US November Election Predictions

Now that there are mere weeks to go before American voters get to pass a midterm judgment on the Obama Presidency, I will make some predictions.

First some observations.

I am still amazed that the nation that calls itself the Leader of the Free World still has so many shortcomings in the practice of Democracy.  In the last midterms of 2006, 34 members of Congress ran unopposed by a major party candidate.  People like to say that it is a two party system......well in that case i would expect at least two candidates in each district.  34 members ran unopposed, far more ran with only token opposition.

Gerrymandering (both racial and simply partisan) have created a wealth of safe districts where the incumbent only ever faces a threat in the party primary.  George Will called this the ultimate perversion of Democracy....a system where politicians choose their voters rather than the voters choosing their politician.

A Republican tide has been predicted by most commentators.  Most predictions call for gains that exceed those of the 1994 election that ended 44 years of Democratic majority rule in the House.  In 1994 not a single incumbent Republican Congressman, Senator or Governor was defeated.

However some key differences are worth noting.  While many pundits are saying that Obama and Clinton both overreached in the first two years of their mandate, Clinton was elected with 43% of the popular vote.  Obama won 52%.  This is a key difference since the Perot voters did not have a candidate in the race in 94.  Obama voters do.

In 1994, the Republican landslide was a shock to everyone.  Virtually nobody saw it coming.  In 1994 the Speaker of the House lost his own district.  The Chairman of the Ways and Means Committee also got voted out along with several incumbents who did not even commission polls because they thought that they were so safe.  This time, Democrats are putting resources into races where defeat was previously unthinkable....such as Representative Barney Franks of Massachusetts.

This year everyone sees the wave coming and so the Democrats have time to batten down the hatches.

I am surprised and perplexed at the Democrats for their lack of message.  The signature achievement of the first two years of Obama's term is Health Care Reform.  A complex measure like this has many good and bad points.  Everybody knows that the Democrats passed it with only token Republican support.  Why are they running away from it rather than emphasizing the good points?  By ceding the fight, they have allowed the Republicans to paint Health Care reform as 'unpopular'.....and by doing so it becomes a huge negative.  A plethora of news stories point out that Dems are not even mentioning health care in their campaigns.   People...you passed it now take the credit for the good points!!!  If they were going to act like they needed to hang their heads in shame upon passing it then they shouldn't have voted for it.

The President's party loses seats in the midterms generally speaking.  George W Bush bucked this trend in 2002 in the wake of 9-11 but it generally holds true.

My prediction:

1) The Republicans will gain control of the House by a slim margin.....they will not win the 100 seats that some are predicting.
2) The Republicans will gain 9 Senate seats to create an evenly balanced Senate.  VP Joe Biden breaks ties so this means that Dems effectively maintain control.

Most of the Democrats who are voted out will be Conservative Democrats and as such the agenda for Congress will not change much.  The more interesting thing to watch for is whether this new crop of Republicans will actually produce someone who is a viable Presidential candidate.  Nobody had heard of Barack Obama until he won election to the Senate in 2004.

The Republicans had best hope so because none of Sara Palin, Mitt Romney, Mike Huckabee or Newt Gingrich are electable.

Of course i could be very very wrong.  Considering that there was not a single African American Congressman who represented a majority white district......I didn't think that America was capable of electing a black man to be President.