Nate Silver, a political prognosticator whose analysis of polls and data is considered about as solid as you can find, has more bad news for Democrats: he has concluded that if trends continue the Democrats could lose their majority in the Senate — during a year when many already believe the Dems will lose control of the House:
The Democratic majority is in increasing jeopardy in the Senate, according to the latest FiveThirtyEight forecasting model. The Democrats now have an approximately 20 percent chance of losing 10 or more seats in the Senate, according to the model, which would cost them control of the chamber unless Gov. Charlie Crist of Florida, who is running for the Senate as an independent, both wins his race and decides to caucus with them.
In addition, there is an 11 percent chance that Democrats will lose a total of nine seats, which would leave them with 50 votes, making them vulnerable to a defection to the Republican Party by a centrist like Joseph I. Lieberman of Connecticut or Ben Nelson of Nebraska. On average, over the model’s 100,000 simulation runs, the Democrats are projected to lose a net of six and a half Senate seats, which would leave them with 52 or 53 senators. (Even though the G.O.P. primary in Alaska remains too close to call, that outcome is unlikely to alter the model.
Right now — unless something changes — polls repeatedly suggest a whopping Republican vote this fall and tepid turnout by Democrats. Some Democrats seemingly give up when they don’t get all the policies their way, or they want to punish their party (just listen to callers on liberal talk shows say how they’re going to stay home because they’re mad that Barack Obama dind’t produce a “public option” on health care). Or, they become almost immobilized as their party’s poll numbers go south. Unless the Dems can find a way to get out their best “ground game,” it is not outside of the realm of possibility that they can wake up after election day finding Congress controlled by the GOP.
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.