Here, however, are the four marquee races to watch:

• Nevada Senate: Harry Reid, in the thankless role of Senate Majority Leader (think Tom Daschle), has been polling terribly at home all year, and everyone seems to agree that he’ll go down in November. But the emergence of a true Tea Party candidate, Sharron Angle, as poll leader on the GOP side has Democrats hopeful — Reid polls best against her. In a fun twist, Sue Lowden, the early GOP favorite and fundraising leader, lost her significant lead after she made some bizarre comments about solving health care costs by bartering with chickens. If Angle wins, Reid may survive.
• California Gubernatorial: Two strong female candidates in California have run, so far, two terrible campaigns. Yet they will live on to fight in November! Meg Whitman, former eBay CEO and Mitt Romney advisor, suffers from her old boss’s inability to take a firm position on any issue, but she’ll still probably get the GOP nod for Governor. Despite spending a fortune of her own money, Whitman trails Democratic former Governor Jerry Brown in the general election polls. Why anyone would want to be Governor of California at this point defies logic, but it should be a feisty (and expensive) campaign.
• California Senate: On the Senate side, the conventional wisdom holds that, in this anti-incumbent climate, Barbara Boxer is finally vulnerable. Maybe, but if the laughably incompetent Carly Fiorina wins the Republican nomination, as she should, I wouldn’t count on it. Fiorina has already released the most memorable ad of this campaign season, and continues to show her thin grasp of the issues by calling climate change “the weather.” I wouldn’t expect much from a fired Hewlett Packard CEO and economic advisor to the McCain campaign (how’d that work out for you?), but Fiorina’s bumbling campaign continues to surprise and delight. She’s within striking distance of Boxer, but if the primary campaign is any indication of how she’ll manage her messaging in the general, I wouldn’t bother dreaming of “Carlyfornia.”
• Arkansas Senate: Senator Blanche Lincoln’s political future hangs in the balance of today’s primary runoff, and Lt. Governor Bill Halter has all the momentum. Lincoln had Bill Clinton campaigning for her at the finish line, but it doesn’t matter: the GOP nominee, Rep. John Boozman, looks to trounce either Halter or Lincoln in the fall.

Stay tuned, sports fans.

1. Buh-bye, Arlen. You won’t be missed. (But this should be a fascinating general election campaign.)
2. It’s great that Bill Halter has forced a run-off in Arkansas, but D.C. Morrison’s votes should break for Blanche Lincoln, since he ran to her right. But really, who cares? Whoever wins the nod is going to get trounced by John Boozman.
3. Rand Paul’s win may be a great victory for the Team Party over the Republican establishment, but it could well turn out to have been a Pyrrhic one, as Paul seems too extreme and angry to win a general election in even deep-red Kentucky. Notice also that both Democratic candidates received more votes than Paul, and nearly 50% more Democrats voted than Republicans, in a year in which conservatives should naturally be the far more energized wing.
4. Mark Critz’s 10-point margin of victory in the PA-12 special election is astonishing, but it’s important to remember that this is one special election in a single Congressional district. Don’t let’s make too much of it. That said, I think Daniel Larison has by far the best analysis.

Okay, one last thing: the most heartening piece I’ve read all day is Larry Kudlow’s characteristically cocky take on the midterm elections, because that asshole is always wrong.

I know you’re just as excited as I am. Here’s a brief rundown of the four marquee races:

