Any thoughts?

The problems in Pennsylvania is we keep ending up with horrible candidates over and over again. It's time for Porter and Lois Murphy to stop running. IN pa 15th one of the county chairs more or less forced the last last candidate here at gun point to run. As to pa 16th as long as Lancaster county is part of that district there is no way for a democrat to win it. As to the 18th Klucko was a bad candidate. The main problem a lot of democrats don't understand is issues don't matter unless people like you. There are plenty of horrible legislatures in pa that stay in office because people like them. Not because they are good at their job.  

wow.  That's a helluva jumping off point.

The only way you'll beat cubin is if you clone he governor of wy

1. MI 7
Republican Tim Walberg
06 Winning Percentage  51%
04 Bush Percentage  54%
Reason for Weakness
Tim Walberg is the most vulnerable Republican member of Congress because running against an opponent in a general election who spent only $ 55,000,.  He got just 51% in a 54% Bush District. His defeat of a Congressman Schwarz who was widely liked  will cause him problems.  If the Democrats can find a centrist in the Schwarz model we should be able to defeat this Freshman.

Nice choice for the #1 spot. And not just because I've been working against this guy for a while.

If you'd like a quick (and incomplete) listing of potential candidates for 2008, I wrote up a post a while ago here.

St. Sen. Mark Schauer and fmr. St. Rep. Doug Spade would probably be the two strongest (besides a party switch for Joe Schwarz). But really, any well-funded challenger could do the job.

Tim Walberg is the face of today's Republican Party-- his campaign was based entirely on "family values" (no gays, no abortions) and tax cuts, and was funded by outside interests (the Club for Growth, Right to Life). Yet, in his own classy way, he kept on staff a man who plead guilty when charged with beating a foster child, and tried to use his influence to get the child put back in that home. Such family values.

Let's see if we can win this in 2008.

Michelle Bachmann (R-MN06-Hell) is essentialy Ann Coulter the congresswoman.  Patty Wetterling must not be the 08 candidate.  John Kline in MN-02 is in a slightly red district, R+3 or somethin, but he's beatable if we have a better candidate than Coleen Rowley.  Ramstad in MN-03 is one of the most moderate republicans in the house, but he faced a loser opponent in Wendy Wilde this year, so he's beatable as well.

My main MN focuses in 08 though will be re-electing Congressman Tim Walz (D-MN01-really awesome) and taking down Coleman (with a candidate who's not Al Franken).

In California...

I'm surprised to see the 42nd C.D. (Gary Miller) not on this list at all.  Not sure who would run, but Van Tamom (who ran for assembly this time) showed a lot of growth as a candidate and could give it a good go!

In Drier's seat we had a similar issue as the comment from Orin76 above, the same bad candidate from 2004 ran again in 2006 and we missed an opportunity to take a good shot at Drier.  I understand that the primary in 2008 will be a rematch of 2006, and I hope the voters of that district wise up and not give a third chance to a terrible candidate.

From what I understand out of the recent California Democratic Party executive board meeting, Charlie Brown IS going to run again.  Doolittle's continued woes and the groundwork laid this year may put him over the top next time around.

I spent a little time working on the race in Palm Springs/the Coachella Valley against Mary Bono.  I don't know if David Roth is going to run again, but he gave her more of a scare than anyone else ever has.  She's still very loved there, but with comments like "This Iraq thing will blow over..." (http://youtube.com/watch?v=8GdK_fm_-nI) she's shown she just isn't up to the task of filling Sonny's old seat.

Just my four cents worth.

Hey Democratic Avenger, thanks for all the Research & Info.
My Diary posted on Kos is compatible with yours.
It has certified Election Stat info on the 35 closest races of 2006:
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2006/12/18 /223328/25

I'm not really whoring, LOL.

This is a great post, a great project and a great service you've taken on.

As I've written before, historically, the key to Presidential realignments is two consecutive wave elections in the House.  This shows in detail how the potential is definitely there.

Avenger should be commended for the excellent work, but he should note the omission of Nebraska's 3rd Congressional District from any of the above lists.  His call whether it belongs in the top 50 or not (incoming R Freshman), but it certainly has a place in the Republican incumbents under 55 or 60%.  It looks as if Avenger accidentally repeated NE-02:Lee Terry under two categories - not surprising since the results were the same in NE-03.  But, note the different name:

NE-03
Republican Adrian Smith
06 Winning Percentage: 55%
04 Bush Percentage: 75% (or thereabout)

This was the Scott Kleeb race that was probably a disappointment to many online but that made everyone proud close enough to the situation to understand what Kleeb was up against (beyond an incredibly weak GOP candidate).

