Wow, first prediction of a GOP takeover in the fall.

One factual error, though.  Unemployment was well over 10% from Sept. 1982 thru Dec. 1982.  It didn't drop below 10% until July 1983.  In the current recession we had 3 consecutive months over 10%, and dropped under in February 2010. 

What the heck is he talking about? Charlie Cook has NO credibility on the policy front. From now on I'll just consider him another Republican pollster. In other words, he is to be totally and thoroughly ignored. And on the polling front, it doesn't help that he was royally OFF, way way off, in his predictions of elections in 2006 and 2008.

http://www.centerforpolitics.org/crystalball/

Another reputed expert who was more accurate than Charlie Cook in the last two elections, begs to disagree.

This is probably the final straw for Mr. Cook's credibility.  As a pollster, his credibility has already been thoroughly damaged by simply being so incorrect; he further destroys that little credibility he has left by wading into policy matters and displaying his true colors.  Ultimately, we are left with a not very good pollster who leans right.  Maybe he can get a job with Rasmussen!

I would take Cook's description of the administration's miscalculation a step farther. Not only did he take his eye off the economic ball but Obama like Bush has consistently supported the rich, powerful and well connected against the suffering and frightened middle class.  From defending outsized Wall Street bonuses and ignoring (re) regulation of the financial industry to protecting the insurance and pharmaceutical companies during the health care debates, this tone-deaf administration has consistently positioned itself on the wrong side of the economic challenges facing our country.  FDR didn't quickly fix the economy or win every legislative battle but no one doubted that he was on the side of the ordinary American.  As Cook correctly notes it is probably too late to fix the economy before the election but there is probably still time to get on the right side of the economic issue by sincerely supporting the people against the plutocrats with both words and decisive action.  That would be change that voters could (again) rally around.

 If you want to believe that the problem is Charlie Cook and not Barack Obama, Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi, Barney Frank, Chuck Schumer, Steny Hoyer et al, please go ahead.  The more entrenched your denial the less likely you are to push your side into useful corrective measures.  Ergo, the more we win come November.  Can't wait! 

By the way, the most accurate polling in each of the lat three election cycles was Scott Rasmussen and his numbers are even worse for the Democrats than Cook's numbers.  

You guys are just sore because you know deep down inside that he is right. There is a palpable anger out there in the country right now that I have not seen in my lifetime. It's a "throw the bums out" mentality. And since the Democrats are in power, and they enacted their ridiculous policies, they're the ones who are gonna be thrown out in spades. There is no use in denying that the mid-term elections are going to be a bloodbath for the Dems. The sooner you acknowledge that, the sooner you can brace yourselves for the inevitable.

By the way, the Stimulus was too big, not too small. You can't spend your way out of this mess, that is a fallacy that the liberals have been perpetuating for decades. Also, the people abused their representatives because they were being ignored. We send them to Congress to represent us, not themselves. They deserved every knock they took.

Rasmussen is the only pollster I really trust. He's been on the money more times than not. Again, you guys are killing the messenger when you don't like what you hear. That's not rational thinking.

Its quite possible that the Democrats will lose the House. Its even possible they will lose the Senate.  At best, its going to be 30+ seats in the House, and 6+ seats in the Senate.

The old Democrat leaders in the House, have rather dramtically over reached, and Obama stood by and let them (probably because thats what he really wanted anyway).

Cook's diagnosis and prognosis is closer to reality than many.

Rasmussen was the only major poll to perfectly predict the Presidential election results, so it doesn't seem like they need any help.  Charlie Cook is one of the smartest people analyzing politics right now.

 Ethan, Egan--

Have another drink of cool-aide, boys!

No, Charlie Cook does have credibility.  Back in 2006 and 2008 he was correctly predicting doom for the Republicans.  He may be wrong but he is not a Republican hack.  Also, by the way, Rasmussen has been much more correct in polling elections than the bogus Daily Kos polls.

