and his party than about GOP candidates' baggage, and that Democrats are in deep trouble.

Whether things pan out the way Democrats envisage remains to be seen. This is clearly a tough political environment; the nasty economy alone, with its unrelentingly high unemployment rates, is an enormous challenge. The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee's 14-3 record in House special elections since the beginning of 2008 shows that it has some real pros running the operation, and that is one of the best things the House majority has going for it. Can they pull it off? We'll see.

http://www.nationaljournal.com/njmagazine/co_20100724_7408.php