News & discussion on house and senate races

His 'problems' were well known prior to this year's primary.....

Representative Charles B. Rangel, the dean of New York's Congressional delegation, said on Wednesday that he would leave Congress if Democrats failed to win control of the House of Representatives in the fall elections.

It's looking really bad for the Republicans this Fall.............


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Corker Enters Senate Contest With Slight Edge Over Ford

Cohen's Win in Memphis Has Ford Family Singin' the BluesRead the whole article

GOP hurt by redrawn Texas district

Fri Aug 4, 10:04 PM ET

AUSTIN, Texas - Three federal judges on Friday reunited a south Texas county into one congressional district under a Supreme Court-ordered map revision, a move that solidified Hispanic voting strength and made one Republican incumbent's re-election campaign more difficult. [..]

The revision came after the Supreme Court in June found that the congressional map drawn by Republican state lawmakers in 2003 unconstitutionally diluted Hispanic voting power by dividing Hispanics in Webb County into two different districts represented by GOP Rep. Henry Bonilla (news, bio, voting record) and Democratic Rep. Henry Cuellar.

The new map places Webb County, which includes Laredo, entirely in Cuellar's district, and gives Bonilla the heavily Hispanic and Democratic neighborhoods of south Bexar County. [..]

Bonilla's district is now more evenly divided between Democratic and Republican voters. Bonilla, whose support among Hispanic Democrats has been dropping, also is seeing his district's Hispanic voting-age population rise from 51 percent to 61 percent. [..]

Because the districts have been redrawn after the primary elections, the seats are open now to anyone who wants to run. Candidates have until Aug. 25 to file for the race. A special election will be held alongside the general election for congressional seats in the affected districts. [..]

Well, they sure havent got much else to run on..

Connecticut exit poll's surprising results
A Connecticut exit poll, conducted by CBS News and the New York Times and obtained by Political Wire, supports some important (preliminary) conclusions, including several that conflict with the emerging conventional wisdom:

1) Seventy-eight percent of primary voters opposed the decision to go to war in Iraq -- no surprise there. But of those, only 60 percent cast their votes for Lamont, which means that 40 percent of war opponents voted for Lieberman. That fact, by itself, demonstrates that the Lamont win (and the Lieberman defeat) is hardly due exclusively -- or even primarily -- to the "single-issue" anger over the war, given that four of 10 war opponents voted for Lieberman.

2) Apparently, a more significant factor than the Iraq war was opposition to President Bush generally. Fifty-nine percent of all voters said that Lieberman "was too close to the President," and although no exact numbers are provided, it was that group which "voted overwhelmingly for Lamont." The most reliable factor in the Lamont win seems to have been not opposition to the war specifically, but a more generalized disapproval of President Bush and of Lieberman's support for the president.

3) Sixty-one percent of voters "rejected the notion of Lieberman running as an Independent candidate in the fall." That number is sure to grow as a) the image of Lieberman as the loser seeps in and b) most of the Democratic establishment abandons him and actively supports Lamont.

A new poll has ominous signs for Republicans
There are several noteworthy aspects to the new Washington Post/ABC News poll released today. Almost all of them are ominous signs for Republicans:

1) A majority of voters now disapprove of the way the president is handling every issue they were asked about, including the "U.S. campaign against terrorism" (by a 47 to 50 percent margin). The percent approving of the president's approach to terrorism is the lowest since this poll began asking the question in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks.

2) A plurality of voters (46-38) trust Democrats more than Republicans to "do a better job handling the U.S. campaign against terrorism." That is the largest advantage, by far, that Democrats have enjoyed on this issue. In fact, Republicans have had a huge advantage in this category ever since the 9/11 attacks (the GOP advantage in October 2002, for instance, was 61 to 26 in October 2002; the following month, Democrats lost control of the Senate), and the first Democratic advantage on terrorism ever (at least for this poll) was in April 2006, when it was one point. The gap has now grown to eight points.

3) An overwhelming majority of Americans continue to disapprove of the way the President is handling Iraq (36-62). And the unpopularity of the Iraq war itself is staggering. By a margin of 59 to 39 percent, Americans answer "no" to this question: "All in all, considering the costs to the United States versus the benefits to the United States, do you think the war with Iraq was worth fighting, or not?" Not only are "antiwar" sentiments the solidly mainstream position, but those who believe that the invasion of Iraq was the right thing to do are part of an ever-shrinking minority.

4) There is a surprising evenhandedness about the Israel-Hezbollah war. Forty-six percent say that Israel and Hezbollah bear equal blame for the war (while 7 percent say Israel bears more blame, and 39 percent blame Hezbollah). And a plurality (48-47) say that Israel "is not justified in bombing Hezbollah targets located in areas where civilians may be killed or wounded" even though the question advises that "Israel says it has been bombing rocket launchers and other Hezbollah targets located in civilian areas."

Only 38 percent believe that "Israel is doing all it reasonably can do to try to avoid civilian casualties in Lebanon," while 54 percent believe it should do more. By contrast, 58 percent believe the U.S. is doing all it can to avoid civilian casualties in Iraq. Perhaps most important, even those Americans who favor the deployment of a U.N. peacekeeping force in Lebanon overwhelmingly oppose (38-59) the inclusion of U.S. troops in such a force.

