California Conservative

At least that’s what this AP article would have you believe. The good news is that the poll that they’re citing to support this claim is as useless as it is agenda-driven. Listen to this grim-sounding opening:

In an ominous election-year sign for Republicans, Americans are leaning sharply toward wanting Democrats to take control of Congress, an AP-Ipsos poll finds. Democrats are favored 49 percent to 36 percent.

This is the AP-Ipsos poll that’s historically and wildly inaccurate because it vastly oversamples Democrats. I know I’ve harped on this before but I’ll continue pointing it out until they change their methods. An attack unanswered is an attack legitimized. That won’t happen on this blog. PERIOD.

Let’s dig a little deeper and find out what this really says:

“I don’t think anyone is hitting the panic button,” said Rich Bond, a former Republican National Committee chairman. “But there is an acute recognition of the grim environment that both parties are operating in. If the Democrats had any leadership or any message, they could be poised for a good year,” Bond said.

“But in the absence of that, they have not been able to capitalize on Republican woes. Because of the size of the GOP majority, Democrats have to run the board, and I don’t see that happening.”

WHAP!!! “If the Democrats had any leadership or any message, they could be poised for a good year…” Yeah and if my savings account had more zeros to the left of the decimal point, I’d be a millionare. Bond is right on the money in noting this. Democrats these days run far better in the generic ballot than they do in real life. In other words, a generic Democrat doesn’t make the outlandish statements that the real candidates make. A generic Democrat doesn’t have to defend the outlandish statements that Dean, Pelosi and Murtha make.

In short, Democrats would do better if they ran these campaigns in the theoretical realm than in reality. Since most people live in the real world, they’ll be running uphill the entire time.

Chairman Bond makes another good point and that is that Democrats pretty much have to run the table to regain control and that simply won’t happen.

Carl Forti, a spokesman for the GOP’s congressional campaign committee, said about 30 House seats are competitive this year, compared with more than 100 a dozen years ago. Rep. Rahm Emanuel of Illinois, who heads the Democrats’ campaign efforts, put the competitive number in 2006 at 42…

Let’s assume that Emanuel’s number is accurate. Let’s also assume that Democrats win 2/3rds of those races. That translates into a 28-14 split. That leaves them 1 vote short of winning back control of the House. I’d put the odds of them winning 28 of the 42 supposed competitive seats in the ’slim to none’ category.

Cross-posted at BoxerWatch

This entry was posted on Sunday, January 8th, 2006 at 4:59 pm and is filed under Author: Gary Gross, DNC, Elections, RNC, Washington, DC. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.