Final Pre-election View, Pt. 2: The House

Forget about your House of Cards/
And I'll Do Mine.

Radiohead, In/ Rainbows, Track #8

WARNING: WE WILL BE DRAWING INFORMATION FROM SEVERAL WONKY ELECTION ANALYSIS WEBSITES. I'll try to link to them at, or soon after, first mention.

For all of its gerrymandered faults, the House is the most democratic of Federal institutions--there is little brake on the whims or delusions of the majority. Then, too, despite the fact that a majority of House districts are set up for a guaranteed party victory (about the same number, some 160-170 for each party), this decade has shown that about 100 are legitimately contested ones, in purplish shades varying from scarlet to indigo. These districts need to be won, or defended, every two years.

Nancy Pelosi did much that many Americans did not want, but I can not fault for a moment her proven ability to run legislation through the House on a timely basis (props also to ex-Congressman Rahm Emanuel, who is leaving his job as President Obama's chief of staff to go back home to try to run Chicago). A Republican majority, no matter how small, should work just as well, so it is much to be feared and opposed. I use the word "work" very loosely--they will be able to pass the legislation they want through the House, though Senate dithering and Presidential vetoes will both await if they get too aggressive--and by "well", I mean "badly", in terms of the short- and long-term interests of Americans, the economy, and the rest of the world. But what I mean is that 218 seats gets them control of all the committees, the bills put on the floor, and the rules which will govern their passage.

So, it's pretty much all or nothing: the Republicans need to gain 39 seats (plus the two vacant ones which are pretty much conceded to them). Go through the following and see if you think they'll get there.

Meet The Wonks

Nate Silver of Five-thirty-eight.com, now housed on the New York Times' blogs, is tops among those who study politics with a serious quantitative discipline. Part of his appeal is his willingness to write honestly and openly, and his willingness to engage in give-and-take with the blogosphere. He is also alone among those I'll mention here who makes his forecasts based on Election Day and not If-Today-Were-Election-Day.

With regard to forecasting individual House races, Silver has taken all the data available and come up with projected Election Day vote percentages, which he discloses in his district-level map. He also has for each a measure of standard error in those estimates (which he doesn't disclose); that error will reduce (and the projected percentages will change, albeit gradually) as Election Day nears and more polling data comes in--he commented recently that only 116 of the 435 races had local polls. The combination of the projected vote and the standard error has allowed him to quote a "percentage chance of takeover" for each individual race.

Silver is thought to be a liberal Democrat, but he has been very clear in establishing a distance from Democratic partisan viewpoints, respecting the work of conservative pollster Rasmussen and others of his ilk, and taking a firm, early position that the Democrats are in serious trouble, particularly in their bid to hold onto the House. His current assessment is that the Republicans have a 67% chance of winning control of the House, his mean simulation result is Republicans 224.3 seats, Democrats 210.7, and he shows a nice, real-life normal distribution of probable Democratic seats (done from "10,000 simulations") that looks like it peaks around 210-212, but with a neat little secondary spike right at 217-218.

I have two beefs with Silver: one is his habit of referring to his model anthropomorphically, as though it were a person with opinions ("my model is skeptical about...") instead of a mathematical construct he made. The other is that the notion of speaking of elections probabilistically is problematic: it has sense in the idea of putting stakes in the ground for bettors to take one side or the other, but not in the sense that political outcomes are random events. They are deterministic in their nature; the uncertainty comes from the difficulty in knowing who will come out and vote, whether people tell the truth to pollsters, how strategic decisions in the last days of the campaign will fall out, and whether past patterns of behavior will accurately predict future behavior, none of which really are random events like cutting cards or rolling dice.

Next up: Congressional Quarterly is a journal which studies developments in Congress and reports on them to the public. A few years ago, they got more seriously involved with detailed study of political races, and their site for this is called CQ Politics. They have done their own district-by-district ratings, which are done in a more traditional, less numbers-driven style. Essentially, they start with a detailed knowledge of individual Congresspeople, their districts, and how politics work, then add data as the race goes along.

The ratings start out with a pretty strong incumbent bias, but gradually filter in threats to incumbents. The only critical data point in the analysis is the last one before Election Day. In this study, I'll be using the ratings from September 17, though they came out with some shifts--entirely predictable ones--on September 30.

Cook Political Report appears similar to me in its base and approach. It makes a lot of good background information available to its paid subscribers--not so much to us Internet interlopers, though I did get a good description of the Congressional district "PVI"--the Partisan Vote Index. A description of a district as "R + 6" means that in the last two Presidential elections (i.e., 2004 and 2008), the district averaged 6% more Republican than the national average (which they quote as 48.7%, ignoring 3rd-party votes).

Larry Sabato is head of a non-partisan political institute at the University of Virginia and a long-time political observer and commentator. His "Crystal Ball" seems to utilize the national generic poll as the primary input to project national House campaign results.* I faulted him for not lining up his race-by-race assessments with his overall prediction ("if the election were held today"--or anytime in the last month--he's predicting a gain of 47 seats for the Republicans), but that overall prediction lines up very well with Silver's moving-target predictions. Sabato's organization just changed ratings of about 20 races on September 30 (unsurprisingly, all in the direction of improved Republican chances), but he has yet to update that attractive, but defective, chart published a few weeks ago.

Cook and CQPolitics have current analyses which are deceptive: they are only calling for net pickups of 10-20 seats for the Republicans, similar to Sabato's seat-by-seat analysis. I don't believe those are anything like what their final forecasts will be, and it would be dangerous for anyone to take them seriously. You have to assign all the many races called "toss-up" to the Republicans to get to their realistic forecast, where I expect them to end up. As I said, shifting each column over (or just relabeling it--Sabato's chart had zero Democratic-held seats as "Likely Republican") makes their analyses comparable to Silver's.

All three of those--Cook, Sabato, and CQ--will go through the same tiresome process of gradually, and selectively, moving races from Leans Democratic to Toss-up, Toss-up to Lean Republican, Leans Republican to Likely Republican, etc. as the days to Election Day diminish. They expect that memories will be short and they will not be faulted for failing to identify many of the seats that will turn over until the last weeks--something that Silver has been willing to do quite boldly. They should converge on similar final charts of race predictions, probably also similar to Silver's as he shifts his, too.

The final site I would recommend to those who want to do some research on their own is electoral-vote.com, which puts faces, PVI's, and narrative together about most, but not all, of the 100 contested races.

I did a study using Silver's percentages, categorized in the style of the others, and testing the hypothesis that the others identify the same races with the same results, only shifted one category toward the status quo. It worked pretty well, but not perfectly--on average, it was the right adjustment, but some races were two columns off or even more, while some were in the same column.

My Turn

This leads me (finally) to my own analysis. Basically, I looked at five pieces of data for 100 races. The selection of the races came easily: there is some variation around the margins (the "Likely Dem" and "Likely Rep" columns of one analyst might have races considered "safe" by others), but in the key areas of likely takeovers and tossup or near-tossup races, with a few exceptions, they're talking about the same ones.

The five pieces of data were the Cook, CQ, and Sabato forecasts, shifted a column away from the status quo as I've tried to describe, Silver's turnover percentages, and the PVI, which I used simplistically: a seat with a Republican-leaning PVI of "R + 6" or higher, in other words with a 55% or higher average Republican vote in the last two elections, was considered for this purpose a seat mildly trending Republican. I sought the center of those five indicators. A consensus is indicated if three or more of them (as adjusted) agree; those where there was too much difference of opinion are highlighted separately.