(5) Reflecting what I believe is the principal hurdle Democrats must overcome, a plurality (48-47) of Americans believe that "the Democrats ... are not offering the country a clear direction that's different from the Republicans." Given how unpopular the Republicans are, it is just inexcusable that Democrats are not aggressively distinguishing themselves from GOP policies.

This failure is primarily due to the fact that Democrats inexplicably continue to follow the chronically wrong and hopelessly fear-driven advice of their Beltway consultants -- echoed by the baseless warnings issued in the last couple of days by Marty Peretz and Cokie Roberts -- which instructs Democrats to avoid any decisive opposition to Republican policies (especially foreign policies) lest they alienate mainstream Americans (who, as this poll conclusively demonstrates, themselves have decisively rejected those very GOP policies).

(6) Finally, here is the ideological breakdown of the respondents to this poll: Only 18 percent described themselves as "liberal," while 42 percent self-identified as "moderate" and 38 percent as "conservative." It is, therefore, quite difficult to argue (or at least it ought to be) that opposition to the war in Iraq or strong disapproval of President Bush is confined to "liberal" corners.

Big Batch of Rating Changes Reflects Stronger Democratic Breeze

The following is a roundup of changes that CQPolitics.com is making to its forecasts of three Senate races and 15 House races. The changes are the result of a thorough review of all races that we've done as part of an elections overview that will be published in the Aug. 14 issue of CQ Weekly and subsequently on CQPolitics.com.

These forecast changes are the result of a one-time systematic examination of all the races at a key moment in the campaign. They are not the result of any single piece of new information. We generally prefer not to issue ratings changes in bulk.

The ratings changes below include summaries of the reasoning behind each switch. Stories containing more detailed explanations will follow in the coming days.

Read on...

Walberg, a minister and former state lawmaker, attacked what he called Schwarz' liberal voting record and made campaign issues of Schwarz' support of abortion rights and his opposition to a U.S. constitutional amendment banning gay marriage.

In suburban Denver, Perlmutter, a former state senator, emerged as the Democratic candidate in Colorado's 7th District after attacking his main rival, Lamm, for her willingness to forge bipartisan compromises with Republicans. Perlmutter had 53 percent of the vote to 38 percent for Lamm, with 92 percent of precincts reporting.

While Perlmutter and O'Donnell may have to wait late into the night on Nov. 7 to find out which one of them will make the trip to Washington, Republican state Sen. Doug Lamborn can confidently start packing his bags now. He almost certainly clinched a berth in the 110th Congress by narrowly winning a six-candidate primary in the 5th District, a Republican bastion centered in Colorado Springs that was left open by retiring 10-term GOP Rep. Joel Hefley.

Lamborn's ticket-punching victory did not come easily. He took 27 percent of the vote to edge Jeff Crank, a former vice president of the Greater Colorado Springs Chamber of Commerce who had 25 percent. [..]

Crank is a former top Hefley aide, and he secured his former boss' support. Crank also won the most delegate support at a pre-primary nominating convention in May, but Lamborn finished a close second.

Lamborn's win represented a victory for the Club for Growth, the conservative group that endorsed Lamborn and criticized Crank on fiscal issues. That helped make this an especially strong night for the Club for Growth, which also backed conservative Tim Walberg in his successful challenge to moderate Republican Rep. Joe Schwarz in Michigan's 7th District.

The House Conservatives Fund, a political action committee that is linked to members of the congressional Republican Study Committee, also backed Lamborn.

The House ProjectionThe Senate Projection

Gathering Storm

By Charlie Cook, National Journal

Time is running out for Republicans. Unless something dramatic happens before Election Day, Democrats will take control of the House. And the chances that they'll seize the Senate are rising toward 50-50.

The electoral hurricane bearing down on the GOP looks likely to be a Category 4 or 5, strong enough to destroy at least one of the party's majorities. The political climate feels much as it did before previous elections that produced sizable upheavals, such as in 1994, when Democrats lost 52 House seats, eight Senate seats, and control of both chambers.

In the past two weeks, polling by CBS News/New York Times, NBC News/Wall Street Journal, and The Cook Political Report/RT Strategies found that just 27 to 28 percent of voters think the country is headed in the right direction. Between 60 and 66 percent say we are "on the wrong track." These are the kinds of "time for a change" numbers associated with tidal-wave elections.

In those same three polls, approval ratings for Congress ranged from 25 to 28 percent, with disapproval ratings of 57 to 60 percent. Keep in mind the Gallup Poll's rule of thumb: When Congress's job-approval rating is 40 percent or higher, the average midterm election net change in the House is just five seats; when its approval is below 40 percent, the average net change is 29 seats.

And significantly, in the NBC/Wall Street Journal poll, just 38 percent of voters said their representative "deserves re-election"; 48 percent said it is "time to give a new person a chance." These numbers don't indicate a status quo election.

