Senate Math Update

Way back on December 16, 2009, I posted a very simplistic analysis showing that the GOP had roughly 3 chances in 5 of picking up Senate seats, about 1 in 6 of losing seats, and just a 1% chance at picking up 6 or more seats. I called this "things looking moderately up for the GOP".

Nate Silver's Predictatron, whose sophistication compared to my analysis is roughly that of a Boeing 787 Dreamliner to the Wright Flyer, shows the situation considerably stronger for the GOP: a 20% chance that the GOP picks up ten seats, and only a 3% chance of the GOP losing any net seats. Eight months ago I had the chance of the GOP picking up 10 seats at too low to be meaningful. Silver shows that a good bet would be for the Senate to be a 52-48 or 53-47 split, leaving Democrat, after the upcoming November elections. Considering how uneven the open seats are tilted toward the GOP, this is excellent news.

Scott Brown, Independent

As I've mentioned before in this blog, we (on the Right) should not be too concerned that Scott Brown is willing to team up with Democrats from time to time, as in the financial regulation bill. We may disagree with specific votes - I expect that to happen, in fact. But if, as I also expect, the alternative is a traditional liberal from Massachusetts, then we are coming out ahead in the bargain.

Brown is going to have his hands full in 2012 when he comes up for re-election. If siding with Democrats on a few votes buys him enough independent cred to keep his seat, and if he sides with Republicans on enough key votes to help block the worst of the Democrat legislation, then we should be satisfied. I think I should retract my original, overly-exuberant statement that he's "my ideal politician", but I stand by my claim that he may be the best we can expect from the People's Republic of Massachusetts.

And it's always possible that, over time, he may be able to move to the Right as he secures his incumbency. Of course, there's also the danger that he'll succumb to pressure to move to the Left. But that happens to a lot of politicians (yes, John McCain, I'm looking at you).

Half a loaf is better than none.

Menendez Recall

Senator Bob Menendez is facing a recall challenge from Tea Party voters in New Jersey.

RoseAnn Salanitri, a Branchville resident and organizer of the Tea Party group in Sussex County, today said the group believes Menendez votes for too many taxes....

"If you hire them, you should be able to fire them," she said.

All due respect to Salanitri for having the gumption to try this. And the NJ state constitution does have a recall provision for senators. But surely this kind of thing flies in the face of the U.S. Constitutional design of the upper house. The Senate is meant to be the slow-moving, deliberative body, with members serving six years precisely so that they will be less subject to the whims and vicissitudes of public opinion.

So, in fact, the founders specifically reject Salanitri's argument that if you hire them, you should be able to fire them. We give Senators a long-term contract. As a NJ voter, I'd be very happy to see Menendez go. But this is not the way.

Brown!

Well, the unthinkable has happened: a Republican has been elected Senator from Massachusetts. This is certainly a repudiation of the current state of the health care bill. For one thing, Brown ran (in part) on a platform of voting against it. For another, he will replace Ted Kennedy (not counting placeholder Paul Kirk), the Senator most responsible for driving health care deform to where it is today. For a third, lots of voters polled said that their experience with MassCare had soured them on a federal version.

It would be madness for the Democrats to double down and try to ram through a bill via trickery. Using the reconciliation process seems to be off the table. Having the House simply pass the Senate bill remains an option, but given the narrow 220-215 passage of even the House bill, it's not at all clear where Pelosi finds the votes for this. That's especially true given the political environment that all House members must be eyeing warily. The public's ire is aroused and a wrong vote at this juncture could be fatal in November - which is rapidly approaching. The window for Obamacare may have just closed.

One more thought: we should celebrate Brown's victory tonight. But expectations should not go too high. He isn't going to become another Rick Santorum. In my opinion, that's a good thing. It's possible that Brown is close to my ideal candidate: fiscally conservative, socially moderate. He was elected primarily on the former, and we will have to see how he does. But even farther-right conservatives than I should be happy if he legislates around the middle of the party.

More on Early 2010 Senate Projections

In the spirit of climate science and financial derivatives, let's put some mathematical gloss on those horserace projections from yesterday.

First, let's pick some probabilities out of the air like Al Gore mentioning that there's a 75% chance of there being no Arctic ice in six years. For the sake of argument, say that if John J. Miller considers it a "likely retention", then the party retains 90% of the time. If he considers it "leaning retention", then the party retains 75% of the time. And if he considers it a toss-up, it's a 50/50 proposition. In that case, his breakdown gives us:

• 4 GOP seats are "likely retain"
• 3 GOP seats are "leaning retain"
• 8 seats are "toss-ups"
• 5 DEM seats are "leaning retain"

So assuming independence, it's a simple matter to calculate the probability of different senate compositions after the 2010 elections. And without further ado, it looks like this:

• 21% chance that the GOP ends up with 39 or fewer seats
• 17% chance that the GOP ends up with 40 seats (same as today)
• 61% chance that the GOP ends up with 41-45 seats
• 1% chance that the GOP ends up with 46 or more seats

The bad news for the GOP is that of Miller's 20 "interesting" races, half of them are currently owned by the GOP. Naturally it would be better for them if their races were safe and all the DEM-controlled seats were in play. The worse news is that there's at least one chance in five that, even with the favorable poll numbers we're currently seeing, the GOP could drop even below 40, and two chances in five that they go no higher than 40. That would keep the filibuster off the table (although, as we've seen with health care, corraling 60 senators can be harder than it might be, especially in the teeth of countervailing public opinion).

The good news for the GOP, of course, is that there are three chances in five that they pick up some seats.

Take this analysis with liberal doses of salt and any other spices you happen to come across. Things are looking moderately up for the GOP, but there's a lot of work to be done before next November.

Early 2010 Senate Projections

On NRO today, John J. Miller runs down the 2010 Senate races. It's very early, so these are about as accurate as using, say, the rings on a single tree in Siberia to predict global warming. But if you assume the toss-ups really are basically 50/50 propositions and that the leaning or likely retentions hold as Miller predicts, then the GOP picks up just one seat. (Eight toss-ups, five for Dem seats and three for GOP seats.) Of course, with the 60-40 Senate balance today, one seat is a big deal.

Here are the toss-ups: Colorado (Dem), Connecticut (Dem), Missouri (Rep), Nevada (Dem), New Hampshire (Rep), North Dakota (Dem), Ohio (Rep), Pennsylvania (Dem).