John Barrow, a perennial GOP target, has caught a pair of breaks this fall. First it was when state Rep. Buddy Carter, considered a strong candidate, pulled the plug on a potential bid against the congressman in October. And now Wayne Mosley, an Iraq vet and orthopedic surgeon who was widely expected to mount a campaign, is saying that he won’t challenge Barrow, after all.
The NRCC is left with John Stone, a former aide to ex-Rep. Max Burns, as their top choice.
Most of us would agree that in order for a Democrat to have a shot at winning OH-02, we have to hope that Jean Schmidt makes it through her primary battle with former Hamilton County Commissioner Phil Heimlich. The odds of that happening would certainly improve if another challenger emerged to split the anti-incumbent vote with Heimlich. And it looks like that may be the case, as state Rep. Todd Brinkman is sending out an email release today announcing his candidacy.
Brinkman finished third in the 2005 OH-02 primary, earning 20% of the vote. Interestingly, his Wikipedia bio includes a paragraph about an incident of petition fraud that Brinkman participated in, and was verbally reprimanded for by a local judge earlier this year. Sounds like a real “winner”.
(H/T: Buckeye State Blog)
Today the SEIU Michigan Council has endorsed Gary Peters, in his congressional campaign for Michigan’s 9th district.
“Our members firmly believe that Gary Peters is the best candidate to represent the citizens of Michigan’s 9th District,” said Phil Thompson, SEIU Michigan State Council president and executive vice president of SEIU Local 517M. “He has a proven record of standing by working families, particularly when it comes to providing access to quality and affordable health care.”
Gary has also received the earliest Congressional endorsement from the AFL-CIO, been endorsed by the Michigan Building Trades, American Federation of Teachers, and the local Operating Engineers, Communication Workers, and Pipefitters.
Peters was proud to accept the endorsement, saying “I’m extremely pleased and honored to get the support of the SEIU Michigan State Council. The SEIU believes, as I believe, that working families deserve a voice in Washington and that it is time for a change.”
Michigan’s 9th District is currently represented by Joe Knollenberg. Last year Knollenberg received a dismal 0% rating on labor issues in the AFSCME House Scorecard.
Getting the endorsement was a very thorough and unique process. Gary Peters and other candidates in Michigan’s 9th filled out a questionnaire, met with SEIU members who filled out assessment forms, and took part in a “Walk a Day in My Shoes” event where the candidates worked side by side with an SEIU member.
Marge Faville, the secretary-treasurer of SEIU Healthcare Michigan and the Michigan State Council treasurer, said Peters understands the struggles that SEIU members face.
“Gary Peters understands our values and our concerns,” Faville said. “He spent a day side-by-side with a home care worker as part of our endorsement process, and we were very impressed with Gary’s passion and his grasp of the issues SEIU workers face.”
Faville went on to highlight two of Gary Peters key beliefs that impressed SEIU members:
Ending the war in Iraq, and supporting children’s health care.
“Gary Peters wants to end the war, bring our troops home and make sure their children get the health care they need through an expansion of the S-CHIP program. Those two issues are extremely important to SEIU members, as they are to Michiganders as a whole. Our members are excited to support a candidate who shares their vision for a better Michigan and a stronger America.” SEIU Secretary-Treasurer Marge Faville
Want to get involved?
After seeing Lois Murphy pour everything she had into two attempts to knock off Republican Rep. Jim Gerlach and fall short both times, potential candidates for 2008 have so far been reluctant to dip their toes in the water. However, it looks like Democrats have at least one candidate on tap so far. From Roll Call:
Philadelphia magazine editor Larry Platt is planning a bid against Rep. Jim Gerlach (R) and an announcement is forthcoming next month, according to a Pennsylvania Democratic operative with knowledge of the race.
“He’s certainly moving ahead and finishing his due diligence, but we certainly expect that he will be running,” the Democrat said. […]
Local Democrats are hopeful that Platt’s connections in the wealthy Philadelphia suburbs will be the ticket to defeating Gerlach in a district that voted for Al Gore in 2000 and John Kerry in 2004. Platt’s office did not return requests for comment.
“Larry certainly would be the kind of candidates that we’re looking for in running,” said Marcel Groen, who chairs the Democratic Party of Montgomery County, part of which is in the district.
John Yarmuth 2.0, perhaps?
This will be cross posted to Swingstatesproject.
It’s based on an article by Kastellec, Gelman and Chandler entitled “Predicting and dissecting the seats-votes curvein the 2006 US House Election” which is forthcoming, and which I found through Gelman’s blog (the blog has lots of cool things for geeks).