Charlie Cook's analysis is clearly weak and superficial.  Bottomline is that the Republicans clearly made a decision to fight Obama on EVERYTHING.  Republican plan:  Obstruction will lead to lack of progress on a host of important issues and that will make Obama and the Dems seem like do-nothings and the people will vote them out.  Working like a charm because the Dems lack backbone.  Whining about partisanship while the other side is smacking you on the side of the head over and over again is a sure losing strategy.  Dems need to push back hard via reconcilliation.  Get a progressive health care bill passed and that will re-energize the base and give the Independents evidence that the Dems can get things done.  Plus, keep pointing out that the bank bailout happened under Bush, but now we are making sure the money is being paid back.  AND get that paid back money into programs to create jobs.  In the end, aggressive, progressive populism is the answer.  Are the Dems and Obama smart enough and strong enough to make the fight?  We will see.

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 You guys are obviously in deep denial. Cook is just saying what every other non-partisan observer is seeing. Can't believe how clueless the left has become--and, until recently, I was one of them.

Another pollster idiot who blabbers vague platitudes without any meaningful SPECIFIC examples of what to do and who (assuming his premiise is correct - which I doubt).

Any moron who would vote for a Republican presidential candidate in 2012 (we created or worsened all the problems in 2000-2008 but if you vote for us and give us another chance in 2012 we will show you how we can fix them!) (Yeah right!). deserves another 4 years of Bush and Cheney II.  I don't and half of America sure don't, but the other half surely does since they were too stupid to learn anything from the previous 8 years.  But they never will since what their party-mates do is irrelevant as long as a GOSH! Democrat or Independent doesn;t get elected.

Here's an idea....

How about refusing to vote for ANY Republican incumbent since all they have done is say NO to any program or ideas or potential solutions pit forward?  I didn't tolerate that when my child was 3 and throwing a temper tantrum, yet a lot of voters seem to think that is appropriate behavior.  DUH!

Yes Virginia, Sara (Flailin') Palin is the face of America - little or no acquaintance with the truth, habitual lying, lack of accountability, invent their own facts, etc., and Mr. Cook has has finger on their pulse.

As much as I dislike his vagueness mixed with obvious bias, he is closer to the truth than I would like to admit, since most voters are far too ignorant and stupid and lazy to actually THINK about what is happening and why and have an INFORMED opinion rather than one based on ignorance and bias.

UGH!

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Okay, full disclosure time.  

I am a lifelong Democrat who has voted for, at various times, Walter Mondale, Jesse Jackson, Paul Simon, Tom Harkin, Michael Dukakis, Bill Clinton, Al Gore, John Edwards (my bad), John Kerry, Hillary Clinton, and Barack Obama.  I have voted Republican exactly once in my life - for a local judge who was in fact more liberal than the Democrat running against him. I believe in my party.

However, I think Charlie Cook is on to something here.  Dems may not lose the House as he suggests but they are going to come very, very close to losing it.  Unfortunately for the President, he has turned over too much control to the House leadership (Nancy Pelosi, I'm looking at you) on issues such as health care reform.  This is not presidential leadership, it is passivism at its worst.

Democrats in softer areas, the South, for example, are genuinely concerned about a rout in November.  We Dems need to get our heads out of the sand and recognize that the majority of the country is NOT San Francisco, Cambridge, or Chicago.  As a party, we need to pursue the politics of the possible, not pie in the sky.

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Shoot the messenger, huh guys?  Go ahead a delude yourselves.  Plenty of GOPers did the same in 2006 to their own peril.

Obama's approval rating is currently around 50 percent.  He received 53 percent of the vote in 2008.  So he's lost about 3 percent of the public on the whole.  Cook's answers here read as though he thinks Obama has Dick Cheney's approval numbers.   

Given that in just one short year, the Republicans have apparently rebounded enough in Cook's mind to make up that 70 seat deficit and take back the House, then why can't the Dems rebound in 9 months to hold it?  We should throw out all political prognostication unless it's one month before election day because apparently the winds shift this dramatically in short periods of time now.

It would be hard to find much above - other than his point about unemployment and possibly the comments about the weak stimulus package - that isn't complete nonsense.

P.S.  Health care is exactly the opposite of the Iraq War.  It will become MORE popular, the more time goes by.