Democratic-held seats:
Gone (predict 100% to lose):
IN-3 (vacant); TN-6 (Open-Gordon); AR-2 (vacant- Snyder); NY-29 (Vacant); KS-3 (Open-Moore) (5 total; the two vacant were mentioned above, so Republicans need net +41 with them included).

High likelihood of loss (80% to lose):
LA-3 (Open-Melancon); ND-AtLg. (Pomeroy); MD-1 (Kratovil); AR-1 (Open-Barry); TN-8 (Open-Tanner); OH-1 (Driehaus); IN-8 (Open-Ellsworth); CO-4 (Markey); NM-2 (Teague); OH-15 (Kilroy); WA-3 (Open-Baird). (11 seats--note how many were seats vacated, either because Democrats sensed loss and abandoned them, or, in several cases, because they chose to run for the Senate, generally unsuccessfully).

High vulnerability, but forecasts varying widely (lose 2 of 3):
MI-1 (Open-Stupak)--91% turnover chance from Silver; PVI R+3; Cook Leans Republican (LR); Sabato Tossup (TO) (but moving to LR now); CQ TO.
MS-1 (Childers)--84%; R+14; Cook, CQ TO; Sabato LR.
PA-7 (Open--Sestak)--76%; D+3; Cook LR; CQ, Sabato TO.

Medium vulnerability (24 seats--lose 60%):
MI-7 (Schaer); FL-24 (Kosmas); WV-1 (Mollohan); NH-2 (Open-Hodes); PA-11 (Kanjorski); NH-1 (Shea-Porter); SC-5 (Spratt); PA-3 (Dahlkemper); PA-10 (Carney); AZ-1 (Kirkpatrick); IL-14 (Foster); GA-8 (Marshall); PA-12 (Critz); FL-8 (Grayson); VA-2 (Nye); IN-9 (Hill); NV-3 (Titus); MO-4 (Skelton); NY-24 (Arcuri); PA-8 (Murphy); KY-6 (Chandler); AZ-8 (Giffords); TN-4 (Davis); FL-2 (Boyd).

Medium, but varying forecasts:
On the high side (lose 3 of 4)--
IL-11 (Halverson): 88%; R+1; CQ LR; Sabato, Cook TO.
VA-5 (Perriello): 88%; R+5; CQ, Sabato, Cook all TO (Sabato moving to LR).
OH-16 (Boccieri): 84%; R+4; CQ, Sabato, Cook all TO.
WI-7 (Open-Obey)): 83%; D+3; CQ, Sabato, Cook all TO.
SD-AtLg. (Herseth-Sadler): 82%; R+9; CQ, Sabato, Cook all TO.
TX-17 (Edwards): 68%; R+20 (!); CQ LR; Cook TO; Sabato TO (moving to LR).

On the low side (lose half):
AL-2 (Bright): 74%; R+16; Sabato TO; Cook, CQ LD.
AZ-5 (Mitchell): 66%; R+5; Sabato LD (moving to TO); Cook, CQ TO.
IA-3 (Boswell): 63%; D+1; CQ LD; Sabato, Cook TO.
CO-3 (Salazar): 61%; R+5; Cook TO; Sabato, CQ LD.
WI-8 (Kagen): 56%; R+2; Cook, CQ TO; Sabato Likely Democratic (here abbr. as PD, Probably Dem.)
NC-8 (Kissell): 50%; R+2; CQ LD; Sabato, Cook TO.
OH-18 (Space): 49%; R+8; CQ, Sabato LD; Cook TO.
ID-1 (Minnick): 47%; R+18; Cook, CQ LD; Sabato TO.

Lower vulnerability (lose one in four):
CA-11 (McNerney); TX-23 (Rodriguez); FL-22 (Klein); NY-19 (Hall); NC-11 (Shuler); NJ-3 (Adler); OR-5 (Schrader); MI-9 (Peters); IN-2 (Donnelly); CO-7 (Perlmutter); NY-23 (Owens); PA-4 (Altmire); MA-10 (Open--Delahunt); ; NY-20 (Murphy); NM-1 (Heinrich); WA-2 (Larsen); VA-11 (Connolly); GA-2 (Bishop); OH-13 (Sutton); VA-9 (Boucher); WV-3 (Rahall); NY-1 (Bishop); CT-5 (Murphy). (23 seats)

Low, but varying forecasts(low side--lose 10%):
IL-17 (Hare): 26%; D+3; Cook, CQ LD; Sabato Safe Dem (but moving to PD).
CA-18 (Cardoza) 0.5; D+4; Sabato, Cook PD; CQ LD.

Very low vulnerability, but still considered contested (all to be held)
CT-4 (Himes); CA-47 (Sanchez); NC-4 (Price); GA-12 (Barrow); AR-4 (Ross); KY-3 (Yarmuth). (6 seats)

Democratic losses counted, by category above: 5 + 8.8 + 2 + 14.4 + 4.5 + 4 +5.75 + 0.2 + 0 = 44.65 seats (of 88 considered)

Republican-held seats:
High likelihood of loss (lose 3 of 4):
DE-AtLg. (Open-Castle); HI-1 (Diou); IL-10 (Open-Kirk); LA-2 (Cao). (4 seats)
Low likelihood (lose 1 of 4):
CA-3 (Lungren); FL-25 (Open-Diaz Balart); PA-15 (Dent); PA-6 (Gerlach); WA-8 (Reichert). (5 seats)
Very low, still considered contested (hold all):
MN-6 (Bachman--unfortunately); OH-12 (Tiberi); CA-44 (Calvert)

That's it--basically there were only 12 Republican-held seats that any of these experts gave a significant chance of flipping. Not too surprising when one considers that basically all the vulnerable House seats were going Democratic in 2006 and 2008. My expectation is that the likelihood of loss of these seats will become greater for the high-likelihood ones, but lower for the low-likelihood ones. There are a couple of real weak seats for the Republicans, but the wave will probably carry the other Republicans to safety.

Republican losses: 3 + 1.25 = 4.25

Net: Republican gain of 40.4 seats, resulting in the following count (my official prediction):
Democrats--217.6 seats, Republicans 217.4 seats.

I did NOT force these results--it's what came out from these calculations, honestly, even blindly, considered. My conclusions are the following:
1) In this election, control of the House is likely to be an absolute cliff-hanger.
2) The experts will be reluctant to show a tie or near-tied House, because it suggests an inability to make a decision.
3) Strategic use of resources is critical--nothing can be wasted. If I were in the DCCC, I would pump money into the "medium" vulnerability category above, including the ones contested to the high and low sides. They make up almost half the Democratic losses, while the high-end category seats are probably not salvageable, and the low vulnerability ones are very numerous yet represent a smaller portion of projected losses. In terms of states, I see a lot of Pennsylvania, Florida, Arizona, and Virginia in those groups, and not as much Ohio as I would've thought.

For New Mexico residents: Note that NM-1 is considered to have a low vulnerability, NM-2 a high one, while our district, NM-3, is about as safe a Democratic seat as you will find anywhere. I agree with all these assessments.


*There is some data supporting use of the generic poll, though not as an unbiased indicator; there needs to be some adjustment of the raw vote percentages to get an accurate indication of expected results, and the generic results with unnamed House candidates is different from a national poll in which respondents are told the names of the candidates. Thanks again to Silver for both studying this, and for reporting on it.

Israel-P.A. Talks Test

Last night the Israelis' self-imposed moratorium on new settlements in the occupied territories expired. Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu has said he cannot continue the moratorium, citing lack of support for such a move in his coalition Cabinet. The Israelis' counterpart in the negotiations, the Palestinian Authority, has threatened to pull out of the newly re-established face-to-face negotiations if the Israelis begin to start new "illegal" settlements.