Andrew was nice enough to give his permission.
If I mess up his argument, I apologize.
How well did the Democrats do in 2006? Very well indeed. Everyone acknowledges that. But how well? As well as the Republicans in 1994?
In 2006, the Democrats gained 31 seats to take control of the House. In 1994 the Republicans gained 54 seats. So, at first glance, it seems like the 2006 election, big as it was, wasn’t quite as big as 1994. But Kastellec, Gelman and Chandler (henceforth KGC) show that this is incorrect, and the Democratic victory was even bigger than 1994.
There are two general ways of predicting the House: Nationally or district by district. National forecasts are typically based on such variables as the economy, views of the president, and so on. They can be useful, but district-by-district methods let us account for local condition. KGC use two local conditions to help predict races; despite this parsimony, the model is quite useful. Their two conditions are the election results in the previous election, and whether the incumbent is running again. They then model,using simulation, how these would be affected by a variety of national tendencies towards voting Republican or Democratic. Then, these various estimates, and the resultant change in seats, can be graphed. (See the paper).
For those who like formal models:
where
They let the swing range from R +10 to D +10, and simulate each condition 1000 times.
Based on all this (and more, see the paper) they estimate that the Democrats needed 52% of the average district vote to have a 50% chance of winning control of the House. Why?
Two reasons: 1) Geography and gerrymandering, and 2) incumbency
In the first, the Democrats waste more of their votes. There are far more Democratic districts than Republican districts that are won by huge margins. Part of this is due to geography, but it’s enhanced by gerrymandering (more on this in another diary). Incumbency is an advantage because people tend to vote for the incumbent.
Where does this leave us for 2008? Well, geography and gerrymandering haven’t changed, but incumbency certainly has. Not only are there now more Democratic than Republican incumbents, but more of the Democrats are running, especially in closer districts (see my diary more signs of Democratic gains to come. That’s one of the problems with gerrymandering: When the mood shifts, or your gerrymandered representative retires or dies, there is more of a chance for a switch.
KGC estimates that if the Democrats get 49% of the average district vote, they will maintain control of the House. If the Democrats get 55% of the average district vote, they should get about 58% of the seats, which would be a gain of 8 seats.
In a later diary, I’ll use the CGK formula on each district
Then there’s the national mood, which I’m willing to bet favors Democrats.
A message from Harry:
America’s constitutional system is a work of genius. But today that system is broken. That’s the simple truth here. And I think most of us know it.
You can see this truth in the failed adventure in Iraq. Only a Congress without a spine would allow a president to send our kids to war 10,000 miles away from home for no good reason and with no plan for victory.
You can see this truth in a national debt that has spiraled out of control. Only a Congress that had lost its mind would help pile up three trillion dollars in debt in just the past seven years alone.
You can see the truth of our broken system in the shameful way that Washington hasn’t lifted a finger to deal with energy independence or climate change. Only a Congress in the pocket of special interest groups would ignore the reality of global warming for year after year even as glaciers melt and temperatures rise.
You can see the truth of America’s failed politics in the complete collapse of our healthcare system. Only a Congress beholden to an extreme ideology of every one for themselves could allow 47 million Americans to go without healthcare coverage, watching as thousands of our citizens literally die every year from lack of coverage, and yet do nothing at all to address the problem.
Finally, you can see our broken system in the ways that America’s economy no longer works for everyone. Only a Congress that is bought and paid for by the super rich would look the other way as most income gains in the past seven years went to the top five percent of households, and America’s middle class – which is the very bedrock of our society – struggles to make ends meet.
It’s time for some members of Congress to go. And we have one of them right here in Charlotte.
Our nightmare started on December 12, 2000 when the Supreme Court appointed George W. Bush president. Sue Myrick stood with this president virtually 100% of the time. On December 12, 2007 we need your help in retiring Sue Myrick.
On December 12th, we’re asking 4,000 Harry Taylor supporters to contribute at least $25…to raise $100,000 in a single day! Will you stand with me to take our country back?
Sign up here:
http://www.actblue.com/page/12-12
Thanks for your support!
http://www.harrytaylorforcongr…
Soon to be Crossposted on Kos, BlueNC, Open Left, Democratic Underground, MyDD
With Rob Wittman out of the House of Delegates and into DC, Virginia Democrats can take solace in knowing that they’ll likely pick up his seat in the state House. From the WaPo last week:
Former Del. Albert C. Pollard Jr., who narrowly lost his Senate bid this year, said today he will likely run for his old state House seat if Del. Robert J. Wittman (R-Westmoreland) is elected to Congress next week. […]
If he runs, Pollard would be a heavy favorite to win Wittman’s state House seat. In this year’s Senate race, Pollard received 57 percent of the vote in the portion of the district that includes his old House seat.
