One of the readers of this blog contacted me and challenged me to issue my predictions for the midterm elections. In the table below I have summarized my predictions with the most famous political prognosticators in the business, Charlie Cook, Stuart Rothenberg and Chris Bowers.
MadProfessah Charlie Cook Stuart Rothenberg MyDD
House 30 20-25 34-40 23-28
Senate 5 4-5 5-7 4-5
Governor 8 5-8 7-9 6-9
I am being deliberately optimistic in my predictions, particularly in the House because I do believe that the midterm elections of 2006 will be an equivalently historical election the 1994 midterm elections in which the Democrats lost 54 seats in the House and 9 seats in the Senate.
I will go further and pick exactly which Senate and Governorships the Democrats will pick up.
In the Senate, I believe the Democratic pick ups will be: Montana, Rhode Island, Pennsylvania, Virginia and Ohio.
In the Governor’s races, I believe the Democratic pick ups will be: New York, Massachusetts, Ohio, Colorado, Maryland, Minnesota, Arkansas and Florida.
The Democrats will control the House of Representatives, the Senate will be under Republican control with 48 Democrats, 2 Independents (Sanders and Lieberman) and 50 Republicans (Vice President Darth Cheney breaks ties in the Senate under his constitutional role as Presiding Officer of that body.)
UPDATE: I have posted my election scenario on the great New York Times election blog site.