There is an "easy" solution to this problem, and whether they arrive at it quickly will be an excellent indicator of whether these two parties wish to make a deal. (The alternative is that they just showed up to please the US and President Obama but don't really care to do it.) The solution starts from a recognition that the draft settlement that both sides have seen and studied allows for some swaps of territory: some of the West Bank going to Israel, similarly-sized swaths of territory going from Israel to the proposed new Palestinian state. Further, most of those land swap areas have already been identified, and for the ones going to Israel, well-populated already with Israeli settlers.

All that is needed is for Israel to draw conservatively the map of territories they are due to get--conservatively meaning not aggressively, i.e., not including within the zones land that that is disputed in previous negotiations--and announce they will only build new settlements within those zones. The PA does not have to agree to the specifics of these zones of new development at the present time, but merely to tolerate it.

Such an "agreement" would be a great starting point for future negotiations; essentially, they would agree to take a large set of potentially contentious content and put it in a briefcase of agreed topics. One of them would be the PA's contention that all the Israeli settlements in areas beyond the 1967 boundaries are illegal. It would also put the framework of the discussion into a new agreement rather than trying to re-create the status prior to 1967, which was an unacceptable one for Israel.

Two cautionary notes, though:

1) there would probably not be much agreement on new settlements in East Jerusalem, and the Israelis would be well-advised to be extra careful about targeting any new areas there; and
2) Sharon's Wall--the safety wall the Israelis have been putting up in occupied Palestinian areas to separate priority zones of Israeli interest from the Palestinians--could easily be a complicating factor. The Israelis are unlikely in this scenario to identify much beyond the Wall, but neither should they assume everything on "their" side of it is agreed (especially if it had not been agreed in the draft maps of prior negotiations).

More Jobs? How About Less Work?

Here's an essay I wrote in June, 1994 for a writing class that I turned up the other day looking through old papers.

Here's a notion that is political heresy but that we had better learn to handle: finding full-time jobs for all Americans who can work is impossible, and trying to make it happen is bad public policy. If we need proof that full employment is an unsustainable proposition, we need only look at Wall Street's recent responses to the news that unemployment has reduced. It's only going to get worse.

Expressing the argument in simple terms of social behavior, producing all the goods and services Americans want requires a great deal less than the full-time effort of all our able-bodied adult population. This statement is oversimplified in that it considers the United States as a closed system. However, consider the following questions: If we produce for poorer countries and sell to them, won't that just enrich us further and perpetuate their poverty? And, as for richer countries (if there are any), why should we work to put bread on their inhabitants' tables if they are not inclined to do it for themselves? These should serve to start to show that international trade can only address the domestic employment challenge in a limited, short-term fashion. Its role is instead as a balancing process in which the comparative advantages of different nations are utilized to add value through greater economic efficiency.

Greater efficiency leads among the reasons why we should expect ever greater unemployment in our future. Quality management efforts have dictated relentless improvements in manufacturing processes. Service and manufacturing companies alike have realized savings through pruning middle management. The owners of international capital have demanded the liquidation, downsizing, or relocation of unprofitable operations. These products of the "Invisible Hand" of market economics are inevitable, and they have positive effects in rising productivity and keeping American industry, yet there is no law of macroeconomics which tells us that their net result on employment will be positive or even neutral.

Reductions in the level of employment in America may also result from structural changes to eliminate unproductive work, particularly in the public sector. Government social services programs at all levels will certainly undergo the same kind of pitiless scrutiny for productivity improvements that occurs in private industry and in non-profit agencies. We will all insist on it, to reduce both the budget deficit and the amount of wasteful spending. "Star Wars" missile defense programs will lose their funding (and those in those programs will be displaced), not because they are unnecessary for security, but because we will come to realize they just don't work: the task of intercepting an incoming ballistic missile is basically an impossible one. Support for the national manned spaqce program is likely to evaporate except in the areas which depend on it to maintain jobs.

Similar considerations of localized unemployment effects have postponed the expected peace benefit from the Cold War's end, a major reduction in military expenditures for weapons development and base personnel. Public understanding already exists that such "pork-barrel" decision methods are unethical, but they are accepted as a political fact of life. Structurally, voters have no method of penalizing the representatives of other areas for their selfishness. Recognition of the intrinsic nature of this governmental waste combines with the voters' powerlessness to change it, producing increased cynicism about politics and decreased willingness to fund governmental activities. These changes, too, will in time lead to reduced public-sector jobs.

Time is a factor which will tend to increase the gap between the number of employable individuals and the number employed full-time. Actually, we are now in the beginning of a period of a predicted labor shortage, when demand exceeds supply for certain skilled professions. Indeed, the market for current graduates is the strongest that it has been for many years. This will give way in a few years, though, to a steadily rising tide of new entrants to the job market, the children of the baby boom. To make things worse, the long-term forecasts which emphasize the huge surge in retirement-age people beginning about 20 years from now rarely note that, with pensions and savings shrinking, many of these people will need to continue work well past age 65, again causing excess job-seekers.

A future for America in which unemployment is endemic among its youth, even the most educated segment, should not be so surprising an idea. The fully-developed economies of Western Europe have had such a condition for decades now. Those societies have endured the strains such conditions bring, largely through extending the term of parental support and through developing a variety of forms of casual, informal, and part-time labor.

These are the types of adjustments we will need to make in American society. The marketplace does the best job of allocating a scarce commodity, which employment is already and will become more so. However we must give employers the variety of tools they will need to employ people rationally, instead of forcing a dichotomy between those who Have and Have-Not work. In civil society, we must develop new norms of equity in the distribution of employment--for example, it may not be the case that "one can always find work if one tries". Politicians can add value through responsible statements which recognize the limits of our society's capacity to provide employment, and through restraint in advocacy of localized solutions which work to the detriment of the general public.

What we all must try to do is develop creative solutions that recognize that employment is not a binary variable. As an example, consider the current debate over national health insurance. Putting the burden of payment solely on large employers of full-time workers will tend to decrease their number and further concentrate their burden, thus producing a job-destructive cycle. A more creative approach would provide partial benefit credits for part-time and temporary workers. This would also leave the way open for an enhancement in which work credits and associated health benefits would accrue to those performing critically important unpaid work, like caring for elderly relatives or responsibly raising children.

Accepting less-than-full employment is political heresy only because of the financial insecurity it implies, not because we all want to spend all of our lives at work.

A couple of the arguments are dated, like the one about the end of the Cold War, but most of them are as relevant or moreso now--note that this was written when the debate about Hillarycare was active. As for me, at that time I was looking from the inside out (i.e., I was one of the overemployed), but though that has flipped, I still feel the same way. The tech boom gave way to the war on terror and then to artificial props through financial engineering; now that those bubbles have burst, forming the Great Crater, the government's attempts to artificially produce employment are falling short, yet the politicians' pronouncements (from either party) on the subject have not progressed one iota.

Evolution Works Both Ways

Friday evening Bill Maher aired a brief bit from his old show "Politically Incorrect" in which current Tea-bagger Senate candidate in Delaware Christine O'Donnell asked the trenchantly stupid question, "Well, then, why aren't monkeys evolving into humans?"

My counter-question would be, "How do we know humans aren't evolving into monkeys?" Or indeed, into something far worse.

If we keep selecting for stupidity--something that poll results suggest Americans are on the verge of doing this election--our legislators will create an environment in which morons like them will survive and propagate themselves. If you've seen the recent "Nature" series on dogs, you will understand that intentional selection can work far faster and more dramatically than random, natural selection.