• Pennsylvania Senate: Nowhere can the right-left divide be seen more vividly than in the Keystone State. On the right, former Congressman and Club for Growth president Pat Toomey has the Republican nomination locked up. “Club for Growth” is, naturally, the euphemistic name for a group of anti-tax zealots. What’s more, Toomey managed to achieve a remarkable 97% rating from the American Conservative Union during his congressional career. He is very conservative. On the left, however, liberal Democratic Congressman Joe Sestak has a slight edge over five-term Senator Arlen Specter, the political chameleon who only switched to the Democratic Party last year when it became apparent Toomey would likely defeat him in a Republican primary matchup. Talk about lose-lose. In general election polling, Toomey has a 6-point lead over Sestak and 9 points over Specter. It’s not an insurmountable lead, but Republicans are viewing this as a prime pick-up opportunity.
• Arkansas Senate: Again, the GOP nomination is almost certainly decided, with Congressman John Boozman holding a commanding lead over all others. Both Arkansas Senate primaries force a runoff if no candidate wins a majority of the votes, but Boozman’s 46% in the polls seems soft in such a large field. On the Democratic side, the drama of a runoff could well unfold. Popular liberal Lt. Governor Bill Halter entered the race during the health care debate, as Senator Blanche Lincoln’s support cratered, and while she’s maintained a nearly 10-point lead, it remains to be seen if she can top 50%. It’s all a bit of theater, however, as structural and demographic conditions strongly suggest conservative Arkansas will elect (can you believe this?) only its second GOP Senator since Reconstruction come November.
• Kentucky Senate: The power of the Tea Party will be on full display in the race for retiring Senator Jim Bunning’s seat. Rand Paul, son of Dr. Congressman Ron, will likely breeze to victory over establishment Republican pick Trey Grayson, the Secretary of State. Paul will probably then go on to defeat whichever Democrat wins the dead-heat primary race, Attorney General Jack Conway or Lt. Governor Daniel Mongiardo, although general election polling shows either race closer than he’d probably like. This should be an interesting contest, as it turns out Kentucky voters are actually insane.
• PA-12 Special Election: The race to replace the late Congressman Jack Murtha is going down to the wire, with former Murtha aide Mark Critz and Republican Tim Burns in a statistical tie. Structural factors are against any Democrat, and President Obama’s favorables are under 50% in the district, so Burns has a good chance to win. But Murtha was outrageously popular in the district, so it’s possible Critz could win by virtue of their long-time association.

All in all, today should be a good day for Republicans, and especially for the Tea Party, as Rand Paul would be its first actual member to win a high-profile race. (Scott Brown had the support of the Tea Party, although he has never been a member.) Of course, a terrible economy, several divisive policy debates and a general anti-incumbent political atmosphere ought to give the GOP a natural advantage against Democrats in power this year. But it doesn’t help progressive hopes when laughably amateurish mistakes turn what ought to be a cakewalk (Linda McMahon!) into a real race.

Stay tuned. This should be interesting.

Evan Bayh announced his retirement from the Senate today. Good riddance. Even though, per Nate Silver, Bayh is a relatively valuable vote when he bothers to vote with his party (rather than undermine it), he’s actually the worst kind of entitled “centrist” whose principles change with the political winds; the worst kind of legacy politician whose celebrity gave him near-perfect electoral security while accomplishing absolutely nothing; and — wouldn’t you know it? — the worst kind of turncoat, who waits until the day before the filing deadline to announce his retirement. Screwing over the Democratic Party: the only legacy Bayh can be proud of.

Josh Marshall sums up Bayh’s oh-so-high degree of integrity nicely:

[L]et’s not paper over the fact that he says our national government is broken. And his decision is to walk away.

The political fallout from Scott Brown’s insurgent win has me thinking about the nature of our democracy. The way the republic is set up, if a large enough group of legislators—say, hypothetically, the Senate Republican caucus—simply chooses not to negotiate in good faith with the other side, offering only ideological proposals that have no basis in reality—say, hypothetically, deficit reduction and no cuts to Medicare—they can completely obstruct the agenda of even a huge majority like that the Democrats currently have (and will continue to have, don’t let’s forget, even in the wake of the Brown-out).

There is a certain brash creativity to this.

The Republicans stated, quite loudly, as soon as President Obama announced his intention to pursue health care reform in early 2009, that they would kill it. Straight up said it. A moderate few pretended to negotiate, but according to Harry Reid “it was a waste of time dealing with [Republican Senator Olympia Snowe] because she had no intention of ever working anything out.” The GOP can claim to have offered alternative legislation, but look at Jim DeMint’s proposals and try to tell me with a straight face that they would solve any problems. You can’t.

The Republicans’ capacity to obstruct has much to do with Senate rules and procedures. Use of the filibuster has jumped to historical highs in the past few years. There are many people, myself included, who believe that America might be better off if the Senate were simply abolished. If wishes were horses…

The broader point is that American democracy is imperfect, and always will be. A small minority can, with audacity and consistency, stop the government in its tracks. That old dinosaur The Village Voice captured it best today with their headline: “Scott Brown Wins Mass. Race, Giving GOP 41-59 Majority in the Senate.”