Nice starting point, avenger.

You can take DE-AL off your list. Mike Castle may be a Republican, but he is immensely popular and will not be seriously challenged as long as he holds his seat. There is no Democrat who could give him a run, except the governor and Joe Biden. Somehow I think they prefer not to go to the House. So scratch that one.

I'm a little surprised Jerry Lewis in CA didn't make the list, since he's dogged by serious ethics issues and could be vulnerable to a good opponent and some DCCC money. His win % in '06 is totally due to there being no Dem on the ballot.

Also, you could really use an editor. I'm not throwing rocks, honest. You have great content, but it's hard to read when you have sentences that aren't sentences and misspellings scattered about.

Keep up the good work, man. This can turn into a much anticipated feature around here.

   Why was Michigan our collective blind spot this past cycle?  It's odd.

In California's 4th, I'm pretty sure you can count Charlie Brown IN.  (The question really is, will Doolittle escape indictment for two full years...lots of legal trouble is breathing down his neck.)

I'm so f'ing psyched to see CVastle on the list.  He is soooo beatable and had a stroke this year.  

If the netroots pour it on - I bet he decides to not even run.

THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU!!!  

IL 10 - Shortly after the election, a local report quoted a Kirk staffer indicating that he was considering not running in 2008 for this seat.  He may be mulling a senate bid or other options, but, in any event, it is possible this may be an open seat.  Even if Kirk runs, this district is trending the right(left?) way and with a little more national support (extremely limited this year) this definitely could be a pick-up in 08.  Dan Seals has not ruled out running again and if he does he will have an existing local campaign network to build off of.  Not matter what, it will be competitive given the changing nature of the district, especially if the Dem Presidential nominee has any tails.

Paul Ryan has more money than god, and the district doesn't have a deep Dem bench.  There was a relatively solid grassroots candidate this year who lost the primary to a Dem that had previously been beaten by Ryan multiple times.  I don't see anybody coming up who could do much differently.

It's also a tough district to campaign in, with no dedicated media market (people watch TV from Madison, Milwaukee, and even Rockford, IL).  Our grassroits candidate lost based, I think, on name recognition since he had a hard time making connections to voters quickly.  The district is also a bit of an odd duck geographically, with an ugly mix of rural, suburban, and blighted urban areas.

That's not to say it isn't worth a shot--but it may be the longest shot in your list of 50.

The line in the sand in the 2006 election was 60%.  If Democratic and independent expenditures equaled or exceeded 60% of Republican and independent expenditures, Democrats had a 50/50 chance of winning (won 27, lost 26).  If expenditures were less than 60%, Democratic chances plunged to below 2% (3 wins, 176 losses).

What is exciting here is that although a majority of seats are among those where we "had a chance" some of the top seats were in districts where spending was way out of balance.

MI-7 Dem spending was 4.0% of GOP
PA-15  7.0%
CA-50  Under 50%
NC 8 29.7%
MI-9 14.3%
1L-14 5.9%
PA -18 5.6%
WY 59.3% (due to a late surge of "independenr GOP spending")

In only 10 of the 232 races, did the Democrats and allies top Republican and allied spending, Democrats won 9.  The one candidate unable to win despite a money edge also was running in an open seat.  Yes, it was Patty Wetterling.    I think we neeed a new candidate in this district (she's lost twice).

OTOH, the key to the Nebraska results was money.  Scott Kleeb may be movie star handsome and Maxine Moul either uses the worst photograph in history or she comes nowhere close.  The key to these races was money.  No, we were outspent, but by reaching over 80% of GOP spending, even deep red Nebraska was competitive.

BTW, if you wonder why I picked 60%, the statistics seemed to pick themselves.  The ones we won and the ones that were nailbiters mostly fell within this group.  Surprise showings fell within this group.  Bad results were outside it.

Maybe we need to incorporate this data.  I an e-mail it.  And yes, it was time consuming to compile it but the basic data value is pretty high.  It would be really great to have 10 or 12 cycles worth of data but talk about time consuming!  Oh, yeah, data from the Democrats would also be valuable.  On an anecdotal level, fewer Democrats seemed to blow a million bucks on totally safe races.

FL-13 is still unsettled, and the parties are in court right now.  I won't think about '08 until we've settled all the races from '06.  Right this moment the Republicans are trying to steal a seat in Florida and we can't take our eyes off of that, for the sake of the voters there who are being silenced by this theft.