So, in a few generations we--or most of us--may be mobs drooling and hanging from artificial cellphone trees which don't work any more. The isolated remnants of homo sapiens will be hiding out in places like Hawaii and Bali that are hard for our neo-simian relatives to knuckle-drag their way to.

Inexplicable--That's What You Are

The apparent decision by the House of Representatives not to call a vote on the extension of the "middle-class tax cut" is pretty much indefensible. If there were more time until the election, I would say that a groundswell of opinion would cause them to change their minds and have the vote, but there is little time before the session will recess for the final election campaign, so I have little hope for a change of heart.

The House Democratic leadership is saying that they wanted a vote, but have been persuaded not to do so by the Senate's "leadership" punt. I can actually understand--somewhat--why the Senate would not bother to push the issue now; with a couple of Blue Dogs (Lieberman, Nelson of Nebraska) opposing the Democratic program of tax cut extension for the middle class and none for those with annual income over $250,000, and with an apparently united Republican opposition, the proposal would never even make it to the floor: it would be stopped by a filibuster and never get past the procedural votes.

For the House, it's a question of political strategy, then. The arguments about policy, or about economics, or even support for the White House's recommended policy--all of which militate clearly for a tax cut extension for the middle class, perhaps only a temporary one--are largely beside the point, given the low likelihood the Senate will be able to get it through. It's simply a question of whether having a recorded vote for a middle-class tax cut--nothing about the Republican-and-Blue-Dog-backed tax cut extensions for the wealthy need even be mentioned, given the House's rules and Democratic control over them--will help Democratic House members in tough races.

A number of them--Blue Dogs in Republican-leaning districts--put pressure on the leadership not to be put on the spot with this vote. Minority Whip Jim Clyburn was alluding to this when he indicated that a lot of members didn't seem to realize that the proposed cut would actually apply for the wealthy, too (the distinction the Obama White House has been pushing; it's just not a reduction in the marginal rate over $250k in taxable income). Clearly, he wants the vote and thinks it will help them.

The only--and I mean only--justification for the House leadership's decision is uncertainty about what the Republicans in the House might do. Minority Leader John Boehner (the Orange Man, seeking a future House of Orange) has said that he might have to support a middle-class tax cut if that's the only cut on the floor (he then quickly got with the party program, to hold all tax cuts hostage for cuts for the rich), so there is a chance the Republicans would actually vote for the middle-class tax cut, which would deprive the Democrats of exclusive hold on the high ground. Instead, the House Democrats seem to have chosen to hunker down in a besieged fort surrounded by good firing positions.

Thus, the Democrats in the House may be giving up their best chance to have a winning issue for this final, desperate phase of the campaign to keep control, behind a totally incomprehensible rationale.

Inexplicable, indefensible, incomprehensible (and I haven't even pulled out the heavy accusations, like "cowardly", "betrayal", "suicidal")--bad move, House leaders!

In the interests of fuller disclosure, I will say that early in this millennium (roughly 2000-2004), I was in the high tax bracket, and the Bush tax cuts made absolutely no difference in my life. My employer withheld what was needed, and I felt no change when the rate was cut. I say any argument that high income earners will feel pain--expressed as reduced spending--from expiration of the tax cut is bogus. The one exception would be if there is an expectation during the year--say 2011--of a lower tax rate, leading to lower withholding, and then some kind of retroactive increase.

Republican Pledge: Well-Polished

In their Pledge to America, the Republicans seem to have confused a statement of policy with the well-known furniture polish Pledge. When it comes to bringing forward some ideas to help this country in its hour of great need, they come up with canned, shiny, glossy crap.

I know that it is the prerogative of the opposition party merely to provide opposition, and under the unfortunate circumstance of our economy's current condition, it's possible they could even win a house of Congress (I'm unwilling to believe they can win both), but I see no reason for this party's need to exist. Their record from 2001-2008 is reason enough for all of us to resolve that they should never again be allowed near the levers of governmental control, and their new "program" shows they have not come up with anything new since they were justly booted out in 2006 and 2008.

I yearn for a new Era of Good Feeling, such as in the early 1800's when the Democrats had no real opposition party, an era which lasted until they eventually split into competing factions. Americans should feel secure that the Democrats would do this again; there is no need for the Republican party to be around just to have an opponent.

Blair Sells His Book

Tony Blair's new memoir is called "A Journey". I'm not plugging the book, or anti-plugging it, either. I would instead like to make some comments about two or three rather surprising things Blair said in his interview with Christiane Amanpour on ABC's "This Week", last week.

In the late '90's, I admired Blair as symbol of a new, revitalized, progressive-but-pragmatic Britain. After that, I was living in England early in this century: first I saw his generous, heartfelt support for the US in the wake of the 9/11 horrors; then, I watched that loyalty bring him to his disastrous support for the invasion of Iraq in 2002-03. Was Blair courageous in either case? In the first one, one could argue that Blair did what was popular and expected of him, though he did back up that stance with actions. In the latter case, I would say that the clearer profile in courage was that of the late Robin Cook, who resigned as Foreign Minister rather than support the unwise invasion of Irag, in a brilliant speech in Commons that I remember well. I would like to read what Blair says about that speech and his former Cabinet minister, who died rather suddenly a couple of years later.

In his interview, Blair defends broadly the Iraq invasion despite the absence of weapons of mass destruction. Not much of a surprise there; documents that have come forward in recent years suggest Blair knew that the allegation of Iraq's trying to develop nuclear weapons, at least, was a canard. His comment today, and I'm sure it's consistent with how he felt at that time, was that risks must be taken to advance the lifelong cause of the war on terror. He likens that to the Cold War and urges the West to have the same kind of unconditional, long-term commitment to the struggle that we had back then.

For me, this is a major overstatement of the seriousness of the threat currently posed by violent Islamic fundamentalists, and this kind of overstatement leads to overreaction, precisely of the kind that the Iraq War brought, and that in turn gives the terrorists great recruitment opportunities. There is a need to combat Al Qaeda and its ilk, and I am fully prepared to support offensive action in some cases when that will help reduce or eliminate that threat, but what I don't want to hear is JFK-type language that we are going to "face any foe, go to any length" to combat them. Instead, I want to hear that we are taking extremely well-targeted, limited, practical steps to reduce the threat and further isolate this small, fragmented, and harassed band of outlaws from modern Islamic society.

If the first surprise was a negative one that Blair is still talking unlimited, endless war on terror, the second was a positive one: Blair was asked about his relationships with Bill Clinton and with his successor as President. The popular view of Blair today, both here and in the UK, is that he was the lapdog of W, Cheney, and the neo-cons, but what he said in the interview (and, presumably, in his book) was that he was closer to Clinton, and he specifically said, "I'm a Democrat." That's pretty unusual, his identifying with a foreign political party--though I could imagine his political philosophy might have been closer to the mainstream of our Democratic party than the trade union socialist traditional center of his own Labour party--that kind of sympathizing and identification with foreigners, no matter which ones from whatever country, would never be tolerated in this country.

The third surprise had to do with Prime Minister's Questions, the weekly grilling of the Prime Minister by his fellow members of Parliament (and particularly, by the leaders of the opposition parties). Blair was the best I've ever seen at it, and my experience is that he eloquently, knowledgeably and effectively faced down all challenges. So, the surprise for me was his admission that he was terrorized by the weekly ritual: it kept him up at night and stressed him out incredibly. I don't doubt him for a moment, I'm just surprised at his ready admission that it was, indeed, frightening to be at the center of it.

My Last Pre-Election View Pt. 1: The Senate

Pundits typically take a conservative approach to their previews (born of many late electoral changes they didn't see coming, no doubt): assume incumbents win, shift when the evidence is overwhelming, and make the right call late. We don't roll that way (or do we?--see the Bottom Line). This will be the last full-length review; if we see some changes worth noting, we'll make them in the comments.

