This is the second of three posts analyzing Michael Barone's cover story "Open-Field Politics" in the current issue of The National Journal. In the article Barone, lead author of the Almanac of American Politics, is working hard to rewrite history, diminish the importance of the 2006 midterm results, and resurrect the Republican Party.

It is important to note that Barone, a conservative political scientist, has undue influence on shaping the worldview of the 'Inside the Beltway" crowd. He claims to be the first pundit/political commentator to describe America as a 49% nation - a country evenly divided between two partisan factions. Through his writings in US News & World Report and The National Journal (not to mention his appearances on Fox News) he presents his conservative "spin" on election results, typically hyping Republican advances and diminishing Democratic gains. Often, these ideas become the conventional wisdom of the DC political class.

Why is this important?

This week's National Journal cover story, "Open-Field Politics" is written by Michael Barone, long-time author of The Almanac of American Politics. It is a lengthy article that merits considerable discussion and analysis among politically active Americans. He makes some broad observations about recent election results, the current presidential campaign, and the new political playing field that may have emerged from the 2006 midterm results.

Barone is a member of the DC punditocracy and in recent years his analysis has become increasingly biased toward conservative partisan views. He is a semi-regular Fox News talking head and he posts over at Townhall.com. This fact makes it all the more important to review his article, as it reveals how the conservative "thinkers" are hard at work framing the current political climate.

Originally posted at dKos

The Green Papers has a huge table of election info here.

Here's some info from that table:

The Dems won the House Popular vote 52/46.

And Under the Fold, I'll go over the club of candidates who didn't spend $100K but still got over 40% of the vote.

As well, a few big spenders, third party all-stars, and hapless Republicans will be noted.

And i'll produce a short targets list too.

As some of you may know, I did youth outreach for Philly Against Santorum in the last election, much of which was done at the concerts of Philly's premiere all-ages concert promoter: Sean Agnew's R5 Productions. Sean could not have been more supportive of the work that we did, and he not only let us in to shows to talk with kids and persuade them to vote, and vote liberal/progressive/Democratic, but he actively helped push kids our, and the polls, way by sending out e-mails on our behalf and by lending us a bit of his amazingly large cachet of cultural credibility.

And now, Sean and R5 need our help. Tomorrow is R5's HUGE annual Punk Rock Flea Market, where you can buy all sorts of goodies for the young, and young at heart, on your Christmas list. Don't let the name fool you, it's not all punk rock merch being sold- I bought my wife an amazing (and unbelievably cheap) handmade necklace and earring set, and there are items for people of every age and interest. Please consider coming out tomorrow to help R5 continue to throw amazing shows and enable groups like PAS to reach out to youth from all around Eastern PA!  Details are below the fold:

As I noted in my first post-mortem piece, my plan for getting "the kids" to the polls centered around work at concerts and on campus. In my second in a series of post-mortem pieces I'll look specifically at the concerts we worked, including an introduction to Sean Agnew and R5 Productions, who made this work possible, and helped ensure it was a success.

Sean Agnew & R5 Productions

As you know by now, much of my outreach centered around working at concerts thrown by Philly's #1 independent promotions company- Sean Agnew's R5 Productions. Now, for those who don't know, or at least know of, Sean, he is, to use the scientific term, "The Man".  Sean has single-handedly kept the Philadelphia independent music scene fresh and available to kids of all ages, while going up against the two horrendous monopolies that dominate American concerts and events: Clear Channel (whose concert division has recently been "spun off" into Live Nation) & Ticketmaster. If you want an idea about what Sean does, and who he has to go up against, check out this Harper's Magazine cover story that looks at Sean and his much larger competitors, or just head to the First Unitarian Church (22nd and Chestnut), the Starlight Ballroom (9th & Spring Garden), or Johnny Brenda's (Girard & Fairmount) and check out one of the extremely well attended and almost always entertaining shows that R5 throws! He also recently had a stalker blog dedicated to spotting him, which I'm just assuming means that he is hot shit, and he shares Ed Rendell's love for politics and the Eagles (though I don't think he share's Ed's love affair with fast/junk food or yelling at little league umpires- which is my earliest memory of the Gov). And while Sean is definitely not the type of guy who most people would think of as political, and definitely not someone who politicians might look to for help and or advice, he is very passionate about politics and is exactly the type of cultural community leader whom democrats should be looking to work with. Here's Sean's current myspace picture:

Sean & Ed Agree! The Eagles should be 8-1!!!

Say hello to the new House map:

Click to enlarge.  Apologies to Alaska, Hawaii, and Georgia, which doesn't show the new district boundaries.

This map shows how much support Republicans received in each district.  Because you can't see the urban, overwhelmingly Democratic districts at this scale, it skews towards Republicans.  It shows how Republicans did in rural/exurban/suburban districts: not that great.  The map also makes it easy to see where the battle for control of the House was waged (mostly), in a belt from New Hampshire through New York and Pennsylvania to Ohio, Indiana, and Kentucky, and westward to Iowa, the Plains, and the Mountain West.

Below, more ways to look at the amazing victory last week.  The map above might look a bit too red for comfort, but wait till you see the map from 2004.... Cross posted at DailyKos.

A couple of months back I mentioned that I had proposed and accepted a job doing political outreach and organizing with Philly Against Santorum (PAS). Since then I have been completely overwhelmed with the work at hand and a big move back to Philly (I lived in Brooklyn for the past 8 years with my wife), so I wasn't able to write as much as I would have liked to (and lord knows I love to self-promote!). But now that things have come to an end (and what a sweet, sweet ending it was!) I wanted to tell you a bit about the program I ran through PAS, and give you some of my thoughts and experiences from this election cycle. Since I am still working to get my life back to a sense of normality, I still don't have a ton of time, so I am going to keep this post short, and expand on it over the next few days.