Just when the GOP is starting to catch some small breaks in the Senate, the situation in the House is rapidly deteriorating. As many had predicted, a growing number of Republican representatives do not find the prospect of life in the minority appealing and are calling it quits. Unfortunately for Republicans, a large majority of them represent competitive districts. The latest retirement were particularly shocking because they were completely unexpected -- especially Rep. Ferguson's in NJ-07. Democrats have golden opportunities to pick-up all of these seats, especially if the environment continues to favor them. But this also means Republicans will be forced to play defense and will not be able to contest that many Democratic-held seats, no matter how vulnerable they might be.

The full ratings is available here, at Campaign Diaries.

The full rankings are available on Campaign Diaries.

Plenty of action in House races since our first ratings came out in mid-September. This is recruitment and retirement season in the House, and Ohio has been the center of it all, with three Republicans retiring, two of them in very competitive districts (OH-15 and OH-16). Democrats have had better news on the recruitment front as well (look at AK-AL, FL-24, IL-11 and MN-06), but Republicans reply that they are very satisfied with their newest candidates in NM-01 and OH-07...

Promoted because Sunday evenings are too quiet around here. Texas Nate
As Rep Nick Lampson continues recovering from his heart surgery, he's making plans for his political future that seem likely to leave a lot of his supporters in the district very unhappy.

The Battle for TX-22 was a hard fought one in 2006. Replacing a wounded Delay (who left the race after the primary in vain hope of allowing the RPT to name a successor) took the combined efforts of a determined candidate, the DCCC and other established Dem powers, and bloggers and other activists sowing blue seeds in a determinedly red district.

John Zogby has a habit of producing polls that, rather than trying to reveal the current state of public opinion, instead are provocative for the media and tell the person who commissioned the poll what they want to hear. His latest poll out of TX-22 is no different: Really? Gibbs is close? Is that what the poll actually says? Um, not exactly: Ah, I see. Write-ins are close. But write-ins are not the same as Gibbs. The poll shows that 79% of write-in voters intend to vote for Gibbs. It also shows that only two-thirds of those voters know how to conduct a write-in. With those two factors taken into account, Lampson is actually doubling up Gibbs 36-19. But hey, Zogby wasn't commissioned to make a boring poll. Remember those Zogby polls showing Chuck Pennachio ready to defeat Bob Casey in the Pennsylvania Senate primary? So do I.

The oddities of this particular race aside, the poll does show long-term problems for Democrats in this district. In a straight trial heat, with Gibbs's name on the ballot, she leads Lampson 53-40. Even if Lampson wins this race due to the odd ballot situation involving DeLay, clearly it will be a difficult seat to hold.

Uber-red districts are fun to attack, but over the long-term we can't count on them. Lampson still looks good to win on November 7th, but those hypothetical general election numbers show that TX-22 will, or at least should, be #1 on the Republican target list in 2008. Our path to a long-term majority is not found in districts like these, even if our path to a majority is at least partially found in not being afraid to challenge Republicans in districts like these. Republicans are expending a lot of resources to try and win a seat where we really shouldn't be this close to winning. That helps us in a lot of swing districts around the nation and, in this case, probably nets us an extra seat for a few years.

I found this on Redstate -- Chris (or someone else knowledgeable about these things), could you please confirm or deny this? Are there polls out there showing Sekula-Gibbs tied with Lampson, or even leading?

http://www.redstate.com/stories/election s/2006/bam_slap_crash_pow

I know, I know, consider the source. But with this election, I am taking nothing for granted.

I noted a couple days ago, the GOP candidate to replace Tom DeLay in Texas, Sheila Sekula-Gibbs, recently held a fundraiser where guests of honor were Dick Cheney and the Bugman himself.  

A couple of weeks ago, I was talking over email with a famous election prognosticator (well, he is at least as famous as election prognosticators can hope to be). He told me that the netroots predicted that the OH-02 special election would be close, and had done so much earlier than had any professional forecasters. I responded that until the last week of the campaign, I didn't think it would be close, but that I was determined to get involved in that race anyway. At the time, I didn't care how conservative or Republican the district was, or how slim Paul Hackett's chances to win the district may or may not have been. As much of a forecaster as I try to be, that campaign had nothing to do with forecasting. After 2004, I wanted to fight everywhere, and in the summer of 2005, there were not many places to pick an electoral fight besides OH-02. I know that a lot of other people online felt the same way, especially after they were introduced to Paul Hackett. In a way, it was almost better that the district was an extreme longshot, because then we would have nothing to lose and everything to gain.