We refer you to our prior previews from January, February, July, and earlier this week. We don't run from any of that analysis, and we accept that we are somewhat on the leftward tail in terms of expectations. We're looking to the endgame, assuming that Democrats will get their campaign together, that Republicans will have visible fault lines behind their pretended unity, and that voters, especially independent voters, will think twice before they hand the keys back to the Bushites (or the neo-Bushites).

In this view, we will take a look at what two key partisan organizations--the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, and the right-wing operation The Club for Growth--have said publicly about which are the key races. And, through implication, which may not be.

Going Where The Rant Leads Us
"The Rant" is a semi-blog operated by the DSCC, and this week they sent a missive--actually, two of them--to me seeking contributions for their races of interest. The first one listed twelve races where they saw a chance and were either asking me to "Contribute" (marked below with a +) or "Defeat Them" (a -). I figure in the former case they want to promote the quality of their candidates, in the latter, they plan to go negative at the Republicans.

As I've suggested before, I think it's best to contribute to individual races where there's a real Democrat with a real chance to win, not just to punt money to the DSCC and let them decide where to spend it. Here are those DSCC-featured races, with commentary from yours truly:

Alaska (-) This might have seemed like a waste of time; Tea Party candidate Joe Miller, a personal fave of Sarah Palin, is a little less of a favorite over Democratic also-ran Scott McAdams than the incumbent ("Establishment", and a personal rival of Palin), Lisa Murkowski. But now, the plot thickens with the announcement that Murkowski is not going to play nice, and will seek to run either as a third-party candidate or a write-in candidate. Either way, it could make things interesting, though I'm not sure it makes McAdams viable or that Murkowski, should she win, would ever caucus with the Dems. Conclusion: Don't bother.

California (+) Barbara Boxer is worth caring about; Carly Fiorina is worth making an effort to defeat. This race is hugely expensive, and pretty close. I am fairly confident Boxer will win in the end. Conclusion: Don't bother--unless you have a whole lot of money to burn.

Colorado (+) Appointed Senator Michael Bennet (and he's been a very good one; pushed hard for the public option, for example) is in a very tough race against right-winger Pat Buck (he likes the TP support, but has drawn the line at birthers). Bennet was behind but has caught up. This is one candidate I've already contributed to, and may do so again. Conclusion: Give now!

Connecticut (-) This is a must-win for the Democrats, and Attorney General Blumenthal has held the lead consistently since Chris Dodd dropped out long ago. The negative is because the Republican candidate, World Wrestling Federation bigwig wife Linda McMahon, is a big, nasty target. Appropriately so. If I were a Connectican, I would work on turnout, because a poor turnout is the only way Blumenthal can lose. Conclusion--No need to give $$.

Delaware (+) Chris Coons may be a nice guy--he's a favorite of Harry Reid--but the real play is negative ads about new upstart candidate Christine O'Donnell (nice, but batty). The best of all would be if they could get ads showing defeated moderate Republican candidate Michael Castle (who would've been a huge favorite if he'd won this week's primary) saying why he isn't endorsing O'Donnell. Don't take our word for it, take the word of the state's most successful Republican politician. Coons should now win if Dems don't relax. Conclusion--see Connecticut.

Illinois (-) This is doomed to be a negative campaign in which Republican Kirk and Democrat Giannolias are going to hammer away at each other's faults. The race is and has been genuinely close, but I would be shocked if the Democrats lose: in the end, I expect the Chicago machine to do its job. Conclusion--Let them do it.

Kentucky (-) This is one of those for which the Democrats claim that "there are 15 races within 5 points" is somewhat hollow: Tea-bagger Rand Paul isn't leading by much (the Republicans could've had a much easier time if he'd lost the primary), but I see the lead as more than 5. I gave some to the moderate Democrat, Jack Conway, because I'd really like to see my birth state do the right thing, but it seems unlikely at this point. Conclusion--a bit of a longshot, but it's up to you.

New Hampshire (-) I think the negative tack is the wrong way, because Paul Hodes is a Democrat worth praising. The Republican nominee, Kelly Ayotte, barely survived a tough TP challenge and has been weakened. Conclusion: A good give, though risky.

Nevada (-) Reid's challenger, Tea-bag Sharron "Right" Angle, is about as bad as they come. Going negative probably makes sense, given the dire straits of Nevada's economy--Reid may have delivered some Federal benefit to the state, but it's not nearly enough. The one thing is, Reid's campaign is going to have plenty of money. Conclusion--Don't give, and better hope he doesn't blow it.

Pennsylvania (-) I refuse to believe that Joe Sestak can't beat former Wall Street right-winger Pat Toomey, but Toomey continues to lead by 5-10 points. I consider Sestak one of the best candidates out there. This is technically a seat the Democrats are trying to hold, because of primary loser Arlen Specter's 2009 party conversion, but it's been uphill the whole way. Toomey currently has a small lead, but there is a high percentage of undecided, so there is still reason for hope. Conclusion--If there appears to be a chance, give to Sestak.

Washington (+) Patty Murray's been a good Senator, though not outstanding like her Democratic colleague Maria Cantwell. She's got a tough opponent in Dino Rossi, and it appears she's slightly ahead. The state trends Democratic, so I'm cautiously optimistic; this is an important race because it's one the Republicans would need to win if they're to take over the Senate. Conclusion--I'd certainly countenance a contribution.

Wisconsin (+) This is Russ Feingold we're talking about, after Bernie Sanders probably the most progressive Senator, and he's in a tough race with a rich right-winger. I thought Feingold, who's been raising money for this race for years, had enough money, but this race may be draining it. Conclusion--better give (I did recently), as we'll all be sorry if he loses.

After the initial Rant request, I got another later in the day asking for money on these four races. I think it was an afterthought--better not ignore any triggers that might spur giving--but I don't bite:

Missouri (-) Decent Democratic nominee (Robin Carnahan, of the family of popular deceased Senator Mel Carnahan), but she has an uphill fight against Republican incumbent Roy Blount. Conclusion--I'm skeptical--"show me" you can win, Robin.

Indiana (+) This hasn't been well handled by the Democrats, as Brad Ellsworth gave up his House seat (which will now probably be lost) to step up for this improbable race. Conclusion--Don't bother.

Louisiana (-) Railing against hypocritical right-wing sinner John Vitter might draw some money, but he's going to win, unfortunately. Conclusion--not this time.

West Virginia (+) It would make sense for the DSCC to give to Democratic Governor Joe Manchin, against a rich, free-spending opponent. They need to make sure he wins in this recently Republican-trending state, one that Democrats need to count upon to be sure of their majority, but that doesn't mean you or I should give. Conclusion--let them handle it.

The Club for Growth choices for big-money contributions are Nevada, Florida, Colorado, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania. These are well-targeted: each is a hot race with a right-wing Republican nominee with a serious chance to win.

Florida is a special case, and notable because the DSCC doesn't seem to be getting behind its nominee, Kendrick Meek, who would be very supportable--if he had a chance to win (he doesn't). It's almost unfortunate that he is running well since winning the nomination, because he's cutting into the votes of Charlie Crist, who's running as an independent and is the best chance to stop TP Republican star Marco Rubio. I had hopes for Crist's chances, but I see them slipping away, something in retrospect I should've seen coming: third-party candidates often lose support late if the two major parties don't yield the field.

The other race notable in its omission from the DSCC Rants is Ohio: the state is trending extremely badly for Democrats, the Democrats' candidate never caught fire, and the chances there are slipping away.