I never understand the beef with Rasmussen.  Link below goes to a Fordham prof's analysis of 2008 pollster accuracy.  Rasmussen is #1.  Where's your argument?  My mind is open, and I am happy to listen, but please present some evidence, preferably without resorting to ad hominem. 

Killing the messenger is useless.  Certainly, it's early in the election cycle, but it's not much of a stretch right now to suggest the GOP will take the House; the claim is not outrageous, your wishes, Egan and Ethan, notwithstanding. 

http://www.fordham.edu/images/academics/graduate_schools/gsas/elections_and_campaign_/poll%20accuracy%20in%20the%202008%20presidential%20election.pdf

Ethan and Egan...are you guys living in Obama's reality?  What did you not agree with?

I mean it doesn't take a rocket scientist to see the Dems have MAJOR problems.  They have lost several major races recently (NJ, VA, MA) where Obama HEAVILY campaigned for them and in NJ and MA those are states that are not friendly at all to the Republican brand.

Dems are jumping off the sinking ship rather than run for re-election.  They see the writing on the wall. 

Unemployment numbers will not help this administration all year.  The Fed, CBO and even this administration says the numbers will stay around 10% this year and possibly higher next year.  And, remember the President said if the stimulus was passed last year unemployment would not go over 8%.  Now, they are saying that if we didn't pass it unemployment would be 11%.  It is a joke.  As one pundit said, more Americans believe Elvis is alive and Obama's stimulus plan worked.  Classic!

Big government doesn't work and neither does spending money WE DO NOT HAVE.  Republicans under Bush were guilty of it and they got the boot.  The Dems picked up where country club Republicans left off in 2006 and things are not getting better.  Until we elect honorable men and women who believe in limited government, less spending and less taxes it will just be a vicious cycle.

Michael Barone, hardly a die hard conservative says in his five decades of following politics he has never seen the Dems in worse trouble than they are in now. 

Granted, things can change between now and then but there are NO signs of a turn around anytime soon. 

Obama will go down as a Big Mistake.  He is making Jimmy Carter look like a decent president.

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Charlie Cook is one of the venerable and most accurate political prognosticators in Washington.  Posters here and the candidates they support that dismiss him just because it's bad news for the President are going to have their heads handed to them in November.  Pay attention to your friends who have become disillusioned by Obama's failure to lead.  They aren't going to vote Democratic this November.

It would seem to me that both Ethan and Egan have not addressed the substance of what Cook has said, and have attacked him.  That is not sound logic, at all.  What Cook is saying is that the American people feel like Pres. Obama and the Democratic Party have overreached and overread their mandate.  Cook also said that Republicans will win the House in November AFTER talking with Democratic strategists who are worried about just that likelihood.  These are not rants, they are reasoned arguments.  Address the arguments and we can have an intelligent conversation.

Wow - first 2 posts just cannot confront the bad news facing the Democrats.

Shoot the messenger.  Attack Cook and Rasmussen if it makes you feel better. 

Truth is hard - the Democrats are facing a blood bath in November.

I've always thought that Mr. Cook was a Democrat, but an honest one who does good work and analysis.  This analysis gives me some hope that the country is ready to reject the radical left wing agenda that Obama shocked us with once he was sworn into office, and restore balance to our Government.  Some of the vitriolic responses to the analysis also give me additional hope that the Democrats are still so arrogant and contemptuous of the voters that they will just continue on with the massive corrupt spending and debt and further alienate the American people!!!!  The country truly needs a decisive change in Nov if we are to start repairing the damage of the past year!!!!

Cook has one of if not the best reputations for not only monitoring the health and direction of a given party, but also predicting election outcomes. Go ahead and ignore Cook. If dems want to bury their heads in the sand (or other dark places) and keep pushing the government health care thing up the proverbial hill, have at it! You're only guarenteeing your quick and well earned demise. Political incompetence is always punished by the electorate. Wasn't it  the forehead James Carville who uttered the famous words "Its the economy stupid"? 

The loss in MA should have awoken Democrats to the fact that, with respect to spending, debt, healthcare "reform," and other issues, they have lurched too far to the left for the American people.