FL-13 is still unsettled, and the parties are in court right now.  I won't think about '08 until we've settled all the races from '06.  Right this moment the Republicans are trying to steal a seat in Florida and we can't take our eyes off of that, for the sake of the voters there who are being silenced by this theft.

This probably goes without saying, but we should expect a slew of rebublican retirements as well...

If a Democrat could win in rural eastern Kansas, I think that urban, unionized Wichita should be a good pickup opportunity, also.  Todd Tiahrt hasn't faced a top tier challenge.  He replaced Democrat Dan Glickman in 1994.  

With a resurgent Democratic party in Kansas, opportunities like this shouldn't be allowed to pass.  Plus, having a serious challenge in Wichita will draw fire away from Nancy Boyda, who will otherwise top Republican lists of seats to challenge.  

We need to figure out how much of poor incumbent performance was due to the Wave. Right now it's too early to tell if there will be a wave in 08 or not but if there isn't, a lot of these weak Rs in the top 20 will get stronger, I'm thinking Cubin and Wilson and Renzi specifically. The problem is there just might not be enough Dems because you can't assume that the people voting for 3rd party candidates will cross over.

Time will tell.

How about Ned Lamont to run against Chris Shays?

NY-25, NY-26, NY-29

Remember when just about everyone earlier in the year said how good NY would be for the Dems, then in about August just about everyone said the Dems would gain one seat at most?

Dems gained three seats, including the sleeper NY-19. Had these three, especially NY-29, been on the national radar screen, the Dems would have won.

We just have to make sure Reynolds has a real challenger this time. Jack Davis was a terrible candidate, did next to no real campaigning, and so was not able to put away the damaged-goods Reynolds. A good challenger would do it in 2008.

Hopefully Maffei and Massa run again, as a Presidential year will definetely increase turnout, especially if either Obama or New York's junior senator is at the top of the ballot. And maybe this time Eliot Spitzer can get his ass out on the trail and help other candidates.

NY-23 is McHugh's until he retires, though.

I would rank IL-10 as the most like pick-up opportunity.

Other opportunities in Illinois will be based on retirements.

One exception, I actually think Duckworth is a good candidate to run against Roskam, if she wants to do it.

And there needs to be a candidate to soften-up Judy Biggert in IL-13.

We have a small group of Kossacks here in the Tampa Bay area who are attempting to monitor the actions of incoming freshman Gus Bilirakis in FL-9.  We're hoping he makes your top 50 list!

We will alert you to any news and will be eagerly awaiting your updates to this series.  Here's the blog which I created for the purpose of "watching" Gus:

http://www.guswatch.blogspot.com/

BTW, Gus already has an opponent.  Attorney Bill Mitchell filed last week to run against him in '08.

This is my first comment on MyDD and I'm coming out swining, but i don't mean to.

I worked in the campaign to remove FL-18's Ros-Lehtinen as a volunteer coordinator part time. She has an incredible machine, she has great name rec. and due to social stuff (her being cuban, etc) she will NOT be knocked off.

In Florida, specifically in Miami if you want to look to a congressional district we can overturn, look no further than FL-25 (I live in Fl-21). in 25, Michael Calderin ran for the first time for office, and garnered 42% of the vote (Patlak had run before against ileana in 2004). He had a two person (including himself) campaign staff). If he receives more money, that district will be ours. He's a great candidate, he's got amazing intelligence, connects with you one on one and is only 26 years old now. A real winner there.

GET ON IT!

Thanks for putting Ferguson NJ-7 on the top 10 hit list. He is one Troglodyte that needs to be tossed along with the head chimp!

Thank you for acknowledging the 9th! I had a great time working for Nancy Skinner, we put up quite a fight this year. I look forward to doing it again in '08.

"from your lips to ..."

You have identified the 4 seats in Illinois we could turn.  But I quibble about the order.

IL-10 and IL-06 are the most likely, and probably in that order.  This is based on last month's results and the '04 Presidential vote.  

Then much less likely are IL-11 and IL-14, again probably in that order.  Yes, Dems were underfunded in those two, and failed to take them, but they are likely to be underfunded again.  Yes, Hastert is likely to retire, but it is still a Republican district.  They are possible, but very difficult.  A special election in IL-14 would fun (Chicagoans can drive there), but still tough.

Everything changes if Obama runs, even just in the primary.  He is wildly popular in Illinois and would energize the activists and the voters.

If Illinois goes another cycle without turning a seat I will hang my head in shame.