Bottom Line Time

In terms of candidates to individual races, then, I'm strongly recommending contributions in Colorado, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin; somewhat less fervently, in New Hampshire, Kentucky, Washington, and California; and urging local involvement in Connecticut, Illinois, Nevada, and Delaware (trusting that those races will get plenty of money). The mechanism to give to specific races? You can certainly look up the individual candidates' websites, but one easy way to pick the ones you want to give is through ActBlue.

O'Donnell's upset primary win takes Delaware from "certain Republican gain" to "probable hold". Rubio's pulling away from Crist puts Florida into "probable hold" for the Republicans. This leaves me with the following slightly optimistic assessments of competitive races or seat switches (Nate Silver's probabilities of party turnover appended):

Republican Takeovers
North Dakota, Arkansas --never in doubt (100%!)
Indiana (98%)

Democratic Uphill Struggles
Pennsylvania--would be sort of a hold (92%!)
New Hampshire--would be a pickup (20%)

True Tossups
Colorado (72%), Nevada (52%)

Feeling Somewhat Confident Now
Illinois (55%), Wisconsin (33%), Washington (30%), California (42%), Connecticut (2%), West Virginia (10%), Delaware (6%).

I'd Love to Believe, But Don't See It (reluctantly, Republican seat holds)
Florida (22%), Alaska (5%, but not updated for Murkowski's renegade run), Ohio(7%), Missouri (7%), Kentucky (9%).

I'll go conservative--but against the conventional wisdom--with party holds in all but the three certain or near-certain Republican takeovers. That would make the count Democrats 54, Republicans 44, plus Sanders (who counts as a Dem) and Lieberman (who doesn't, really). The big ones for me then--where I'm going against Silver's current probabilities--are Sestak in Pennsylvania, Reid in Nevada, Bennett in Colorado, and Giannoulias in Illinois. We also need to hold the others we should win (WI, WA, CA, CT, WV, and DE). Silver has approximately equal probabilities for 51-53 Democrats (counting the two independents).

Finally, for those who put their money where their predictions are, there are two Intrade bets I notice: on whether the Republicans will control 50 or more seats, the price is 42 (42%, roughly speaking); if they will control the Senate, it's 22%. The difference is that, with Vice President Biden able to cast the tie-breaking vote, the Republicans actually need 51 Senators to control that house of Congress.

Note: the only real movements in this prediction from my last was giving up on Florida and Crist, backing away on Paul Hodes' chances in New Hampshire, and flipping Delaware from a near-certain Republican pickup to a probable Democratic hold.

Up on the Tightrope

President Obama's announcement of Elizabeth Warren to fill a newly-created advisory position (to himself, and to Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner)on consumer financial products regulation suggests Obama is trying to walk a fine line between doing the right thing for Main Street and annoying Wall Street.

The questions this announcement raises are many: Who will be the nominee for the permanent position as head of the CFPA (Consumer Financial Protection Agency, set up by the recent financial regulatory legislation)? Why isn't it going to be Warren (it's possible she doesn't want it)? Why didn't he just give her a recess appointment? Can she perform as though she were the agency head in the meantime?

I don't know about any of these, though I have been one to call for her nomination, and devil take those who might block her. This seems a bit too cute to me.

The next Main St. vs. Wall St. tightrope walk will be the question of tax policy, and particularly any role Obama might take, now or in the lame-duck session after the election, to try to settle the logjam on any legislation to extend the Bushite tax cuts.

Today on CNBC they were heavily promoting a town hall meeting with the President they will be telecasting exclusively on Monday, and asking their various guests to name one question they would ask him. The best answer I heard was from one of their frequent contributors (I forget her name)1 , which was: What about the capital gains and dividends rate cuts due to expire?

This, to me, is the key question and could be the key to unlock the door. What I've seen from some economists suggests that of the various forms of tax cuts, the capital gains one would be the form that would return the greatest number of new investment in the economy (and thus, new jobs), and that retaining the lower rates on qualifying dividends would do a lot for (some) stocks' values, and that rises in stock values do the most to stimulate spending on the high end (not increases in income; those windfalls go into savings).

Obama should lay down a hard line on restoring tax cuts for high income earners--that he will veto the bill, if necessary--but encourage the "right types" of income through temporary restoration of tax cuts on capital gains and dividends. And, of course, the middle class tax cut, which will go straight into spending and reviving the economy.

Wall Street will be satisfied, if not thrilled. Main Street will be less than outraged. Those insisting on tax cuts for the rich will be high and dry, with no hope of getting them approved. Obama & Co. might even then pick up that couple of Republican/Blue Dog votes which will be required to get the bill through. And wouldn't that be better than just having a talking point for the campaign?


1 She's a funds investor, possibly in tech?, a bit on the wide side, and notably pessimistic about most everything, even her holdings.

San Bruno: Wake Up Again, Already!

The horrific explosion of a gas pipeline last weekend in San Bruno, California (just outside of San Francisco) once again reminds us that we are relying on a system of extracting, refining, and distributing fossil fuels that is collapsing and ripe for replacement.

Like the Deepwater Horizon explosion and spill--the "Death Gusher"--and a subsequent e platform explosion off Louisiana's coast, San Bruno's disaster was a failure caused by a combination of private greed and regulatory slack. Oil and gas pipeline accidents happen with shocking frequency in the U.S., partly due to the age of many of the pipelines, partly due to the difficult corrosive conditions and stress often caused by external conditions (like weather, seismic instability), but mostly due to the fact that utility companies find it convenient to charge their customers for maintenance and then focus on repair rather than prevention.

It's one thing if pipelines cross uninhabited barren lands, as with the classic Alaska one (though the wildlife may not view them so comfortably), but pipelines in densely inhabited areas require increased measures to isolate and protect the surrounding population. I don't know if containment, as with nuclear power facilities, is a feasible solution, but this is an outrage, poses unacceptable risk, and immediate remedies should be sought, even if the cost to these companies is massive. Sell your PG&E shares!

TP Roll Out

Tuesday's primary election results completed a sequence of remarkable results for far-right activists, working within the Republican party, to remove those whose devotion to extremism, in word and deed, was insufficient.

The most significant result was in the tiny state of Delaware, where a turnout of some 50 thousand Republicans resulted in a major result: the moderate Republican, William Castle, whose success in the general election was considered a foregone conclusion, was nosed out by a political novice, Christine O'Donnell, a sweet young thing whose opinions are pretty batty.

Delaware is an interesting state politically, quite different from neighboring Maryland, and a good example of how the federal system gives added power to small privileged populations. Because of certain state laws, many American companies are chartered there, and the state has successfully established itself as an attractive site for operations centers, for banks in particular. The resulting prevailing political philosophy has been socially moderate, but very supportive of strengthened central government and of large companies' needs.

Joe Biden--who held the seat in contention for 36 years--learned long ago to fit himself into these tendencies, and Castle represented them well, too. O'Donnell does not fit, and so her nomination moves the Senate race from one with a 15-point Republican lead to one where Democratic nominee Chris Coons is 10 points or so ahead. There is still a race to be run, albeit a short one, but the net result is that the Tea Party rebellion against has likely turned a sure Republican pickup into a loss.

Thus far, the net effect of TP seems to be advancing what I would call the Whig Project: the effort to make George W. Bush the 21st-century Millard Fillmore--the last President of his party.

Havanutha Cuppa?It may seem strange that this movement which has revitalized the party--albeit from the outside, in what one of their generals, Dick Armey, aptly has called a "hostile takeover"--and led to much stronger turnout for the primary elections, seeming to have brought the party to the verge of regaining control of the House, that the Tea Party would be a contributor to the party's near demise, but that's the hope and that's how I see this playing out.