But instead of heeding that lesson, the Democrats apparently want to press ahead with their leftist agenda.  And Mr. Cook is absolutely right: the political balance of the power in Congress is currently held by Democrats representing normally "red" states or districts.   The Obama-Pelosi agenda has put and is continuing to put these legislators into an untenable position.  

They have survived in office because they could support a mixture of mildly liberal and tepidly conservative policies while staying in the good graces of their constituents.    Obama-Pelosi has made them vote for hard-left policies that cannot be explained away or finessed, and this has branded them in the eyes of their constituents as much too liberal.   This brand will be indelible.  You don't vote to socialize medicine and have the voters forget that, ever.   Obama and Pelosi have insisted they paint a bullseye on their backs.  

Once the Democrats lose their Plains, lower Midwest, and Southern legislators, they are dead in Congress   Especially in the Senate, the Democratic majority  rests on held seats in SD, ND, MT, NE, AR, NV, CO, VA, AK, and NC.    If the Obama-Pelosi left-wing push--successful or not--the reaction in these states over the next 2-3 election cycles will be even more vicious against the Democrats than 2006-2008 was against the GOP.  

The GOP was pounded in 2006-2008 because of perceived (and actual) incompetence with respect to war and budgeting.   But consider the facts:  Barack "Trillion-Dollar Deficits Until 2020" Obama has already displaced Bush as the most profligate spender in US history; Obama's conduct of national security will hardly win any comparisons with Bush when it is realized (as the IAEA announced today) that Iran is indeed working on nuclear weapons;  and, to top it off, Obama-Pelosi want to convert Americans effectively into wards of the state with respect to their healthcare situations.

Add to that the rest of the Obama-Pelosi agenda (cap-and-tax, enviro extremism, tax hikes on all Americans, terrorist coddling, etc) and you get one of the most toxic situations ever faced by a major US political party.   

When Cook says the Dems have committed some of the biggest blunders in modern political history, he ain't kidding.   

And it will be for nothing, too, as any major leftist agenda item "Rahmed" through by Obama-Pelosi will be repealed or simply defunded by the next Congress.    In other words, this is an act of pointless and fruitless political suicide, all to serve the ego of one Barack Obama.

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"  Ultimately, we are left with a not very good pollster who leans right.  Maybe he can get a job with Rasmussen!"

The only problem with that snark is that Rasmussen has shown himself to be awfully accurate.

Charlie Cook has no credibility.  He revealed his true colors as an anti war leftist during the liberation of Iraq with skewed policy analysis of our eventual win in that country.  He should give it up and leave polling up to the guys who know what they are doing like Rasmussen.

 Charlie Cook has always called it straight.  We may not like what he says but that does not mean he is not accurate.  We must understand and accept the problems being faced before we can develop a strategy to counteract the mess we are in as Democrats.

I swear Obama is a Repub plant.

This guy alone, in only one short year, has totally destroyed the Democrat brand for a generaiton.. or two.

And to think... the Dems were predicted to be a "permanant majority for decades," just last year.  

HaHa! You Dems are going to lose both the House and Senate (and then the Presidency) because your policies are so contrary to what the majority of Americans want, and the real funny thing is that you can't stop yourselves because you don't understand just how out-of-touch you are!  Get used to being the minority party again -- losers!

Ethan and Egan apparently don't like the news of whats coming in NOV. And to refer that the author is associated with polling for Rasmussen is entertaining since they (RAS) and Gallop are supposed to be the most non-partisan of the polls. As far as Mr Cooke losing his credibility, that is nonsense. Is all as one needs to do is look at all the polls, both partisan and non-partisan to draw a logical conclusion. Then look at senate and congrressional seats that are in danger, retirements in hotly contested seats, DEM losses in seats they thought they could not lose and do your own math. Not hard. This author, whether LIB or CONSERVE is pretty close to the mark.  Nothing like shooting the messanger!

Cook, for the most part, is right.  The first bill didn't stimulate the economy, and the Democrats continue and continue to try to shove health care and cap and trade down our throats when NO one wants them...at least not even close to the majority.  They want the economy focused on, but Obama has done a number of things, such as his close association with the SEIU and all the government jobs, that hurts the economy.

