My Little Senate Predictions

Step right up and get your Senate predictions!

Overall, I expect things to level out where they are now nationally, or perhaps tighten just a hair in favor of the Dems due to better resources and saner candidates.  I have six seats flipping to the Republicans, with none flipping to the Democrats.

1. North Dakota – Hoeven (R) 67, Potter (D) 31 – Even Harry Potter couldn’t pull this off.

2. Arkansas – Boozman (R) 57, Lincoln (D) 40 – This was gone anyway, but divisive primary didn’t help.

3. Indiana – Coats (R) 54, Ellsworth (D) 44 – Thanks Evan.  Nice goin’ dude.

4. Delaware – Castle (R) 54, Coons (D) 45 – On September 14, we are all part of the Tea Party Express.

5. Pennsylvania – Toomey (R) 50, Sestak (D) 47 – Should tighten but too deep a hole for Sestak.

6. Colorado – Buck (R) 49, Bennet (D) 47 – Holding out hope on this one, but I’ve had it flipping all along.


7. Florida – Rubio (R) 40, Crist (I) 37, Meek (D) 20 – Increase in Meek strength may ruin Crist’s chances.

8. Illinois – Giannoulias (D) 48, Kirk (R) 45 – Logical that Illinois will pick detested Dem over detested GOPer.

9. Nevada – Reid (D) 48, Angle (R) 44 – None of the Above runs up the score in this stinker.

10. Washington – Murray (D) 52, Rossi (R) 48 – Primary result made me feel better about Murray.

11. California – Boxer (D) 49, Fiorina (R) 44 – Can’t see Fiorina making the sale to blue electorate.

12. Wisconsin – Feingold (D) 52, Johnson (R) 47 – Johnson looking more like a yahoo every day.  

13. Kentucky – Paul (R) 52, Conway (D) 47 – State may be too red to beat even unconventional Paul.

14. Ohio – Portman (R) 52, Fisher (D) 46 – Dem prospects in Ohio, like many residents, headed south.

15. Missouri – Blunt (R) 52, Carnahan (D) 46 – Really bad environment here for Dems.

16. Louisiana – Vitter (R) 51, Melancon (D) 42 – Third party candidates steal votes from Vitter.

17. Connecticut – Blumenthal (D) 53, McMahon (R) 44 – McMahon spending keeps it reasonable.

18. North Carolina – Burr (R) 53, Marshall (D) 44 – Marshall lack of resources prevents closer race.

19. New Hampshire – Ayotte (R) 53, Hodes (D) 43 – This one hasn’t looked competitive for awhile.

20. Alaska – Miller (R) 53, McAdams (D) 43 –  Relatively strong Obama approval in AK perplexing.

21. West Virginia – Manchin (D) 56, Raese (R) 41 – Cannot believe Gov with 70% approval in trouble.

22. Georgia – Isakson (R) 58, Thurmond (D) 40 – Decent recruit in Thurmond loses due to environment.

23. Iowa – Grassley (R) 59, Conlin (D) 40 – Another good recruit bites the dust due to bad environment.

24. New York (B) – Gillibrand (D) 60, DioGuardi (R) 39 – New York looks rock solid statewide.

25. Arizona – McCain (R) 59, Glassman (D) 37 – Primary damages McCain only a little.

26. Oregon – Wyden (D) 60, Huffman (R) 35 – Wyden may have been vulnerable if targeted.

27. Maryland – Mikulski (D) 63, Wargotz (R) 34 – No trouble for Mikulski in deep blue Maryland.

28. Alabama – Shelby (R) 66, Barnes (D) 34 – Shelby has incredible warchest, won’t need to use it.

29. Kansas – Moran (R) 65, Johnston (D) 32 – Blowout in open seat race.

30. Oklahoma – Coburn (R) 65, Rogers (D) 31 – Could be even worse.

31. Vermont – Leahy (D) 65, Britton (R) 31 – Non-serious challenge for entrenched Leahy.

32. New York (A) – Shumer (D) 67, Townsend (R) 32 – Big sweep across the top of NY ticket.

33. Utah – Lee (R) 69, Granato (D) 29 – Utah gets its first Teabagger Senator.

34. Hawaii – Inouye (D) 69, Cavasso (R) 27 – Inouye an institution in Hawaii.

35. Idaho – Crapo (R) 71, Sullivan (D) 27 – Crapo breaks 70% against unfunded candidate.

36. South Carolina – Demint (R) 69, Greene (D) 23 – Could anyone be less deserving of this political gift?

