Sometimes, pundits make a point that's just silly. Sometimes, they make a point that contradicts facts and reality. Sometimes, it gets so bad they contradict themselves in the same paper at the same time.
Stuart Rothenberg, writing in Roll Call, points out that large Republican gains in the midterms were once not as inevitable as they are now, so we can't complain that the Democrats couldn't do anything to avoid the coming catastrophe.
What he doesn't realize, however, is that this point contradicts itself. If big gains weren't inevitable last year, why are they now inevitable? Yes, we're closer to the election, but there's nothing inevitable about an election result until voting is underway.
If anything, Rothenberg just made the argument for saying that Republican gains were never inevitable, and that all talk of a GOP sweep is premature conventional wisdom run amock. If that was his point, I'd agree with him. But in typical Beltway punditry fashion, he's fond of looking backward to prove his predictions can change without ever realizing that his predictions can change direction yet again in the near future. Maybe he's GOP-colored glasses are biasing him against taking his ideas to their logical conclusion.
It really annoys me when I can provide better political analysis than the so-called well-respected "non-partisan" professionals who get paid handsomely to do it.