Odd.  The first two commenters think Cook leans right.  I think he goes beyond leaning and stands firmly on the left.  He seems very concerned that the Republicans are going to trounce the Democrats, as opposed to happy about it.

Ethan and Egan Foote,

Attacking Charlie Cook won't change the circumstances of Democrats in the coming elections.  You need to wake-up and come to terms with the new normal.  If you support Obama and his policies, it might be worth your effort to try to persuade other Americans of the rightness of his policies instead of bitching about Charlie Cook.

Wow, if enough people assert that Cook, who has long been considered left leaning, is a rightwing shill, maybe people will believe it.  Maybe it'll magically change how thoroughly the Democrats are going to be destroyed in November.

Or maybe liberal propaganda has finally run its course and We The People will take control of our government from the foreign party.  Keep at that chicken, maybe you guys can take another swing at health care 30 years from now.

Cook wasn't way off in his predictions for '06 and '08 but he was  behind on what is coming for '10.  Ethan and Egan are going to eat their words along with some other things the night of the first Tuesday in November.  The House of Cards that is the Democratic Party is going to collapse.  Cook is just warning of the obvious.  Dems lose Kennedy's seat in Mass?  No way right?  Dems are cooked meat.

To the previous posters (Ethan and Egan):

Charlie Cook isn't even a pollster. You guys are utterly confused. And accusing him of bias because you don't fancy his analysis is in bad form. Take that partisan vitriol out of here, if you please.

Ms. Poulson,

Very interesting interview but I wonder if passing HCR (through reconciliation, which would mean that things wouldn't be done till the end of the Summer, at least) will affect the Democratic chances in November in any substantial way. I have no idea what would be the best course of action to the DP at this point in time from an electoral perspective.

The possibility that the Republicans may control the House before the unemployment rate starts going down must be terrifying for the Democratic. They should start working now to defuse the possibility of a reasoning that proposes a causation effect gains steam.

LoL, the liberal kooks are out in force.  Nate Silver can continuously lie in his echo chamber to you small-minded, left-wing miscreants but Americans are out in force and we will take back our country from the crony politics of the Democratic party.

Bank on it.

Liberals always accuse honesty by independents as selling out to the right. My reading of what is possibly going to happen in the next several days if Obama, Reid, and Pelosi try to push the health care bill back for a vote, is that Mr. Cook is probably underestimating by a large margin the harm this will cause the Democratic party. I support the notion that more government destroys liberty and freedom. My hope is that liberals and big government advocates keep thinking the people from the Tea Party and economic conservatives are a bunch of nuts. When November 2010 comes around, you will see how off the mark you are about Mr. Cook. Mr. Cook's record of handicapping elections is actually very good, better study up on your fax instead of simply accusing an astute observer of the political scene of being a "right wing agent."

This is the fatal disconnect for Dims.

A guy comes out and gives them truth, and what do the two commenters above do? They attack the messenger. Of Course, because that is what is necessary to continue the world view.

Another example, The head of Climate Research has finally admitted that the Medieval Warming Period was warmer than today AND that there has been no warming since 1995. The reaction of Dims is to double down and push for Cap and Trade Taxes, prevent drilling and to block Atomic Energy.

In a way it is good that Dims go down, screaming and holding onto the Wheel, because that will make anything they say in the future more suspect. They are truly lost for a generation if not longer.

keep on whistling past the graveyard, Ethan and Egan.  When the Dummy's lose 60 seats in November, you can personally call Charlie Cook and apologize.

Rasmussen is consistently the most accurate pollster of all.

But Charlie Cook is obviously wrong; it should be an excellent year for Obammunists.

Just keep pushing ObamaCare and Crap-And-Tax, or perhaps take over a few more industries.

CC is right on the mark here. November, if one can base it on Dem losses over the past few weeks, will be a blood bath.

 There's only so much time to blame the messenger. Next November comes the message in an irrevocable way.

Perhaps it would be better to listen to the warnings now.

Egan and Ethan,

A Republican won the Senate race in Massachussetts.

Cook:" I sort of reject the notion that there is a communications problem with President Obama."