All eyes now turn to Obama. His reaction will determine how the Democrats will govern with only a 19-seat majority in the Senate. I leave you, for a dash of hope, with Jonathan Chait:

Here is what I think will happen. The shock and panic will play itself out over a few days. Then the Democrats will assess the situation and realize that letting health care die represents their worst possible option. And then they will make a deal to pass the Senate bill through the House. I am not positive this will happen, but it’s my bet, because elected officials at the national level, dim though they can be, are usually shrewd enough to recognize their political self-interest.

In the meantime, the display of hysteria is actually disgusting.

In my last post, I bemoaned the likely election of Republican Scott Brown in the Massachusetts special Senate election today as the death knell to passage of health care reform, since the obstructionism of Senate Republicans has made it impossible, pretty much since Obama’s inauguration, to pass anything without a supermajority.

That was probably a little hasty, and a little misleading. Here’s why:

1. Even if Brown wins tonight, that doesn’t mean health care is immediately dead. It would take at least 10 days, probably 15, to certify the election, possibly giving the Democrats time to push a bill through with interim Senator Paul Kirk’s vote. Of course, nobody prefers that HCR pass on a technicality or the outcome of a lawsuit over MA special elections law, but for those of us who think HCR is more important than politics, this outcome would be better than nothing.
2. It might not even matter what happens in the Senate. Nancy Pelosi is going around telling reporters that “we will have health care—one way or another” and Steny Hoyer was quoted saying the Senate bill “clearly is better than nothing.” These remarks seem to indicate that House Democratic leaders are willing to push the Senate version through, despite the abortion language that has Bart Stupak (ugh) and friends saying they’ll vote it down. Whether Pelosi has the votes remains to be seen.
3. Martha Coakley could still win. Nate Silver gives her a 25% chance of winning, and emphasizes an important fact about this:

People are acting, however, as though 25 percent is the same as zero percent. And—as disappointing as it might be to be in this position—obviously it is not. This is not some basketball game where the score suddenly became Brown 75, Coakley 25; a 25 percent chance of winning means, quite literally, 25 percent.

So let’s lay it out there: Brown is heavily favored to win, although it’s far from certain; the outcomes of special elections are notoriously difficult to predict. If Brown does win, passage of health care reform becomes significantly more difficult, although not impossible. No matter what happens, Lost returns with new episodes on February 2nd.

And one more thing: the outcome of one special election in Massachusetts is not a “referendum” on the President and his “liberal agenda.” That’s idiotic, and if you think it’s true you watch far too much Fox News and know far too little about MA politics. The tenor of this election reflects dissatisfaction with the corruption and hackishness of the good-old-boy Democratic party in Massachusetts—concealed for so many decades behind the enormous historical stature of Ted Kennedy—coupled with a populist Tea Party-style uprising over the economy and channeled into a contest between a charismatic unknown and a career pol who can’t campaign to save her life.

But you should still vote for Coakley.

• Over at the Daily Dish, Andrew Sullivan compiles diverse election reactions from around the web, here and here. He also has some final thoughts on the pain in Maine after last night’s disappointing result. It wasn’t all bad news for the gays, though. “Everything-but-marriage” domestic partnerships survived a referendum in Washington state, and Chapel Hill—yes, the one in North Carolina, really!—elected a gay mayor.

• Alex Pareene has characteristically sensible and witty takes on yesterday’s elections, Maine, and Michael Bloomberg at Gawker.

• At the New Republic, Jonathan Chait dissects the national spin and Michael Crowley articulates what ought to become the conventional wisdom on Mayor Mike: “I’m glad Bloomberg got some comeuppance, but I’m also glad he won.”

• Brian Beutler makes a meaningful point about the elections and health insurance reform: a bill will now be easier to pass in the House.

• Reactions at NRO’s The Corner are predictably smug and self-serving. Jonah Goldberg thinks yesterday was a “very, very bad day for Democrats.” We’ll see. Mark Steyn tries to downplay Hoffman’s loss in NY-23. (Would shoulda coulda!) Never mind, of course, that the Dems actually picked up a seat in the House overall. And finally, slimy Maggie Gallagher is “so happy” about the conservative victory in Maine. (Too bad it didn’t go her way in Washington!)

In actual news, today is the 30th anniversary of the start of the Tehran hostage crisis, and protests there continue for various reasons.

Tomorrow is election day here in America, although with 2009 being an odd-numbered year there are only a few important races. Here’s a primer of the races likely to make headlines: the Virginia and New Jersey gubernatorial elections, a special election in New York’s 23rd Congressional district that’s drawn lots of press, and gay rights ballot initiatives in Maine and Washington state.

