The thirty-three races for the U.S. Senate have seen some
surprising movement recently, and like everything happening nowadays, that
movement is away from Republicans.
Democrats have a disproportionate number of contested seats
this year, and conventional wisdom held that Republicans would gain enough of
them to wrest control over the Senate. And since sluggish economics numbers had
been portending poorly for Obama and Democrats, there seemed a chance that one
of the GOP’s goofball candidates could win in November, giving the Republicans
control over not only both chambers of Congress but arguably all three bodies
of government (counting the right-leaning Supreme Court).
Alas, no longer. An accelerating economy has restored
Obama’s approval numbers and brightened the horizons of certain individual
Democrats. Moreover, Republicans have picked some very poor battles recently,
the worst of which was a fight over contraception that is causing their party
to hemorrhage independent voters. Their candidates haven’t been helping
themselves, either, with Pete Hoekstra’s woeful
attack ad against Debbie Stabenow being a prime example of an unforced error.
The upshot: the GOP will most likely pick up a few Senate
seats, but not enough to sway control over the legislative body. And since a
60-vote majority is required to bring meaningful legislation to a vote, it’s
likely the Senate will remain in its
perpetual deadlock no matter who wins the presidency.
Counting both independents Bernie Sanders and Joe Lieberman
as Democrats, the Senate currently
divides into a 53-47 split. Larry Sabato’s Crystal Ball breaks
the races down into 15 leaning Dem and 11 leaning Republican. Of the 7
toss-up states, 6 are in Democratic states, with retiring Senators Kent
Conrad’s North Dakota seat and Ben Nelsen’s Nebraska seat most likely flipping
to Republicans (though Sabato notes that this latter result probably would have
occurred even if Nelson had not been retiring).
Scott Brown’s anomalous election to Ted Kennedy’s old seat
is the one Republican slot in jeopardy.
This isn’t exactly a rosy picture for Democrats, either, as
the Dem’s best-case scenario is barely maintaining an unpleasantly narrow
margin. And before anybody pops open a bottle of organic Malbec to celebrate
keeping the Senate, a Roanoke College Poll has Republican George Allen opening
up an 8
point lead over Democratic candidate Tim Kaine for George Allen’s Virginia
Senate seat, the first time either of the two challengers has cleared the
margin of error.
But this is still a far better position than the Democrats
were in even a couple of months ago, and they must be heartened by the
continued drag of the Republican primary. If (and when) the GOP ends up with a
candidate few are excited about, Republican turnout might be low, which could
cede a couple of the close states to Democratic opponents. Until then, all eyes
will be on the linked performance of the economy and Obama’s poll numbers as
indicators of the fates of toss-up states, and all Democratic fingers will be
crossed.
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