Comments on The Latest Poll. Gulp.

The R's are pulling out all the stops and I have to say that while the House D's never stopped fighting, I could almost hear some Senate staffers sizing furniture up for their new leadership offices.

And you know that even if there is a 51-49 split in the Senate, the Republicans will take it as a big win and a mandate, despite the fact that all of these races are practically split down the middle.

Our only hope is that the Democrats don't screw up with the House, and that once they're there, they can pull out some major victories over the administration that are not seen as mere obstructionism.

Bite your tongue BMA.

There should never be any criticism waged against Democrats. Not when the election is nearly 136,000 seconds away.

The plan is to say nothing until after they win. Then when they win, remain in silent observation until the Presidential election race starts (approx June 2007 if not earlier).

By then we will know if / what our saviours, the Democrats, will do to turn this country around and make it alllll better. If some of their actions seem at best obstructionist, that's too bad. It wil be time to work on the "agenda" for the 2008 election, so you will need to go back to shutting up.

Democrats can't win if you don't shut up.

Trust them in silence. Otherwise it's your fault when they lose.

I checked out recent SurveyUSA polls on Congressional races and was surprised how many GOPers were either leading or routing their races.

It's not looking too good, guys.

And Patrick, that's a stupid thing to say. This notion of Dems thinking themselves infallible, among many other things, is why the GOP can turn so many people against them.

Also, re: MT and RI, I wouldn't say 'roaring back' given the Dem candidates had such small leads to begin with.

But still, yes, this is a serious issue.

the real serious issue is that we sill allow 51% of the population dictate how the other 49% gets to live.

talk about a fucked political system.

To take the Senate, Democrats need to win a net of six seats on Tuesday.

The polls showed the Democratic Senate candidates leading outright or with a small edge in four contested states that already are Democratic seats - Maryland, Michigan, New Jersey and Washington.

If they hold those, they'd still have to win six of eight other seats now held by Republicans to seize Senate control.

Democrats led in Ohio and Pennsylvania, but trailed in Arizona and Tennessee.

That means to capture the Senate, Democrats would have to win all four other states where they are running neck and neck with the Republicans: Missouri, Montana, Rhode Island and Virginia.

Should have gone to Tennessee Mr. John Stewart. should have gone to Tennessee and rallied those kids to vote.
You helped the Dems clinch Ohio but you missed the big joke down south.
just an observation and the wasted battle the Dems did in Liberal states. We're going to lose to the south again. They run the country you know. not Washington,California,and New York can do a damn thing about it, until we get more liberals to invade there colleges there. Then were talking strategy mkay?

No surprise on the Senate. It was always an outside chance to begin with. The House, on the other hand, is ours, all ours. The nice thing about the Senate though, is who we're picking off. Santorum, the number three in the Senate, gone. DeWine, who's been oh so useful to Bush in keeping his domestic spying from being investigated. Burns, with his 0% rating from NARAL, the NEA, and his near 0% ratings from the League of Conservation Voters, American Public Health Association, and AFL-CIO. It's sad that Lincoln Chafee, who seems like a legitimately good guy didn't switch parties two years ago and thus retain his seat come November, but it's great that we'll have a Dem in his place. Remember, the farther the GOP is from sixty Senators, the easier it is for us to block their agenda.

The Senate was a stretch. I'll settle for retaking the House.

I got a bad feeling about November 7.

Bush/Rove recently had a meeting with a bunch of right wing radio talkers where they were told that the republicans will barely take back both houses and the dems will go to court. Something may be up here.

I believe we are going to have some serious electronic voter machine fraud on election day, particularly in the very close races, which will allow for easier vote flipping to republicans to win their races.

