Ten Midterm Surprises

A GOP romp is still in the offing, but a number of individual races are defying expectations. From the invincible Vitter to Murkowski’s resurgence, The Daily Beast’s Election Oracle turns up 10 shockers.

Alaska’s Three-Way

[SNIP] Our Election Oracle model still puts Miller as a 70 percent favorite to win, but multiple polls show Murkowski running shockingly close.

Ben Quayle Blowing It?

[SNIP] the latest poll shows Quayle behind 46-44 against rival Jon Hulburd. An outlier, or is Quayle actually in trouble?

Delaware Off the Board

[SNIP] Election Oracle now puts Coons as a 90-10 favorite over O’Donnell based on his overwhelming advantage in the polls.

The Nevada Deadlock

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The Democrats’ ‘Conscience’ Falters

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West Virginia Surge for GOP

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Jerry Brown Returns

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David Vitter: Invincible

We really need to change our definition of a political scandal. Louisiana Sen. David Vitter was caught in a prostitution scandal in 2007, and then, right as election season heated up, one of his most trusted aides was arrested for attacking his girlfriend with a knife. Reports showed the aide had a criminal history of drunk driving and domestic abuse that his boss apparently ignored. Democrats weren’t afraid to go after Vitter for his troubles, but none of it seemed to stick. He’s a 90 percent favorite to win the race against challenger Charlie Melancon.

The Playing Field Expands

Political analysts peg the number of competitive seats at as many as 100, producing some surprises. Among them is Michigan Democratic Rep. John Dingell, the longest-serving member of the House, who trails by 4 percentage points in the most recent poll in the race. At the same time, some Democrats thought to be seriously endangered are proving tough to knock out—West Virginia’s Nick Rahall, for example, is still a 90 percent favorite to win on Election Oracle based on his strong polling, despite a wave of anonymously funded, race-baiting ads running in his district.

Gay Rights Falls Off the Map

After being credited with pushing evangelicals to the polls in 2004, gay marriage seems to have faded almost entirely from the political conversation in 2010, despite more states legalizing same-sex unions over the last election cycle either through state legislatures or court decisions. With economic issues dominating, social conservatives are having trouble bringing attention to the cause even as the right’s grassroots are more powerful than ever. Could it be that the gay rights movement has reached its tipping point? Our Election Oracle shows that few races saw the issue occupy more than 3 percent of the online buzz and the few that saw disproportionate amounts of discussion were mostly blue states where gay marriage has been legalized or is being considered by the legislature.

Full article

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Why do conservatives not care about sex scandals and marital infedelities of Republicans?  Is marital infedelity allowed in the religious books or something that I dont know about?

I really do not like LGBT rights being pushed to the side.  If you thought Tea Party is not about social issues, think again.

And, I wonder who is funding ads against Nick Rahall.  His opponent Spike Maynard was once a judge and lost his seat in re-election due to a scandal that he was seen vacationing with the coal mine company Massey Energy's CEO. This is from January 2008.

Massey has already been campaigning since late 2009, campaigning openly in favor of, and explicitly "FOR CORPORATIONS".

Sept 2009

1984:

I sure wonder if Massey/Blankenship is funding the ads against Nick Rahall and his newly re-registered-as-Republican friend (former supreme court judge) Spike Maynard.

Good summary by Benjamin Sarlin; I'm going to follow his posts going forward.