Consider also the venerable "generic congressional ballot test" question. Those same three polls show Democrats holding an advantage of 10 to 13 points. Other polls peg the Democratic advantage as low as 8 points or as high as 16. Looking at all eight July polls, the Democrats' average lead was 11 points.

Since the midterm elections is typically a referendum on the party in power and, more specifically, on the president, George W. Bush's approval ratings are a factor in how the Republicans are likely to fare this fall.

In the most recent polls by CBS/New York Times, NBC/Wall Street Journal, Cook Political Report/RT, Gallup, and Fox News, Bush's approval ratings range from 36 to 40 percent. His July average in all major national polls covered by PollingReport.com was 38 percent, exactly the same as the trend estimate computed by the University of Wisconsin's Charles Franklin on his Web site called PoliticalArithmetik.blogspot.com.

President Clinton's lowest job-approval in the Gallup Poll at any point in 1994 was 39 percent. Again, Bush's numbers are consistent with a tidal wave.

What about voter turnout? In both the Cook/RT and the NBC/WSJ surveys, when voters were asked to rank, on a scale of 1 to 10, how interested they were in the upcoming elections, Democrats were much more interested.

Voters ranking themselves as most engaged (10) favored Democrats by 14 points in one poll and 18 points in the other. As RT Strategies pollster Thom Riehle puts it, "We are approaching the point where most Democrats can't wait to vote, and some Republicans are embarrassed about voting. The effect of lopsided partisan interest in voting is magnified in low-turnout midterms, such as in 1974 and 1994."

Finally, money counts. When you add up the June 30 cash-on-hand figures for the two parties' House and Senate campaign committees, Republicans have only an $11 million edge -- $91 million compared with $80 million. During the past nine election cycles, the GOP generally spent 50 to 100 percent more than the Democrats. That's not happening this year.

Looking at the House race by race, we rate 15 Republican-held seats and no Democratic ones as "toss-ups." House Democrats need a 15-seat gain, and it wouldn't take much of a wave for them to get it. Even without a big wave, Democrats could add five of the six seats they need to take over the Senate. And it's important to remember the typical domino effect in Senate elections -- the closest races tend to break overwhelmingly in the same direction.

The bottom line: Unless something happens to interrupt current patterns, the House will turn over and the GOP will hang on to the Senate by a thread.

Republicans could find themselves in a scenario that in some ways is almost as bad as losing the House: holding on to power and the attendant responsibility but with diminished leverage for carrying it out. [..]

Hastert has managed thin majorities before. In 2001 and 2002, there were just 221 House Republicans [..]. But he had two significant advantages at the time. President Bush was new and extraordinarily popular after the Sept. 11 attacks, and Republicans were willing to rally around his agenda with few exceptions. And whenever that was not enough, Hastert had the strong-arm whip operation of Tom DeLay to help keep rank-and-file Republicans in line.

Both advantages are gone. Bush is no longer a politically strong commander in chief, but an unpopular president who will be entering his final, lame-duck two years in office. And DeLay is out of office, his operation replaced by a newer leadership team that doesn't have as strong a track record in holding Republican votes together.

In the House, the first post-election decision the leadership would have to make is what lesson to draw if the Republicans suffer significant but not majority-ending losses. Their governing strategy could depend on how they settle a debate already starting in the GOP ranks: Is their majority in trouble because they have moved too far to the right, or because they have made too many compromises that undermine basic conservative principles?As Republicans begin to make the transition from Bush to searching for their next leader in 2008, they may have less of a reason to close ranks on tough votes and even less of an agenda to pull them together.

That reality isn't likely to diminish the Republicans' energy in fighting to save their majority. But it is likely to diminish their energy if they succeed. The Democrats know what they want out of this election: power. The Republicans already have it, and even if they hang on, they may end up wondering if the fight was really worth it.

GOP Dips in Religion Poll


By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: August 24, 2006
Filed at 8:54 p.m. ET

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The number of people who consider the Republican Party friendly to religion has dipped below half in the last year, with declines among white evangelicals and white Catholics. But the GOP remains far more closely tied to religion than the Democratic Party.

The number of people who consider the GOP friendly to religion dropped from 55 percent to 47 percent -- with a 14-point drop among white evangelical conservatives and an 11-point drop among white Catholics, according to the poll by the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press.

Only a fourth, 26 percent, considered the Democratic Party friendly to religion -- about the same as last year.

Religious voters have been a key voting bloc in recent elections with the most devout Protestant, Catholic and evangelical voters leaning strongly toward Republicans.

''The Republicans had done a good job of mobilizing those two groups in 2004 and that may be cooling a bit now,'' said Scott Keeter of the Pew Research Center said, referring to white evangelicals and white Catholics

Bush got 78 percent of the white evangelical vote and 56 percent of the white Catholic vote in 2004, according to exit polls.

The survey found that about four in 10 Christians identify themselves as ''born again'' Christians or evangelicals, while a third describe themselves as ''progressive Christians.'' The conservative Christians are a far more unified group politically than the progressives, however.

The poll of 2,003 adults was conducted July 6-19 in cooperation with the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life and has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 2.5 percentage points.