The House is a done deal. I think the Senate remaining in Republican hands for the time being actually will help the Dems in the long haul politically and going into the '08 cycle:

1) Looking in broad brushstrokes, if the D's hold both houses, the R's will make a huge deal about Congress getting very little done in advance of the '08 election. The Senate remaining in R hands provides some innoculation for the D's
2) The reality is that to get anything accomplished, you need 60 votes in the Senate to make it happen. Neither party will accomplish this.
3) The down side is of course with regards to judicial nominations. The Senate still acts in its "advise and consent" capacity. However, the president will be significantly weakened, and with the political cards on the table the Senate will be loathe to have polarizing juducial nominees pass through , particularly if Bush continues down this same track. Cheney himself said this morning the they aren't running for re-election, don't care what the public thinks and will do what they want to do.
4) More important than the Senate are the number of governors that will be elected on the D side, along with changes in state legislatures. The Dem party should be consolidating those gains, and taking advantage of redistricting those states to do to the R's what they have done to the D's over the past 15 years in redistricing to D advantage. A recent US supreme court case has given the green light to that, and there should be no holds barred.

There you go again, Feitkopfs. With all the ugliness you've thrown at Ken Blackwell, Hutch ('fnarf' wants him to fuck off and die), & Buju, you're simulating shock! shock! about an innocuous ad aimed at Ford & are pewling about ugliness & bigotry. You tards are utterly shameless, utterly devoid of appreciation of your hypocrisy. Surely there's a 12-step for the irony impaired.

Even if Burns wins in Montana, he still faces indictment in connection with the Abromoff scandal. If he had to resign, the Demoractic governor of Montana will be able to appoint whomever he wants, right? If so, that seat may be destined to be blue anyway.

Indictment? Better have a ref for that one. Believe Burns did nothing indictable, but could be wrong.

His 'crime' was being the gold-medal grift taker, even above Pepsodent Patty Marray, but am told he gave it all back. Am told she didn't. Even your old man, Tom DeLay, has not been proven (yet?) to have exchanged crimes for Abramoff's dollars.

It's notable that Republicans made back a lot of ground in these Senate races by going extremely negative and getting extremely personal in their mud-slinging. The saddest thing is, that if the Republicans pull off wins in Tennessee and Montana, they will see it as a vindication for their vile tactics. Never will we be able to expect an above-board, race "based on issues" again. Meanwhile, the most in the media will blame "both sides" for the negative campaigns. Expect something like, "the Republicans accused the Democrats of raping baby lambs.. boy that's negative, but the Democrats are equally culpable, by attacking the Republican's approach to the war on terror."

What's even better is the Republicans will crow that the election is a mandate on Bush's approach to the "War on Terror" in Iraq and his scorched-earth fiscal policy.

If we thought the last two years of Republicans showboating wedge issues on the national stage was entertaining, wait for next two.

So much for the home of the brave.

I'd like to see some "vile tactics" back from the Democrats. Maybe they could take down a couple more of these scumbags, like our friend here, who thinks (as all Republicans do nowadays) that racism is benign.

Tom DeLay hasn't been found guilty in a court of law, it's true. But he IS guilty as hell, and the Republican leadership knows it. He was removed by his own co-conspirators, not by Democrats, remember.

There is no amount of ugliness that I or anyone could throw at Ken Blackwell that would obscure the mushroom cloud of ugliness that emanates from his own soul. Or from yours, my friend; you know as well as I do, down in the center of your shriveled heart, that your party is entirely in the hands of brigands and mush-heads now. THERE ARE NO ETHICAL REPUBLICANS LEFT.

A lot of these polls seem like outliers compared to everything else that's been done. Cantwell with a 16 point lead? Republican candidates who haven't been ahead in months suddenly leading for no apparent reason? MO a tie? All of them just feel off.

Feelings aside, the encouraging thing is that only one Republican is hiting 50% and most are stuck at or below 45%. I doubt those undecideds are going to break for Republicans in a significant way.

I do however agree with Neo-Realist, that there will be a massive wave of voting irregularities -- not all of them favoring Republicans -- that will throw a number of races into the courts. The radical-right courts.

Remember how politics works: Democrats are stupid, and Republicans are evil. Just because a few extraordinarily stupid Republicans have popped up in the past few years doesn't change the paradigm. There already are reports of voting machines registering straight-R votes for straight-D voters, in several states. No paper trail means no recount and no way to prove anything, either. I will be looking for races where the results diverge by large margins from the late polls.