In the short run, the Republicans get tea-bagger candidates for key Senate contests like Rand Paul in Kentucky, Sharron "Right" Angle in Nevada, and O'Donnell in Delaware. Others, like Kelly Ayotte in New Hampshire, who barely survived a challenge from the right on Tuesday, have been forced far to the right to fend off the TP threat; Ayotte's lead in polls for the general election contest has been sharply reduced. Ken Buck in Colorado has found the birther army's support to be problematic, and he also finds himself in a tough race.

Those two may survive the brush with the thick white stuff, and Tea Party rebel candidates may yet survive in rightist-tending states like Alaska and Utah. However, the general pattern of the primary season would have to make moderate Republicans wonder what they are doing in such a narrow and vindictive tent, and independents--who on the whole may be receptive to the idea of balancing off Democratic political power in this election--will have to swallow hard and close their eyes before selecting some of these flaky right-wingers.

If the Republicans succeed in TP'ing the House just after Halloween, they may find this to be a Pyrrhic victory, just as they did their victory led by Newt Gingrich and the Contract with America in 1994. Rather than castigating the Bushites for having governed as incompetent, statist, civil liberty-denying, tools of the military-industrial complex, they choose to oppose them on the dubious ground of having been too accommodating to the Obama administration. As if! Much as independents' desires might include a reduction in the level of Federal government activity, the post-'94 history suggests they will not reward an attempt to shut things down, either--particularly if the economic weakness continues.

In the longer run, running against a Tea Party national candidate in 2012 would seem to be a dream scenario for President Obama and the Democrats. If the extremist Republican primary takeover model is not discredited by the 2010 general election results, it's possible it could repeat in the national party nomination process. Sarah Palin could easily pull off a caucus coup in Iowa, survive New Hampshire and win South Carolina, then use the momentum to win the nomination. Such a result could cause a politically-disastrous split in the party, and would regardless suggest a massive Democratic win.

It's a gamble, I recognize. First, Democrats could become overconfident in this year's races; second, the country would be damaged by a Congressional takeover by reincarnated John Birchers. Then, if somehow it were possible that Palin & Co. could win--and the Electoral College makes all kinds of undemocratic outcomes possible--we would be looking an unprecedented disaster in the face, even worse than Bushite Misrule.

TPM Post

I apologize to my reader(s) for the relative silence of the past few weeks: I had to bone up on both Spanish and Italian for oral exams (in Italian: "interrogazioni"), but that is now over. I will now attempt a burst of several postings, and at least one on the key primary elections tonight (whether before or after them, I'm not sure at this point).

First, this one I posted on Talking Points Memo's website today in response to the "news" that the Republicans have come up with an historic "compromise" on the tax cuts (among themselves, that is), the compromise being merely to kick everything down the road for two years (or three years, as Lindsay Graham generously proposed).

This is the classic slow-motion train wreck (remember "The Fugitive" remake?)
With the exception of a few renegades, you won't see many Democrats agreeing to this "compromise", and to put the shoe on the other foot for once, they should have enough votes to filibuster such a lousy deal. Remember, extending the lower rates a couple more years for the wealthy will give the special interests the chance to pull this stuff again in 2012 or 2013, when the debt will be much bigger, and the deficits and the unemployment may be no better.

A much better compromise is to allow certain tax cuts--I have in mind the reduced rates on capital gains and dividends--to continue for a couple of years, because the former will lead to some reinvestment in the economy (much more than lower rates on high-income earners would do) and the latter will help the stock market (which will lead to more spending among the wealthy). The tax rates on the wealthy should expire--now!--while the lower rates on the middle class could be extended (kicked down the road) for a few years, rather than making them permanent. That will make the projected cost of the deal much less than other options.

This is also posted on facebook--TPM has this habit of frequently screwing up my log-in ID, and I couldn't even get to the login screen for this today (as chinshihtang), so I had to use my alter ego name. Solve the riddle--earn a piddle!

Campaign Gets Serious

This is Labor Day weekend, the traditional beginning of the general election campaign. Of course, it's been going on for months, but a lot of the focus has been on primaries--which are still not complete. We've been making forecasts for nine months or more.

There are some very bold predictions being made in these unsettled days of great discontent; most of these bold predictions are favoring the Republicans' chances this year. These are people who are surfing what they see as a great wave of reaction to Democratic control of government, something driven by dissatisfaction of independents and readily seen in recent polling trends. Many of these admit there is no great wave of sentiment, coherence, or incisive argument on the Republican side--it's just anti-Democrat and anti-Obama, which, in our two-party system, can easily be enough.

It's Saturday, So I've Come to Bury Sabato, not Praise It

I have to point out something which I see as a surfing prediction from Larry Sabato, the respected political science professor and longtime electoral commentator at U Va. He has decided to take the spotlight, going public with a prediction that the Republicans stand to gain 47 seats in the House (they need to gain 39 to get control). To his credit, he has seat-by-seat ratings of those he does not consider safe; however, the math does not really add up. Of the seats he rates "Leans Dem" or "Likely Dem", most are currently held by Democrats but three are not. Of those rated "Leans Rep" or "Likely Rep", the majority are held by Republicans, but 17 are not. Of the seats rated "Toss-Up", 28 are Democratic-held, one held by Republicans.

If you credit his calls on the individual races--and for the ones I know about, I have no quarrel with his ratings--the Republicans have net +14, with 29 races as toss-ups. Give half of the toss-ups to the Republicans (plus the one currently Republican), and you get +28 for the Republicans--very close to the 25-30 seat gain I've been predicting all along. Even if you give every one of the toss-ups to the Republicans, you get +42--good enough to change control, but still not the +47 he trumpets.

I have to accuse him of a little intellectual dishonesty here: either he doesn't believe his own ratings on the individual races, or he decided to disregard them to get some headlines. He owes us a little better explanation, particularly after he leads his post by bragging about how he advises his students to stick to the facts and not go with feelings.

There are some good aspects to Sabato's post, particularly his contribution to the analysis of gubernatorial races, a key dimension of this year's election with legislative redistricting coming up. Quite rightly, he's highlighting a big Republican gain in statehouses and its major implications. However, as a New Mexican, I have to complain how he highlights all the races he's expecting to cause change of control, but doesn't mention by name our state, for which he is calling for a Republican takeover. I hope he's wrong there; I'm not sure he is, but I at least think we deserve to mentioned.

Finally, his ratings of Senate seats, which people have focused upon, are generally reasonable and consistent with current polls. He's got the Republicans gaining seven seats, but specifically is not discounting the possibility of a gain of 10, which would give them control of the Senate, too. He also points out an interesting fact, that in the six cases of the House flipping control since World War II, the Senate has also flipped each time, even though some of those changes were not anticipated.

I still go the other way: the House will not flip, nor the Senate. My belief in the Democrats' holding such seats as PA, CO, IL, CA, WA, NV, and WI (the first two rated by Sabato as leaning Republican, the others as toss-ups) is more based on Americans' coming to their senses and to the inferiority, or even outright imbecility, of some of the Republican candidates in key contested seats than it is hard poll numbers, but I do have this on my side: not a single general election vote has been cast yet, and polls do not decide any races.

Aid to Pakistan

I have heard lots of pleas for more assistance for the flood victims in Pakistan lately. The UN promised 450 billion (dollars, I think it was) but was having trouble fulfilling that promise with pledges from its "member nations". All the big international charity organizations were using that fact, and the continuing worsening situation, to make topical pleas for more money, too.