Looking back on that election now, it really was a good idea to get involved, even if most of us thought Hackett would get pasted. A couple of hours ago, Survey USA released the results of a new poll in OH-02, showing incumbent Jean Schmidt only narrowly ahead of Victoria Wulsin, 45-42. Not only is that a statistical dead heat, it is actually one point closer than the final margin in OH-02 last summer. I have to believe that one of the main reasons that OH-02 is honestly close in 2006 is because the netroots threw so much into it in 2005. We helped bring an anti-Bush message into OH-02, and it is sticking. We helped bring new activist excitement into OH-02, and it is sticking. We helped reveal to voters in OH-02 that Jean Schmidt is an empty suit, and that message is sticking. We helped voters grow used to voting against Jean Schmidt, and now she is the first choice of probably only around 25-30% of the voters in the district. Because we helped Paul Hackett and local Dems make a stand in OH-02, we are still competitive in a district where we should just flat out not be competitive.

Perhaps best of all, in a truly fitting bit of irony, one of the reasons we went into OH-02 was so that Republican resources would be stretched thin in the swing districts in 2006. However, as the results in OH-02 revealed last summer, Republican resources have been stretched thin in 2006 because so many seats are competitive. Now, instead of not having enough money for the swing, they actually won't have any money for districts like OH-02 which remain competitive. The NRCC came in with ad buys to help out Schmidt last summer, and partially because of that they won't have anything to help her with this fall. That isn't good for Schmidt, since Victoria Wulsin actually holds a slight cash edge on Schmidt, after Schmidt was forced to blow her wad in a tightly contested primary. Will the NRCC seriously pull money out of districts like PA-07, WA-08, or CT-05 in order to help out candidates in OH-02, WY-AL, or ID-01? Doesn't seem too bloody likely to me.

Making big pushes in longshot districts like OH-02, TX-22, WY-AL, and ID-01 is part of the fifty-state strategy. I love the dividends these longshot challenges are starting to pay. In TX-22 and OH-02, which were assisted by the netroots much earlier than they were assisted by the DCCC, we now have a nearly guaranteed pickup and a shockingly competitive race in districts Bush won by about 30%. Now, we are looking at WY-AL and ID-01, where once again I am convinced we are going to do a lot, lot better than we are supposed to do. The Republican candidates in both districts are pretty pathetic, and not even liked by many of the Republican voters in the area. Even if we don't win, we could help make these seats more competitive in the future. Even if we don't do very well, at the very least it was worth a shot. You never know how many apples will fall from the tree unless you give it a good shake.

There is something else about these longshot challenges that I miss in 2006 now that we are really getting down to brass tacks: the Hackett challenge in the summer of 2005 was really, really fun. I couldn't go to OH-02 because I had a big, movement starting rally in Philly the day after the election, but hot damn the 200 activists at that rally were excited when Patrick Murphy declared he was the "Paul Hackett of Pennsylvania." Everyone knew what it meant, and it really fired people up. Being able to make serious inroads in Republican territory can give us the hope and excitement we need to make inroads in other places. It lets us know that despite our losses, we can still fight Republicans on their turf. It reminds us that there are people ready to vote for our candidates everywhere. It gives us a glimpse of a much more progressive America, and a much more gutsy, feisty Democratic Party. Sometimes, it can even be jus the excitement we need to get us out of ruts during a dull, quiet campaign season.

Let' fight some more of these challenges. Gary Trauner (WY-AL) and Larry Grant (ID-01) are on the netroots page. You can help out Victoria Wulsin here. Don't back down anywhere, and savor the joy of contesting every seat.

Update: It occurrs to me that maybe I was bored thinking about the election in general, but excitied about these races, because there is no way we can beat expectations for the overall national picture. We are supposed to take the House. We are supposed to do well in the Senate. We are supposed to do well among Governors. We are not supposed to do well in these races, though. I guess it coems from being in the blogosphere, where we weren't ever supposed to be meaningful ourselves. If we are supposed to do something, is isn't as much fun, and there is no way we can amaze people anymore.

Nick Lampson currently has three ads available for viewing on his website. None of them use the words "Iraq," "Republican," or "Democrat." I know he's running in a red district, but he doesn't even use key words that let us know which party he belongs to. All are well-made ads, but they all miss the point of the strategy memo, and none of them has turnout messaging at the fore. "Came From" and "Sheriff" are feel-good ads about Lampson being a good guy, and despite the truth in the MyDD stretegy memo, I think there's still a place -- albeit a small one -- for such ads, so I'll give them a pass, but in "Bullhorn" he takes on an actual issue -- the deficit.

The deficit is not an issue devoid of potential for accountability/Iraq messaging. Lampson could say he would stand up to Bush's irresponsible spending, stand up to his give-aways to the rich and the corporations. He could talk about the war's tremendous contribution to the deficit and promise to seek accountability for war-profiteering and government waste. He could promise to put an end to corporate give-aways and no-bid contracts. He didn't do these things. Instead of blaming the deficit on the pork-and-earmarks-obsessed Republican Congress, his ad blames the deficit on the fact that (para) 'Washington isn't getting the message [that the deficit is too high].'