Primary results

Joe Sestack Upset longtime senator Arlon Spector yesterday in the Pennsylvania Democratic Senate Primary. This makes the race slightly more likely to be a GOP pickup.

Arkansas is headed for a runoff between (Democrats) Lincoln and Halter. Lincoln would be a kiss of death for the democrats in that race.

In Kentucky as expected Rand Paul won the GOP primary. Conway slipped by Montenegro on the democrats side, at the moment Paul leads the general by about 2 points.

Crist to Run as Independent in Florida

Charlie Crist has decided to forgo the GOP Primary, which he likely would have lost anyway, to run as an independent. This three way race is now a Toss up.

New Senate Ratings

This is a bit temperary so let's see how Primaries shake out. The only way the GOP has a shoot at taking down Gillenbrand is if Pataki gets in, and that seems unlikely. The Hayward-McCain Primary could change the direction of the race, Christ looks like he's going to lose the primary, but if he runs as an Independent, Florida will go crazy. In Arkansas If Lincoln Loses Democrats win if not they lose. My projection as of today is Democrats 55 Republicans 45.


Safe Dem (49)
WA
OR
HI
WI
VT
MD
NY (Schumer)
CT

Dem Favored (51)
CA
NY (Gillinbrand)

Lean Dem (54)
IL
PA
CO

Tossup (5)
AR
IN
MO
OH
NH

Lean GOP (41)
NV
FL
KY
NC
LA

GOP Favored (36)
DE
SC
GA
IA
AZ

Safe GOP (31)
ND
AK
SD
UT
ID
AL
OK
KS

Rassmussen Polls: Not to be trusted

Today after weeks of being weary of them, I have dismissed all rasmussen polls as too conservative to even be used in compiling an Average.


The Dagger in the heart of their credability came about two weeks ago when in the same day Rassmussen Relased a Generic Ballot poll with the republicans up by 10 and the AP released one with the Democrats up by 8 (an 18 point discrepency). That same day Quinnipiac, the Most trusted name in polls put out one on the Pennsylvania senate race with Spector up by 7 over Toomey. At this time Rassmussen had pinned this race as Toomey by 9 (A 16 point Descrepency). Today Daily Kos put out a poll pinning the race at Spector by 6.

Today Yet again polls were released signaling major descrepencies of Rassmussen's Accuracy. Rassmussen has Buck leading by 6 over Benet in Colorado. PPP put out a poll with Bennet ahead by 6. Buck by 1 over Romonoff in Rassmussen, Romonoff over buck by 8 in PPP, Norton over Bennet by 9 in Rassmussen, Tied in PPP.

There has been a consistant 10-20 point decrepency between Rassmussen and where the races actually stand, Thus they should be dismissed as Partisan leaning. It is probably because durring the 2008 election they were ascosiated with Fox News, and that has caused an extreme House Effect (Which is a result of the fact that Liberals are more likely take a call from the New York Times than Fox News, Not usually the integrity of the pollster). Because of it's Conservative leanings I will no longer use them in acessing races.

Big primaries

Tomorrow two of the biggest primaries of the season take place. The heated Marco Rubio-Charlie Crist senate race in Florida, and the Rick Perry- Kay Bailey Hutchinson Governors race in Texas.

The Rubio-Crist race has come to symbolize the infighting in the republican party between the moderates and the conservative. Early on Crist was the heavy favorite, But Rubio has staged a comeback and I predict Rubio will win by about 10 points. However there is a good chance that Charlie Crist will run as an independent, and if that happens be prepared for one of the most interesting senate races in US History.

This could be the "third party uprising" that many pundits have kind of predicted on the back burner for the last 4 election Cycles. Lincoln Chafee (R Turned I-RI) is winning a three way race for governor, and the John Hayward-John McCain Primary could also spark another Major three way race. Perhaps again in Arkansas and Pennsylvania where there are tough Democratic primaries between moderates and liberals, will turn out to be 3-way races. David Vitter may also see a three way race develop if republicans are unhappy enough with him. If every thing goes right we could see up to 5 senate seats and 3 governors races go to independents this cycle (Bringing the total to 7 in the Senate) however this scenario is unlikely. But don't be surprised if one or two senate races and Rhode Islands Gubernatorial race go to 3rd parties.

In Texas, Senator Hutchinson made the decision to oppose Governor Perry in the primary in the summer when her chances looked good, as the governor was talking about secession , however now her chances are shot and she will lose tomorrow by about 13 points.

In other news Harold Ford has dropped his challenge to Christine Gillenbrand in New York. and Brown-Newsom instead of being a primary fight in California, now looks like it will be the ticket for governor and Ltg.

Also major news on Arkansas: it now looks like the very unpopular Blanche Lincoln will have to survive a primary challenge against the Lt. Governor. She will probably lose, but the question is how will this effect the senate race as a whole?

It could renew the democrats hope in the race, or kill their last good shot.

Tomarrow will be exciting, my picks are Rubio and Perry.