Oh yeah, and there’s a mayoral election right here in New York City. I wonder who will win?

Historically, the VA and NJ governorships, always a year behind the Presidential cycle, tend to switch parties after a new President is elected, to the party that isn’t in power in the White House. The trend could continue this year.

With Governor Tim Kaine not running eligible for reelection (he’s the new Chairman of the DNC, and Virginia is the only state not to allow governors to serve consecutive terms), the Virginia gubernatorial race was wide open all year. Democrat Creigh Deeds, despite having seemingly all the advantages in this race—an ascendant party in the state, a popular Democratic president in the White House, a popular governor whose act to follow—has run a terrible campaign and is behind Republican Bob McDonnell in the polls 54-41. Deeds has gotten flack for not embracing President Obama enthusiastically enough, and he’s running well behind Obama’s numbers from last year, even in rural Virginia. This race looks pretty much locked up—increasingly blue Virginia should have a Republican governor come January.





The New Jersey Gubernatorial election is far closer, and far more interesting. New Jersey has a budget crisis as bad as any state, making it a ripe environment for an unseating. NJ Governor Jon Corzine, a former Goldman Sachs executive and U.S. Senator, increasingly unpopular in his home state, is in a surprisingly tight race with Republican Chris Christie, a former U.S. Attorney. After leading in the polls all year, by as much as nearly 20 points over the summer, Christie is now in a dead heat with Corzine in Pollster.com’s poll of polls.  There’s a third party spoiler in former Republican Chris Daggett, currently polling around 11%, and some Republicans have begun to call for Daggett’s withdrawal from the race. President Obama campaigned for Corzine today, a sign that the Democrats see this race as winnable. (One wonders what effect all the entertaining controversy surrounding Christie’s weight will have on the result.) Who will win tomorrow in the Garden State? Nobody knows. This will be one to watch.





A special election for Congress in NY-23 is perhaps the juiciest story of this election season. Republican John McHugh resigned the seat earlier this year to become the Secretary of the Army. The GOP officially nominated assemblywoman Dede Scozzafava in July, but she quickly drew criticism from the conservative wing of her party for being too liberal. (Scozzafava, it turns out, is to the right of most of her caucus in the New York legislature, a fact of little relevance to the tea partiers.)  Prominent conservative leaders from Sarah Palin to Tim Pawlenty endorsed Doug Hoffman, the Conservative Party nominee, leading to Scozzafava’s withdrawal from the race on Saturday. Yesterday she endorsed Bill Owens, the Democratic nominee. (See Frank Rich’s column from yesterday’s Times for a taste of the situation’s absurdity.) It’s anyone’s guess to which candidate her supporters turn now, but the interesting story here has already been written: the continuing triumph of the far right “Tea Party” wing of the GOP over the traditional Republican establishment. And so the Republican Party digs its own grave.

Even gay rights, opposition to which propelled President Bush to reelection in 2004, don’t seem likely to heal any wounds on the Right this year. Maine’s marriage equality law is up for a people’s veto (Maine Issue 1). This is no Prop 8, however—the bill was passed by both houses of the Maine legislature and signed into law by Governor John Baldacci, marking the first time in American history that gay marriage has been enacted by a governor’s signature. “No on Issue 1″ has held a steady lead in the polls, despite the efforts of Maggie Gallagher and her sad “National Organization for Marriage,” and it looks like same-sex marriage will survive tomorrow’s vote.

In Washington State, a domestic partnership law (“everything-but-marriage”) is up for referendum. Unlike Prop 8 in California or Maine’s Issue 1, a vote for R-71 is a vote for the expansion of domestic partnership rights and benefits. The referendum should pass, according to the latest Washington Poll [PDF].

So what does the big political picture look like on Wednesday morning? A mixed bag, I’d say. Conservatives will note, loudly and regardless of the outcomes in NJ and NY-23, that the results represent a tarnishing of the Democratic brand. (Indeed, some are already saying just that!) Liberals will almost certainly be able to find hope in the results of the two gay rights ballot initiatives.

But what’s most important to remember is that this is an off-year, and we’re talking about high-profile elections in just two states and one Congressional district. These few races, despite what everyone will tell you, do not represent any significant measurement of the political pulse.