If he wins, Democrats would pick up a House seat and increase their margin to 45.
Look, I’m probably as bummed out about Weirauch’s loss as the rest of you are (even though I never once expected a win here), but there’s one key number we need to be taking away from the OH-05 and VA-01 special elections today: $537,038.24.
That’s the grand total that the NRCC flushed into both of these races over the past couple of weeks. To put it in another formulation, that’s 21% of their available cash-on-hand at the end of October.
I hope Republicans are finding the taste of victory to be sweet tonight, because that’s one hell of a high price to pay to win a pair of 60% Bush districts.
Who’s Sam Bennett?
Where’s PA-15?
Why am I supporting her?
Why should you?
all this and more, below the fold
(cross posted to docudharma and dailyKos)
PA-15 is the southeastern corner of PA. The most famous town in the district is Allentown; there’s also Bethlehem. This is former steel producing country, a bit off the main tracks of America. Nowadays, it’s got a lot of small shops and businesses. It’s not poverty stricken (median income is $45,330, and about 8.2% below poverty level), it’s got a small but not absurdly small Black population (2.8%) and a reasonable Hispanic population (7.9%).
It’s a swing district: Kerry got 700 votes more than Bush; Gore got about 2,500 more than Bush. Its current representative is Charlie Dent, first elected in 2004. As Republicans go, he’s not the worst. But that’s sort of like being a tall midget. In 2006, Dent won 54% to 46%, despite the fact that Dent raised $1.2 million and his opponent (Charles Dertinger) raised $88 thousand (yeah, a ratio of over 14-1). Dent replaced that rarest of breeds – a Republican who kept a term-limit promise.
Who’s Sam Bennett. Well, Sam is for Siobhan. Her
website is here . I like it. I especially like:
The Bush Administration seems to have things exactly backwards. Where government should be robust – protecting and caring for its citizens – they have made it weak. Where government should tread lightly, they have made it overbearing.
and
I want to bring our troops home, to the hero’s welcome and lifelong support they have earned.
and
“Supporting our troops” is not leaving them in Iraq to referee a religious civil war, with no plan, no mission and no end in sight. People here and across America support our troops with all our hearts, and we want them home.
and
Our dependence on foreign oil is a serious national security issue, a serious economic issue, and a serious environmental issue. It is also an enormous opportunity to fundamentally change and grow our economy.
Want more? She wrote a diary and she stuck around a while too.
aren’t those the things we’ve been saying? Doesn’t a candidate who says them deserve our support?
I’m not the only one who likes her. She’s gotten donations from a lot of unions and 77 individuals and a lot of people on her Act Blue page
She sounds good, and this is a race we can win. Give her some money.
And!!!!
Today is her 50th birthday!
9:33 PM ET (David): AP calls it for Latta.
9:03 PM ET: About a third of precinct are now reporting and Latta is maintaining a 55%-45% lead.
8:42 PM ET: 11% of precincts are now reporting in Ohio and Latta has a 56%-44% lead over Weirauch. As a side note, it appears that the SOS' RSS feed is updating a bit quicker than the main site as it was displaying these results a few minutes earlier.
8:30 PM ET: I think we can officially put a nail in Forgit. With 93% of precincts reporting, he's still at 35%.
8:21 PM ET: With 2% reporting in Ohio, Latta is up 53-46.
8:07 PM ET: 75% of precincts are reporting in VA-01 and Forgit is still holding steady at 35%.
7:51 PM ET: Results are starting to trickle in for OH-05. With what appears to be a single precinct reporting, Latta is up 75-69.
7:41 PM ET: With just over half of the precincts reporting, Forgit's still sitting at 34%. Even Kerry was able to garner 39% in this district.
7:30 PM ET: Polls just closed in Ohio; we'll know shortly whether Weirauch was able to seal the deal.
7:27 PM ET: With about a quarter of the votes in, Forgit is still down by a 2-1 margin. Looks like it won't be a long night in Virginia.
7:17 PM ET: Early returns (10% reporting) show Republican Rob Wittman up 2722-1330 over Democrat Phil Forgit.
Up above, I've posted links to sites that should update with results throughout the night. But if they don't come through for us, I'll update accordingly. If you happen to find a better results page, let me know in the comments.
It'll probably be a while before any votes actually get counted, so treat this as your final chance to lock in predictions.