How hard do you think the Republican majority in the house will be hit in November? Presumably some losses are inevitable now that the fever of 2010 has cooled (and some state-level republicans have over-reached in blue/swing districts).You should take my answer with an even larger grain of salt than you do with the other subjects I spout off about. Outside of my home state, I can probably name fifteen or twenty House members. Discussing the dynamics involved in 410+ elections all across the country is well beyond my realm of expertise.
Generally speaking, I expect the republicans to take a loss. Voter interest is not fired up right now, and what little enthusiasm there is involves the presidential race. Unfortunately, with a candidate as vanilla as Mitt Romney, I do not expect enthusiasm to grow much between now and November. Somewhere along the line, conservatives are going to have to get excited about defeating Barack Obama.
But I doubt anti-Obama sentiment will translate to House races for three reasons:
One, midterm elections are referendums on the president. The only proactive way to comment on the president‘s performance in a midterm election is by voting against his party’s congressional nominees. In a presidential election year, they can target him.
Two, mitt Romney is not exciting enough to have coattails. Republicans will not be voting for him. As much as hey will be voting against Obama. If Romney campaigns feebly, social conservatives will stay home like they did in 2008. The same bloodbath will ensue.
Three, I do not think the Tea Party has the enthusiasm it did in 2010. Maybe they will get it back by November. The Tea party’s waning influence is fast becoming a motivation for veep speculation. First, it was some suggestion Rand Paul should be the eventual veep choice. Now there are rumblings about Allen West. Why? Because there are fears Paul is too conservative to last in Kentucky and West is too conservative for his new district. People are beginning to realize some Tea Party favorites are not a good fit for their districts. There will be course corrections come November, particularly in swing districts.
Taking a wild guess, I will say the republicans will suffer a net loss of ten or twelve. That is after some favorable redistricting has brought in some new Republicans. South Carolina has a new House district which is split from Joe “You Lie!” Wilson’s district. It is a guaranteed Republican pick up. I assume other redistricted states will be similarly positive. Seriously, is there such a thing as a Democrat controlled area that is actually growing in population?
No comments:
Post a Comment