37. South Dakota – Thune (R) 100, Nobody (D) 0 – Really, we couldn’t get anybody?

54 thoughts on “My Little Senate Predictions”

  1. I think Giannoulias and Murray will both win by slightly larger margins, and see the potential for a D pickup in Alaska with Miller as the GOP candidate. (I don’t buy that we won’t pick up ONE seat somewhere.) NH is still a wildcard, too, depending on how damaged Ayotte is and whether she survives the primary. I agree on most of the rest – KY will mirror the 2004 result pretty much exactly. OH is gone, MO probably gone (though I haven’t totally lost hope on Carnahan yet). I was bullish on Crist earlier, but see FL as Likely Rubio now because of Meek, and also because Crist still won’t say which damn party he’ll caucus with, which is just alienating the people he needs to win. (Though I also have us holding FL-08 and picking up FL-25 and FL-Gov, so not all is doom there.)

    Reid-Angle is a fugly race, but somehow my cynicism and the fact that everyone hates Reid has me projecting Angle by under 1000 votes. Eew. This would also be consistent with Reid-Ensign in 1998 and Cannon-Laxalt in 1964; NV voters seem to like occasionally putting the fear of God into their Democratic senators.  

    In addition to McMahon’s spending, Blumenthal’s glass jaw also keeps CT reasonable. At least Dodd retired and took this race out of the takeover column in what’s otherwise a pretty awful year.

    I see a net GOP gain of about 6 seats, bringing us to about 54D majority, at least two of them teabaggers. Ugh.  

  2. Your Nevada and California predictions look awfully similar to what I’m thinking right now. For all the talk of Reid being “dead” last year, I knew better… We’ll pull this off, even if it’s a bit of a squeaker. And I was scared a few weeks ago about Cali, but I don’t think “Failorina” did herself any favor at last night’s debate and I’m also now confident that Boxer will pull it off next door.

    The only race I definitely disagree on is Colorado… At least for now, I’m cautiously optimistic that Buck is just too teabagger crazy for them and Bennet will pull off a narrow win.

    Otherwise I’m not writing off Crist yet in Florida, and I’m crossing fingers that Sestak may still have enough time to pull it together in Pennsylvania.

  3. Obama should have gotten down on his knees and begged him not to retire, promising him anything he wanted.  Not only did his retirement cost us a Senate seat, it also cost us a House seat as the overeager Ellsworth decided he wanted to be the lamb to slaughter.

  4. I would put Cali and Wisc ahead of Washington. I can easily see Fiorina and Johnson winning.  I can’t see Rossi (although he is a better candidate than the two before) beating Murray.  

    And I can see both Angle and Buck losing even in a great cycle for the GOP.  I usually vote Republican but there is no way I’d vote for either of those two (although I wouldn’t vote for Reid or Bennet either.)  I would put Kentucky higher, Paul is another nut.  Have to say that I’m pretty frustrated with a lot of the candidates that we have nominated.

  5. How quickly they forget: http://www.swingstateproject.c… 😛

    When I become the junior Senator from Utah I’m gonna remember your horrible pessimism!

    Seriously, not a bad predictions list, personally, I disagree with you w/r/t to Colorado, I think that Bennet defeats Buck, but otherwise totally reasonable.

  6. Revising my Utah prediction:

    DGM (I) 81, Lee (R) 10, Granato (D) 5, Ghost of Joseph Smith (I) 4

    Your platform of mandatory internet porn subscriptions and drug and gambling legalization for Utah will clearly draw votes from both parties.

Comments are closed.