The night before the election, all of the pundits are predicting that the GOP will take over the US Senate tomorrow. The latest polls are showing a close but leaning GOP takeover to be decided, if not by Wed. morning, then at least by January.
Think about those last five words; "then at least by January."
Jump with me, and follow my thoughts over the hump...
..."then by at least January."
That is how certain many of the "experts," are about tomorrow's results. I heard it myself, over, and over. The election really is that close. Steve Kornacki just said it on the Rachel Maddow show, "we may not know until January."
So, other than the prediction of mostly very good weather tomorrow, why am I so foolish as to think we may actually win tomorrow? Consider the following year;
1998
That was the year that, well let me quote from Wikipedia:
The U.S. Senate election, 1998 was a roughly even contest between the Republican and Democratic parties. While the Democrats had to defend more seats up for election, Republican attacks on the morality of President Bill Clinton failed to connect with voters and anticipated Republican gains failed to materialize. The Republicans picked up open seats in Ohio and Kentucky and defeated incumbent Senator Carol Mosley-Braun (D-IL), but these were cancelled out by the Democrats' gain of an open seat in Indiana and defeats of Senators Al D'Amato (R-NY) and Lauch Faircloth (R-NC). The balance of the Senate remained unchanged at 55-45 in favor of the Republicans. With Democratic gaining five seats in the House of Representatives, this marked the first time since 1934 that the out-of-Presidency party failed to gain congressional seats in a mid-term election, and the first time since 1822 that the party not in control of the White House failed to gain seats in the mid-term election of a President's second term.
Now take the
wayback machine to remember what the polls and "experts" at the time were convinced would happen that election. Clinton had just been impeached by the GOP and the pundits were certain the Dems would loose seats in the House.
This is what I predicted two days before the 1998 election on my webpage at the time:
Now that the election is only two days away, I will once again stick my neck out and predict, that the Democrats will do much better in the federal elections than even they are now happily predicting. And, going way out on the limb, I predict the Democrats will even pick up a few seats in the House of Representatives.
Now, I'm not saying that the Dems will gain any seats in either house this year. But, what I'm saying is the Dems will hold onto the Senate. With, at least, VP Joe Biden being the tie breaker.
If you go back to my thoughts in 1998, I felt that the Clinton sex scandal actually helped the Dems with many voters. In that case, I theorized that, the Big Dog would pick up white males who were actually impressed by Bill's "extracurricular" activities.
As crude as that may sound, and accepting that the reason for the results that year are still very much in debate, the result was as I predicted.
So, here is my "crude" reason/prediction, but not a bit scandalous as my thoughts were in '98, why I think the Dems will hold onto the Senate this year:
The 2008 Obama voters are four years older than they were in 2010.
That means that yes, this year they will vote. And the Dems will win.
Because the "likely" voter models that the polls and pundits are banking on, are way off. This is a classic case of how historical forecasts can sometimes be very misleading. They forgot that Obama voters are now older and, therefore, more likely to get out and vote for other Dems this year.
Mark my words and if we lose, I will humbly accept the lifetime mantel of "hopeful fool."
But, if we win, then maybe this time the internets will (should) reward me with at least little bit of credit!
Now, until then, prove me "right" (or wrong) and GET OUT AND VOTE!!!