Here come the midterms

OK. I admit it. I am a politics junkie. We are less than a week from the midterm elections, and I am in bliss.
Are you ready for the midterm elections? This is one of the most important elections in a long time. Have you done your homework?
Let's give it a look.
Did you know that the Democrats are trying to "nationalize the election"?
That means that they want to get people to vote on their individual congressional races in response to their feelings about the current overall condition of Washington, as opposed to simply voting based on your view of the local election. In simple english, what this means is that they are saying that if you don't like President Bush, vote for the Democratic candidate in your congressional election, even if you favor the Republican candidate for office. Simple enough. But it's a hard task to pull off.
It was done before, but by the Republicans. Remember when President Clinton's first midterm went so far to the Republicans that they took over control of both the House and the Senate? That was in response to the Republicans' "contract with America".
The difference here is that the Democrats are not offering a "contract" the same way that the Republicans were back then. The Republicans had said, "if you elect us to a majority, in the first hundred days of office, here is the legislation that we will introduce into congress". I'm having a harder time with the Democrats version of it, because they seem so wishy-washy about it all. What would they do, specifically? I keep hearing a lot of, "ummm...we'll do it better" But what exactly will they do? Well, that's the problem. There isn't a consensus. If fact, there is quite a rift. The whole Hillary vs. Dean idealogy rift that's going on.
So can they pull it off? That's the question. If they pull it off, then obviously they did something right. So can they?
In the Senate, there are 100 seats. But they are not all up for reelection. Only 33 of them are. To get a majority in the Senate, the Democrats need to pick up six seats. I can only find four that are even close. They are Montana, Ohio, Rhode Island, and Pennsylvania. These are seats that are held by the Republicans where the Democrats have a shot at winning. On the other side, New Jersey is looking like it could swing Republican, where it is currently Democrat. In addition, Missouri and Virginia are close enough to call them a toss up, and they are both held by Republicans. As far as I've been able to tell, all of the other states look like they will go to the incumbant party.
So if I am correct in my estimates, the Democrats would have to win all six of the Republican seats that are in play, as well as keep New Jersey. That's a tall order of business. So unless they can reach into their bag of tricks and pull something out dirty, I don't think they can do it. So my prediction is that the Republicans will keep the Senate. I can't see the Democrats picking up more than four seats.

Ok, how about the House?
Now that's another story. The Democrats need to pick up 15 seats in the House in order to capture the majority. But unlike the Senate, ALL of the seats are up for reelection. And there are 435 of them.
Well, I haven't had time to go through all of them (yet).
But overall, there are 12 seats right now that look like they will switch from Republican to Democrat. No seats look like they will go from Democrat to Republican.
But the key is that there are a number of seats that are too close to call. And all of them are Republican. In fact, there are a couple of dozen. The Democrats actually have chances to pull it off. But what's it going to come down to?
Voter turnout.

Historically, midterm elections have a very low voter turnout.
Also, historically, Democrat voters simply do not vote. It's an odd thing about Democrats. They don't vote. They try all of the same things that the Republicans do, but for some reason, it just never seems to work for them. We even studied this in college, where my instructor was a Democratic lobbyist. She said that they had meetings lamenting the fact that Democrats just won't go out and vote.
So to get them to vote, they need to try to "energize the base".
That is to say that they need to appeal to the die-hard Democrats to go out and vote. Get them all fired up. So in the next week, look for the Democrats to start dropping bombs in the news. Maybe dig up an old dusty story and give it another run. Maybe they'll start talking about Rush Limbaugh's drug investigation, or Bush's national guard service. If they can come up with a couple of new indictments, they will.
On the other side, look for the Republicans to start doing the same type of thing. But they do it a bit different. They'll start asking, "do you want to see nancy pelosi as speaker of the house?" They go more for the "do you really want these clowns in office" kind of approach. Watch for it. It's fun to see.

Ok, so locally, I have my Senator up for reelection, Kay Bailey. But she is a shoe in. So is my Representative, Kevin Brady. Texas races are pretty easy for the Republicans. Governor's race? Perry will win by a mile. He's pulling over 40% in the polls right now. And that's even with Strayhorn splitting the red vote. Of course, Kinky is splitting the blue, so it works out even. Easy win for Perry, I think.

Other Texas races to watch are Tom DeLay's seat, which the Democrats successfully were able to go to court and block the Republicans from putting a candidate on it. So there's a write-in candidate Shelley Sekula-Gibbs, who is running as the Republican against the Democrat Nick Lampson, who was previously in Congress, but was defeated by Judge Ted Poe (the hanging judge).
Also there is a race up in Waco (including Crawford) in which the Democratic incumbant, Chet Edwards, was targeted in '04 for defeat by the national Republicans, along with four other prominant Texas Democrats. He was the only one who won. So this year, they are trying again to unseat him. That one will be fun to watch.

Ok, how about you? Are you registered to vote? Do you know where to go? Do you know who your congressman is? Who is his opponent? Have you looked them both up and done your homework? What are their campaign promises? And even more importantly, have you looked up their voting records? Is one of your Senators up for reelection? Do you know who your Senators are? What do their voting records look like?
How about your Governor? (Or Governator, if you happen to live in California)

Come on, do your homework. Your ancestors died to give you the right to vote. It's what separates us from the Commies.

-edit--check the news-- Ann Coulter Voting Fraud Case Likely Will Be Turned Over to Prosecutors, Florida Elections Chief Says -- I told you so. It's already starting.