Evan Bahy retires

I'm sure everyone has heardby now that Evan Bahy is retiring unexpectedly. I still like the democrats chances to hold the seat, but we'll just have to wait and see. the republicans have a slightly better chance of taking the senate but I still doubt that they will.

Do Republicans Have a chance totake back the senate?

Early this year polls have started to show that things are looking bad for the democrats. Now I feel that polls have bottomed out for democrats, and that over the next few weeks and maybe the next two to three months, you will start to see them recover. But I will play devils advocate here, to see if the Republicans still have a chance to take back the senate.

In order to regain control they need to pick up nine seats. North Dakota and Delaware have pretty much been gift wrapped and handed to republicans by circumstance. in North Dakota Dorgan Retired and Hoeven stepped in leaving the democrats playbook in shambles. In Delaware the popular moderate congressmen stepped in (Castle) and Beau Biden, who would have made the race a tossup, unexpectedly sided against a run. Both seats are sure to be republican pick ups and thus make the next senate Democrats 57-43.

Now two seats look to be heavily trending in the republican direction. Ironically both Democratic Incumbents will likely lose because Democrats don't care enough about them to donate money to their campaign and/or go out and vote for them. on top of this the republican uproar isn't helping. Polls have started to suggest that Blanche Lincoln (of Arkansas) is in bad trouble and is losing to pretty much every opponent by 5-15 points. In Nevada Harry Reid is also losing to pretty generic republican opponents by 5-10 points. At the moment, both races are leaning republican, and unless something unexpected happens I'd put my money on the GOP to win both (Lincoln could unexpectedly retire, Reid could lose his primary, Health care could change, but that's another story). So if both races go the way its looking Democrats margin falls to 55-45.

Two races are kind of teetering on the brink. I'm talking about Colorado and Pennsylvania. In Colorado, the only company that has done a lot of polling thus far is Rasmussen, which is heavily conservative this cycle. They have Bennett going down by about 7 points, However every non-Rasmussen poll taken so far has Bennett winning. I don't trust Rasmussen's numbers for a second. I think In Reality Bennett is probably losing by 2-5, But I like his chances of coming back. In Pennsylvania, again there hasn't been a lot of serious polling done in a while. Rassmussen and Franklin and Marshall put out polls recently that have spector down by 9 and 14 and Sestak down by 8 and 22. Again I don't trust these numbers at all. The last quinnipiac (In December) had the race tied, so I think tommeys probably up by about 5, but there is a major ex-factor: The heated primary between Sestak and Spector. Right now many Sestak supporters are saying that they wouldn't vote for Spector and Visa Versa, and when the dust settles from the primaries, they'll find them selves on the same side (Probably Spectors). I like both democrats to come back however for the sake of arguement let's say they don't, this would mean Democrats have the senate by a margin of 53-47.

In Illinois Democrat's chances were boosted when Alexis Gulianis won the primary. As of now he's leading by about five, but again I think this will go up as time passes. but let's say things get worse for democrats and they lose this seat. This brings Democrats Margin down to 52-48.

The GOP probably only has about a 15-25% chance of getting to this point. My guess is that right now the 50% mark is at 54-46 but it will move up for democrats. Lets take this 15-25% chance for Republicans to pick up 7 and make the senate 52-48. This is where the GOP's chances run into a thick wall.

The GOP to take back the senate would need to take 3 of 4 strong, but not completely safe democratic seats. 50-50 is not good enough for the GOP, because Joe Biden is the tie Breaker. they need a 49-51 seat majority to be able to do anything.

The four seats in question are Fiengold's Wisconsin, Bahy's Indiana, Boxer's California, and Gillenbrand's New York.

Let's look first at Indidana; Rassumussen put out a set of polls indicating that Bahy was only ahead by 3 and losing in some matchups. However this week Daily Kos/ Research 2000 put out a set showing where the race is actually at in the estimation of probably all experts, Bahy by 12-20. I don't like the GOP's Chances there.

In California, Rassmussen, has again tried to make it look close, putting out polls where Boxer is ahead by as little as 3. How ever the much more respected Field poll, and PPIC have put out polls that she is actually up by 17 and 8 on Carly Firina, and 10 and 4 on Cambell. Keep in mind that it is alot harder to Move California 4 points to the right, than it is to move Indiana 4 points to the right. My guess is that Boxer's margin may shrink to as little as 3 but the state can not turn red.

In New York it might be close if Pataki get's in but if not Gillenbrand is a sure shot winner. Pataki would make the race a tossup, but to be quite honest I like Gillenbrand either way.

In Wisconson Little to no polling has been done, but Democrats like Fiengold, and his approval remains relatively high. He should win easily, but maybe, just maybe he won't.

I'll give the GOP a 2-5% chance of taking back the senate, if that isn't specific enough then I'll estimate it at about 3.5%. and probably about a 5% chance of the senate Being 50-50 or better.

The odds are slim but Democrats should not take these seats for granted; Republican's still have a shot, slim, but existent.