SSP Changes Ratings on Eight Races

SSP is changing its ratings on eight Senate and gubernatorial races:

  • AR-Sen: Safe D to Likely D
  • CA-Sen: Safe D to RTW
  • CO-Gov: Lean D to Tossup
  • IA-Gov: RTW to Likely D
  • MA-Gov: Lean D to Tossup
  • NV-Sen: Likely D to Tossup
  • NY-Sen-B: Safe D to RTW
  • WI-Gov: Lean D to Tossup

We’ll be posting full write-ups for these changes soon. Our full race ratings charts: Gov | Sen.

27 thoughts on “SSP Changes Ratings on Eight Races”

  3. This is looking more likely to be competitive as opposed to a race to watch, but I still think Culver is favored.

    I am concerned that Iowa tends to be late to enter and late to leave recessions, so even if things pick up nationally next year, we might not be feeling it yet in Iowa. On the other hand, Iowa’s unemployment rate of 6.8 percent (very high by Iowa standards) is still low compared to the national average.

  5. Although Im expecting/hoping the WI-Gov race to move back to Lean D once we get our ducks in a row.  But at the same time, from doing my own redistricting for MN and getting pretty intimate with my data, I was able to answer why Obama won WI by 14% freakin points but only won MN by 10%, when in 2000 and 2004, we didnt have giant nail-biters like they did.  In WI, the key is seeing how the rural areas shift.  Milwaukee and Madison are small enough metro areas so as not to create big swaths of Republican exurbs nor large enough to have swingy suburbs that decide elections.

    In WI, the area that decides elections are all of the rural areas.  I always use the Dkos Electoral Map to look at election results so I suggest to everyone to look at that state in 2000 or 2004 and compare it to 2008.  Obama carried nearly every single county and that’s because the Republican exurbs and suburbs are all contained to one county, and it’s only populated enough to support one CD.  

    WI-3, WI-6, WI-7, and WI-8 I are all rural with nearly 40% of their populations being rural.  WI-3 Obama shifted the Dem margin by 14%, WI-6 by 14%, WI-7 12% and WI-8 he did 20% better than Kerry.  The largest shifts in the electorate occurred in the rural areas hence why we gotta make sure we have a candidate who can rock it out there.

    Who are all of our people considering again?  Lt Gov Lawton, Rep Kind, who else?

    (Kind would probably knock it out of the park then, representing one of the most rural-centric CD’s in the state.)

  6. Um, I guess it might be a race to watch if you enjoy the sight of Carly Fiorina falling on her face repeatedly (which I do, for the record).

    Seriously, the woman’s a bigger gaffe machine than Joe Biden after a six-pack.

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