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NRO's Quick Guide to House Races

NRO Editor Rich Lowry summarizes the key House races for Republicans. His report is at NRO's The Corner:


Here's one way to look at the race for the House (Republican candidates come first in the list). First, take ten seats where it looks like Republicans will lose (some of these are gone, some of them could conceivably be saved, but even prudent Republicans aren't counting on it happening):


AZ-8: Randy Graf v. Gabrielle Giffords

CO-7: Rick O'Donnell v. Ed Perlmutter: It's just a very tough district for Republicans. Beauprez won there, but he was an excellent candidate and still only eked out the seat in 2002.

FL-16: Joe Negron v. Tim Mahoney: This could still possibly be doable the GOP.

IN-2: Chris Chocola v. Joe Donnelly: Internal polling shows Chocola closing in the last 2 weeks, near margin of error. He's been down for a long time, so Republicans consider this a good sign.

IN-8: John Hostettler v. Brad Ellsworth

OH-18: Joy Padgett v. Zack Space

PA-10: Don Sherwood v. Chris Carney

PA-7: Curt Weldon v. Joe Sestak

TX- 22: Shelley Sekula-Gibbs v. Nick Lampson: Republicans still haven't totally given up on this one. The internal polls have her within the margin of error and rumors have apparently been swirling around the district that Lampson will consider switching parties after the election. So this one is still bubbling a bit.

VA-2: Thelma Drake v. Phil Kellam: She hurt herself with a gaffe last week about Iraq being a vacation outside of a few hotspots. She could still survive, but hurt herself.


Then, there is a second tier of vulnerable seats. If Republicans lose all ten of the above, they can afford to lose just four of these 16 races (almost having to run the table).


Read the rest at the link above. IMO, Sherwood and Weldon are at extreme risk due to personal scandals - Sherwood's infidelity and the investigation of Weldon's daughter, a lobbyist. Padgett could easily win; the key is if voters in the district want to express their anger at the disgraced and corrupt Bob Ney. Negron is in a similar situation running for Foley's seat, but the publicity may, ironically, have helped him by focusing public attention on the fact he ISN'T Foley (whose name will still be on the ballot).

There is no reason to concede any of the Indiana seats. I had Sodrel as the most likely loser, but he seems to have closed it up a bit. Hostettler is always behind in the polls, never runs a "normal" modern campaign, but is the Congressman with the best-organized volunteer corps, bar none. Chocola is facing a rematch, but there is no reason to assume the voters will turn him out. The biggest problem for these three is unhappiness within the state with some of the Republican Governor's recent actions.

And, no, I am still not conceding TX-22 (the DeLay seat), even though no write-in candidate has won a general election to the House in the last century or so. No write-in candidate had ever won a Senate general election, either - until Strom Thurmond.

Thelma Drake will be reelected in Virginia's 2nd CD. It is a conservative, heavily military and veteran district, and Kellam is a moron.

We could lose several of these seats, but giving up on them now would be foolhardy.

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Comments (6)

Jim, we have a similar post... (Below threshold)

Jim, we have a similar post up at Hang Right Politics. I've given a generic link because we actually have several up as well. Our views are quite similar on the races. You have more info on the Indiana races than we do. Also, we have NC-11 as a close one with incumbent Charles Taylor running behind.

We did get a comment from one of our readers indicating that there are some potential GOP pickups as well. We had the IL seat of Melissa Bean as a potential pickup, but we have to keep our eyes on GA-8 and GA-12 as potential pickups as well. I'd give GA-12 better odds.

Good job!

Also, one of our readers is... (Below threshold)

Also, one of our readers is from PA and reports that Weldon is getting some union endorsements.

NRO has usually underestima... (Below threshold)
AWW:

NRO has usually underestimated the GOP result. Miller had the GOP losing 1-2 seats in '02 instead of gaining. So I usually take the NRO prediction and add a few more GOP seats.

Well, this isn't Miller's p... (Below threshold)

Well, this isn't Miller's predictions, it's just Lowry's summary.

It's like the difference between king crabs and crabapples.

NM had a write in candidate... (Below threshold)
jeff:

NM had a write in candidate win a house seat back in the 80s. I don't remember the details but it was Runnels a conservative Democrat

Jim - true. My point is th... (Below threshold)
AWW:

Jim - true. My point is that NRO isn't happy with Bush or the GOP (not real conservatives) and therefore tend to be more pessimistic on the GOP chances. They undershot in 2002 and 2004.




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