Now, think about the decade-long push of the Republicans to disenfranchise as many likely Democrats as possible. If it wasn't for that effort, the Senate would probably be 60-40 Dem, and the House even wider. And of course Al Gore would be halfway through his second term, and Bin Laden and his terror movement would be dead.

@Man Who Thought Was A Hat

Feit is as bad as Schwarzkopf. Where you once had Stormin Norman, we now have Joshin Josh. Sure, Feit is a passionate aggressive lad with an appreciation for basketball and his own self-promotion, but like he stupidly accused someone before, he is UNREADABLE. He feeds basic democrat propaganda just to get people riled up.
Woohoo, I'm riled up. Vote Democrat!

Novembrrrr here is testing my "Democrats are stupid, Republicans are evil" adage by demonstrating a level of stupidity rarely seen in even the dumbest D. WTF - Norman Schwartzkopf? Are you retarded? You can't even write English sentences. Man Who Thought He Was As Clever As Oliver Sacks can at least write sentences, mentally damaged though he is.

Yeah, this was not an election for the D's to take the senate. Statistically, it's an off year: Rs have 15 of their current 55 seats (27%) up vs. 18 of 45 current D/I seats (40%) - note that's a much greater proportion of the Democratic caucus up for grabs. Tough game, but you go to an election with the slate you have, not the slate you wish you had.

The races are close enough, the dirty tricks of 2000 and 2004 will only be sparingly applied. I am SO depressed that the loyal subjects of Jesusland are selling us out. Again. For what? More meth-poppin' boytoy-humpin' hypocracy? Bleah.

Terrible news. Because the Democrats were really going to do something different, and, you know, save the world.

Whoever is posting as MRS. Catalina Vel-DuRay is a sham! I am the only MRS. Vel-DuRay, every since my dear mother fell off the toilet in our double-wide in Orting! (NEVER mix Malt Liquor and Cook's Champagne. It's even worse than bleach and ammonia. )

But whoever you are - you should note that Conrad Burns is currently under federal investigation. He could very well be going down, or at least forced to resign.

So There.

Maybe they could take down a couple more of these scumbags, like our friend here, who thinks (as all Republicans do nowadays) that racism is benign.

It won't happen because many Democrats themselves are racist, even in our supposedly more enlightened strongholds like Seattle. The D's just do a better job of hiding it behind a layer of PC behavior and lingo.

I also agree with Neo-Realist. I have zero faith in the integrity of the vote, which breaks my heart. The easy corruption of the voting machines should be dominating all the news cycles, IMO. Such a sick, powerless feeling. I'm going to vote, but more and more it feels like prescribing medicine to a corpse.

I wouldn't worry about polls too much-- they were the ones that showed that Kerry was going to win in 2004 right up until he lost. Also, if the can't spell Jon Tester's name right, what does that say about their thourough research and accuracy? not a hell of a lot.

focusing on poll results in an election is horse-race politics at its finest and is exactly the type of media coverage the stranger should steer away from. there is more to politics than this and it only furthers the superficial nature of the understanding of the political process by the mainstream media.

*steps down from soapbox and breathes a sigh of relief*

Catalina, don't worry. No one is going to confuse you two. Note that our bipolar Republican friend is "Vel-Delay", not "Vel-DuRay". Fortunately, he's obviously hitting the crack pipe, not the meth -- the really short highs are a tipoff. He's face down in a pool of presumably very expensive champagne right now.

Friends who aren't political wonks (and who know that I am) have been asking me for the last couple weeks what I think of this poll or that poll. I keep giving the same answer - the only poll I care about happens tomorrow, at the ballot boxes.

I truly have NO idea what the voters are going to do. People are righteously pissed, from what I can tell from doorbelling, but what that translates into, I do not know, other than that this year, for once, only a few people are saying screw the whole process and not voting. People ARE voting this year. But I can't tell for whom, or for what.