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Jens 'n' Frens
Idle thoughts of a relatively libertarian Republican in Cambridge, MA, and whomever he invites. Mostly political.
"A strong conviction that something must be done is the parent of many bad measures." -- Daniel Webster
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Thursday, September 28, 2006 :::
There's an idea going around (and I think it's quite plausible) that the Republicans could keep the House while the Democrats take the Senate. Mickey Kaus lists three possible reasons: gerrymandering, the relative scariness of House Democratic leaders vs. Senate Democratic leaders, and a theory that Senate races turn more on the national mood, which is going the Democrats' way.
I can't dispute these suggestions, but I also think the Republicans are unlucky in the way some individual Senate races have played out. Now, half of you probably just said the name "Menendez", and it's true that the Democrats aren't doing happy little jigs over New Jersey. But they have a strong candidate in Tennessee. The Republican incumbent in Montana looks set to go down in a red state; I don't know much about that, but my understanding is that it has more to do with him than with either the Democrat or the feelings of Montanans for Republicans in general. We're defending Rhode Island, and we're defending an increasingly Democratic Pennsylvania against a fairly strong challenger to an incumbent who has not generally won by wide margins in the past. Ohio has several Republican office-holders who are clearly corrupt, which is tarnishing other Republicans in Ohio. The incumbent Republican Senator in Virginia seems to enjoy the taste of his foot.
There's a strong Republican candidate in Maryland, so at least we can look forward to losing that state by less than usual. But in more races than not, the Republicans have problems specific to those races, in addition to the national mood-shift toward the Democrats.
::: posted by Steven at 11:39 PM
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