Walsh should be higher than 17.  He took a big beating over his whining about being disappointed in the voters of Syracuse.

The Republican incumbent in IA-04 (central & northern IA) is Tom Latham.

29.  IA 4
Republican
06 Winning Percentage  57%
04  Bush Percentage  51%

IL-19 should be added to the list. Rep. Shimkus will likely not run again. He will not enjoy the next 2 years being a part of the minority. He was supposedly strong armed by Bush to run in 2006. The "word on the street" in Madison County - 21% of District 19's population - is that IL State Representative Jay Hoffman has already been picked to be the Ill Democratic Party's nominee as soon as Shimkus retires. Hoffman is very popular and has an established and experienced volunteer base ... plus he's a lawyer and would be able to raise more than enough cash. The state and county Democratic Party completely ignored 2006 IL-19 candidate Danny Stover. Many voters believe that Stover was not supported because the Illinois Democratic Party was willing to wait for Shimkus to retire when a Hoffman victory would be cheap and easy. It would have been horribly expensive for Hoffman to beat Shimkus. If Stover had beat Shimkus, Hoffman would have had to wait or face a potentially expensive primary battle.

Five seats in New York sounds about right, starting with NY-13 in the City itself and NY-3 right next door. It's doable.

BTW, if there's going to be '08 speculation, this is a lot more valuable and relevant than all the Hillary talk.

I see very few Southern districts on that list. I realize that there are few Southern districts where GOP incumbents polled less than 60%, but part of that is because many incumbents drew only token opposition.

There are winnable districts in the South. AL-03 is a good example. GOP incumbent Mike Rogers got 59.59% against an unknown candidate in a district that is one third black. This district also has the highest concentration of organized labor in the state.

In 2002, the last time a name candidate ran against Rogers, he got only 50% to Democrat Joe Turnham's 48%.

It's time to put some real teeth into the 50-state strategy and the Alabama 3rd would be a good place to start.

NY-23 is McHugh's until he retires, though.

That's what people were saying about Walsh.  It's not true -- we can take him down.

Thank you for saying this:

This was the DCCC's greatest folly, by choosing a non-local candidate. It allowed the Republicans to frame the race in a way favorable to them and ultimately win it.  That said the race was extremely close. A freshman Republican minority member has to beatable.  Finding a local candidate will be essential.

Of course, many here thought it was just a great idea for Rahm and Durbin to insert their candidate in the race at literally the last minute and bankroll her primary effort to the tune of $750,000 by tapping big money donors in NY, CA, and DC. To them it was a good thing that the Beltway Boys took out local grassroots heroine Christine Cegelis. So the DCCC throws in $3 million (that could have gone to other close districts) and we still lose -- for exactly the reason you stated. All the money from Rahm Emanuel helped reinforce the Republicans' message about Duckworth.

Whether Cegelis would have won or not, she wouldn't have taken that amount of resources AND she would have built Democratic infrastructure in DuPage County that would benefit other candidates in this and future cycles. Duckworth's campaign did nothing to encourage coordination with other Democrats and building something for the future. It was all about her and when she lost, it put us back to square 1. Pretty much the exact opposite of Howard Dean's 50 state strategy that succeeded in helping elect people like Jerry McNerney and Carol Shea-Porter -- progressives who had to beat Rahm Emanuel's stooges in their primaries.

I've lived in IL-6 for 22 years.  In my area of Dupage County, I had never seen a single campaign sign for ANY Democrat on ANYONE's lawn.  I know that there has been a lot of criticism of the Rahm Emmanuel for supporting Tammy Duckworth over Christine Cegelis in the primary.  Honestly, if you're not from IL-6, then you don't understand how amazing Duckworth was as a candidate.  For the first time in my life, I saw people put up Duckworth for Congress signs and actually talk about voting Democratic.  If Tammy lost, it was not because of her failure to campaign or offer honest criticism of the current state of the nation.  Rather, it was due to the most vicious Republican attack politics I've ever seen.  Week after week, we got letters in the mail accusing Duckworth of not supporting the troops, of supporting massive tax hikes, and of being weak on national security.  People in my district - one of the wealthiest in the nation! - ultimately chose to follow their wallets and not their common sense.  If Bush continues his disastrous politics in Iraq and the Dems refuse to raise taxes, Tammy will win handsomely in 2008.  Roskam was the only Illinois Republican state rep to vote against benefits for IL veterans and his stands on stem cell research and abortion are too right wing for a district that year by year is turning blue.