What I haven't heard, and I'm somewhat surprised by it, is anything from the US government. If ever there were a strategic case for humanitarian assistance, it would be there. What I've decided is that they decided they don't need to ask or tell anyone--lots and lots of foreign aid money is already appropriated for Pakistan, and some could be diverted from the "hard"--military--assistance which is much more problematic; lots and lots of military transport (air, land, and sea) are already in the neighborhood. The only thing missing is the PR benefit of being seen to come heroically to the rescue. That, I guess, can certainly wait until the crisis ends.

Much more damaging than the recent Wiki-Leaks releases is the fact now emerging that Pakistan's secret service, ISI, torpedoed negotiations for a settlement with the Taliban and arrested key Taliban leaders because they were talking turkey (or some other fowl too closely related) with the US and with representatives of the Afghan government. And not with the ISI, apparently. The Pakistani minders of the Taliban pretended to be surprised when certain raids caught top leaders (even as high as the Taliban #2, who was leading the negotiations for the insurgents), jail them (most of them, temporarily) and release them with a good lecture about to whom they owe their allegiance. These ISI are the folks who will end up spending, or wasting, most of our covert and overt military assistance, no matter who is nominally in charge of the Pakistan government, and of the military.

One non-cynical note: the lists out there of the charities most deeply involved in Pakistan were either the usual ones, or ones that were so unusual they might not be trustworthy. One that clearly has a major, critical role is Doctors Without Borders (Medecins Sans Frontieres); they are always on the scene, always worth a contribution.

Also Known As The Factory System

There is a sports story which has had me seething for months, one too important to be covered in just a few notes. College football has three concurrent and interlocking scandals--the continuing stink of the BCS (also known as the Boring Cheesy Series, the Baloney Championship Shit, and the Bullshit College Scandal), the rules violations popping up at the major colleges like fungus, and the degrading round of conference shopping we just went through.

For me, the sins of college football far exceed those of pro sports. Performance enhancement problems like in cycling, or baseball, where the athletes are much clearer in their motivations--they are highly-trained, focused mercenaries, willing to pursue any means to gain an advantage--are much more forgivable. Pro basketball, pro football--it's much the same, but the rigors of the season itself impose discipline, and the players just need to have a modicum of following the laws in the offseason. College sports, though, should--must--have some relation to education, or the presidents of their schools are doing a great disservice by tolerating them. Instead, the players are generally totally uninvolved in higher education, performing a type of indentured servitude which gives them the right to seek professional employment--if they keep their noses clean, show talent or the potential to develop it, and don't get injured too badly.

Due to colleges' cozy deal with the NFL--they perform an important role comparable to baseball's minor leagues (for which the talent is at least paid something)--the period of servitude is three years in college football. That's two more years, or three times as much, as the one-and-done deal college hoops has with the NBA for those who really have the talent, and who are, like most big-time college football players, just biding their time educationally and running a high economic risk waiting for the call.

Yes, the costs of putting on big-time football programs are high, even if the talent is unpaid (above the table, at least); they need to get return on their investment and use the cash-spinning program to fund their money-losing sports programs. Lots of equipment, scouting costs, and the huge salaries of a top-flight coaching staff (bidding against the NFL here)--these are justifications for colleges to search for better conference deals and destroy the existing ones. State budgets are strapped, so the public universities which make up most of the top football schools are more than ever on their own to be financially self-supporting.

Revising Conference Monickers
None of this excuses the shameless hucksterism of this year's off-season conference auctions. The only good news is that contractual requirements slow the pace of all the switches that were determined, so that this year's conference lineups will still be recognizable. Next year, not so much.

So, in the interest of our readers' being able to interpret standings, we review the principal players in the BCS (Bottomless and Completely Stupid). We start with the conference all envy (in football, at least), the SEC (a/k/a Separated from Education Completely). The SEC's brand of near-pro ball and endless supplies of well-fed Southern beef have led to five straight wins in the (Fictional) National Championship game (or FNC), with another expected this year (so don't bother watching to see how the FNC comes out this year). The only cloud on the horizon is NCAA investigations of rule violations at several SEC schools, which could lead to future suspensions from postseason play and even possible forfeiture of some past crowns (as happened recently with USC). The SEC has a history of teams going in and out (see South Carolina, Georgia Tech, Arkansas), but is quite happy with what they've got now and didn't have any active additions or deletions from their roster this year.

Next, there are a couple of big-time wannabee conferences. They can't beat the SEC, but expansion to twelve or more teams would allow them, under the rules, to plop for a big conference championship payday. Those are the Big 10 and the Pac-10; the former has been living a lie for a few years now, since they added Penn State, and soon will get its required 12th, Nebraska; the latter will get a couple of wannabees from near-Pac states Colorado and Utah. The Pac gave up its coastal status years ago by adding the two Arizona state schools, so these two newbies will not change the marginal aridity much. To their credit, the Pac has been fairly flexible about name changes and will shift easily to becoming the Pac-12. The Big Ten has not; I now officially dub them the Big XII.

That will be to recognize reality, but also trying to avoid creating confusion with the suffering and similarly name-inert Big 12, losers of Colorado and Nebraska. Dropping to X will cost them a big payday, so I expect conference kingpins Texas and Oklahoma to go raiding in the near future to get their numbers back up to the required target. There were two other big losers in this round of Let's Make a Deal: one was the MWC (now known as the Mountain Who Cares?), who lost Utah and gained total-hopeless-sellout-imitation-college-with-blue-Astroturf Boise St., which jumped in the mistaken notion that the MWC will be destined to get a BCS automatic berth (Breaking News: BYU, the "Notre Dame of the West", is also departing the MWC: they will go it alone in football and accept a downgrade to the WCC in other sports. Good riddance, I say.) The other loser conference (somebody has to supply the wannabees) is the "Totally Wack" (a/k/a WAC, formerly known as the Western Athletic Conference), which has been through this too many times in the past. No doubt they can find a few more Division I-A colleges looking to move up, in order to fill some slots from their depleted ranks.

The conferences that are really getting away with things in football are the ACC (Also-ran Coast Competition) and the Big (in basketball) East. They both get guaranteed berths in the Big Creampuff Showdown, though their football fortunes have slipped dramatically, along with those of usual conference front-runners Florida State and Miami (respectively, not respectfully). The two leagues have a good cash cow strategy, where the allure of possibly winning the conference and losing a prestige bowl game, along with their admittedly awesome basketball programs (the Big East's roster in basketball is about twice as long as that of football, including some colleges with minor or nonexistent football programs, lone wolf Notre Dame, and conference splitter Louisville), together constitute a winning formula. And, if the football team suffers, cut costs further.

Yes, I am jealous that the football considerations are jerking around the basketball programs. And, no, I don't hate college football, as long as one is talking about non-BCS variety. The football programs where the big money isn't at stake feature football that's more fun, more experimental, and show much more respect for the concept of the student-athlete. On the other hand, the BCS musical chairs game is college presidents' attempt to Polish a Turd: they refuse to look at the real issue, the perennial FNC qualification disaster. They should dump this whole phony, pandering system for a small single-elimination tournament of eight or twelve teams. Instead they cite hypocritically the impact on their "education" of extending the season with multiple games, while trying to barter bigger TV deals and sneak in conference championship windfalls.

Finally, another bit of good news from a different sport: the NCAA basketball tournament, one of the real jewels of amateur sports remaining in the US (men's and women's), dodged a bullet with the calls for massive watering-down of its standards and will implement only a modest expansion in the near future. All I ask is that they just get rid of the NIT, and move the Eastern regional permanently to Madison Square Garden, the week after the Big East Classic.