See previous: Blue, Navy Blue, I'm as blue as I can be ... --- Adrift in a sea of sorrow

Addendum to Sprint to the Finish
Hatched by Dafydd

In Sprint to the Finish, I found the election picture nowhere near as bleak as does Power Line. But I neglected to add one more interesting twist to this already fascinating series of contests.

Keep your eyes on California and Florida!

• We have a governor's race here between incumbent Republican Arnold Schwarzenegger and Democratic challenger Phil Angelides; in Florida, the race is between Republican Charlie Crist and Democrat Jim Davis;

• At first, both looked as if they would be close races; but now, Angelides and Davis are far behind and it looks like a foregone conclusion that Arnold will be handily reelected in Cah-lee-for-nee-ah and Crist breeze to the governor's mansion in Florida;

• ...

California and Florida... maybe it's something in the oranges?

I don't believe there were any California Republican seats on the endangered list; and California is one of the most heavily gerrymandered states in the country. But there may still be marginal Democratic seats that could surprisingly switch to the GOP. Even one or two such could spell the difference between holding the House and losing it to the Democrats.

Alas, I can find no comprehensive list of polling in California's 53 congressional districts.

In Florida, lower Democratic turnout may help retain the Foley seat (Florida 16, contested by Joe Negron), a possible Democratic pickup where the Democrat (Tim Mahoney) has a small lead, and ensure that Katherine Harris' seat (Florida 13, contested by Vern Buchanan) doesn't go to Democrat Christine Jennings (who leads slightly), staying with the GOP.

But let's turn also to what many call the "gold standard" of election projections...

Went to bed a little down last night, feeling a little defeated. Slept in, which I think my body needed. Woke up and reviewed something I wrote a while back: ... the means to resist.

II. I will never surrender of my own free will. If in command I will never surrender my men while they still have the means to resist.

Dafydd understands, vet or no:

Bride of Sprint to the Finish
Hatched by Dafydd

The previous two posts on the upcoming election are here:

• Sprint to the Finish

• Addendum to Sprint to the Finish

Big Lizards has been bucking the tide of Republican defeatism, predicting that the GOP will limit their losses to 12 in the House and 4 in the Senate, retaining both houses. And today, we got some support... from a couple of fellows named Bush and Rove:

Amid widespread panic in the Republican establishment about the coming midterm elections, there are two people whose confidence about GOP prospects strikes even their closest allies as almost inexplicably upbeat: President Bush and his top political adviser, Karl Rove.

Some Republicans on Capitol Hill are bracing for losses of 25 House seats or more. But party operatives say Rove is predicting that, at worst, Republicans will lose only 8 to 10 seats -- shy of the 15-seat threshold that would cede control to Democrats for the first time since the 1994 elections and probably hobble the balance of Bush's second term. ...

I'm sticking with my prediction of a loss of 12 seats in the House for now; but then, I don't have access to anywhere near the level of information that Rove has: internal polling, intimate knowledge of the upcoming GOTV (get out the vote) effort, and the full accounting of the money raised by both parties. But I reserve the right to keep fiddling with my predictions every day, if I feel like it, until the day of the vote itself -- November 7th.

So take heart, and ignore the doomcryers: we optimists may be wrong, but by God and my right arm, we'll go down fighting like hell. We won't lie down and die just to avoid making a scene.

Get your rumps out of your chairs and go vote. Vote early, vote often! Make the Democrats struggle for every bloody district they win from us... give them no freebies. ...

We may lose some seats Nov 7; probably will. We might even lose control of the House and/or Senate. Does that mean it's time to just give up now? No just "No!", but "Hell, no!"

TO ARMS! TO ARMS!

***

The Lizardarian Manifesto
Hatched by Dafydd

In the face of electoral adversity, I will be courageous, steadfast, loyal, honest, graceful, and optimistic. To wit:

I will not be a craven.

Regardless of media threats, I will not be cowed or silenced; I will not be shamed or frightened. I will not be pushed, filed, stamped, indexed, briefed, debriefed, or numbered. I will not be made to feel guilty for being a partisan Republican. If they don't like it, they can jolly well get stuffed.

I will not be a doomhawker.

Despite adverse polls, I will not cringe. I will push forward, conceding nothing, yielding no land, handing no freebies to the Democrats. I will not roll over. I will not concede defeat before the votes are even cast, let alone counted. I will contest every contest until the last possible moment. While I may allocate scarce resources where they will do the most good, I will never start a sentence with "after we lose, we'll have to...."

Elections are like sunrises: you always know when they'll come, but you never know what they'll look like until they arrive.

[...]

I will never argue that "the best way to win is by losing."

When we lose an election, that means we lost, you dolt. Nobody ever wins by losing; that's the loser's way of gloating over his own ineptitude, as if it were a plus instead of a big minus.

Finally, I will never use setback as my excuse for despair.

The first rule of Life 101 is that nobody always wins: even Douglas MacArthur was defeated and driven out of the Philippines. Even Ronald Reagan didn't get everything he wanted... his pick for Secretary of Education never managed to make himself unemployed, and we still have that department today.

Adversity is a given in this vale of tears. Take it like a man, even if you're a woman. Suck it up, fix your problems, and charge into the next election with courage, grace, and optimism.

We may lose a contest, but the Democrats can never defeat us; only we can do that to ourselves. ...

***

Why the sea of blue? Part Two
Paul Mirengoff

Glenn Reynolds provides the top six reasons why he thinks Republicans deserve to lose: (1) the Terri Schiavo affair, (2) the Harriet Miers nomination, (3) Dubai ports, (4) immigration, (5) Speaker Hastert's response to the raid of Rep. Jefferson's office, and (6) Foleygate. I think this list is less an explanation of why Republicans deserve to (or may well) lose, and more a demonstration of why it's so difficult for a party to remain in power for a long time.

Any lengthy stay in power will produce scandals that aren't handled well, botched nominations (though Bush fixed the Miers botch), issues that divide the base, issues that produce strong conflicts between the base and swing voters, and issues where the strong beliefs of the the president are out-of-step with key segments of public opinion. Indeed, if Glenn's list and matters like it were the problem, I'd like Republican chances much better. Though Glenn is hardly the only independent-minded voter concerned about the items on his list, I suspect that the party's biggest problems with swing voters have to do with Iraq and maybe Hurricane Katrina. If the party has a serious problem with its base (and I'm not sure it does), I doubt it's because of Terri Schiavo. The party would be in more trouble with the base had it not behaved as it did during those sad days. ...