If a Democrat President states repeatedly that his stimulus has created millions of jobs and a poll by CNN and CBS finds that only 6% of the people believe that it has created any significant numbers of jobs, he has a communications problem.  7% think Elvis is alive.  Only 8% believed the statements on the economy he made in the SOTU address.

He's overexposed.

People tune him out because he has no credibility.  Too many obvious lies.

He and his advisors don't get the American people.  Every time he opens his mouth, he alienates more people.  The isn't a Republican alive that could have resurrected the GOP from th ashes left by George Bush and Henry Paulsen in ten years.  Obama did it in one.

If the Republicans want to win in November, they should buy him air time.

Yeah absolutely Ethan and Egan! Give him what for. Anyone who dares dispute the genius of President Barack H Obama is a vile teabagging right wing racist terrorist who must be shunned by intellectuals such as yourself. The American people really, really, really want what Obama's selling -- that is, Himself -- and it's only Fox News and their own stupidity that's getting in the way.

You schmos are gonna SO need therapy come November. Better line up an analyst now and beat the rush. 

Cook is quite correct on this one.  Look at last week's special Legislative elections in NY.  of four districts with Democratic vacancies, , three flipped to Republican.  This health care bill is the big killer.

Ethan & Egan (sounds like a New England featherweight tagteam), you boys are still in denial.  Lefties have a knack for ignoring reality (see Obama, Pelosi, Reid, et al).  The tsunami is coming, kiddies.   

A balanced analysis.  Looking at the comments posted, it is hard to believe that someone who advocated for a larger stimulus in this interview could be accused of having conservative leanings.  Quite an odd, or more likely, willfully blind to the electoral maths, conclusion.

 Pretty insightful comments there, except for the part about districts being lost to the Dems for a generation or more. One of the reasons the Repubs are going to clean up is the refusal of Dems like the the guys who wrote the first two comments to see what's happening. 

 The problem with the "stimulus" program was not its magnitude, but its design.  When most goes to extend unemployment benefits and shore up profligate state and local governments while little goes to employers, no one should be surprised that it has had little impact on employment.  A program to stimulate jobs would need to give permanent benefit to employers, but that would have run counter to the Obama narrative against tax cuts for the wealthy.  Not understanding that to have employment gains one needs prosperous employers is the original sin. 

Cook is not a pollster.  You guys sound like bitter losers.  The Republicans are going to sweep and you're terrified.  Don't blame the messenger. 

Are you nuts, I live close to Charlie Cook and have been at many parties with him and talked to him on many on occasions.  Charlie Cook is a pretty liberal on most issues.  If you think he is biased in favor of Republicans, you are truly delusional. 

Yeah, that's right...Don't like the facts? Attack the messenger. Cook's got no horse in this race, he's just pointing out what's going on. If you can't accept that the races in NJ, VA, and Mass. weren't messages being sent to Obama and Congress....well, that's cool. It just means like minded fools like you will continue to contribute to losing Dem races. Good luck with that!

The 2 comments above are hilarious.  When you talk to Republicans, they say just the opposite: "Oh, Charlie Cook is a Democrat, so no wonder he has only a few House seats going Republican when everyone else can see the huge wave building."

And by the way, Charlie Cook doesnt DO polls, so he can hardlty lose any credibility as a pollster.  He is trying to tell his fellow Democrats something important, though--there's a wave coming that is likely to sweep the Republicans into control of the House and, barely possibly, even control of the Senate.  The more clueless Democrats like the two commentors above ignore Cook's warning, the more likely it is that Republicans actually will win big.  Don't shoot the messenger--take his message seriously.

I am betting that Cook knows of what he speaks. I doubt the two Es do. Lets watch and see.

Looks like the same gentleman posted twice.

Funny- I always thought of Cook as maybe a little left-leaning, but certainly a very honest and interesting guy. But I suppose many don't want to hear about the Democrats' subtantial woes.

Great transcript.  Great sense of humor.  His thinking, although controversial, is clear as day.

Awesome! Keep ignoring the election results, the problems in this country and the insane agenda of this administration that only adds to the anxiety of the American people the mid-term elections will be a slaughter of epic proportions.

I love it when dems want to kill/discredit the messenger.    Just keep thinking that way.   

He's exactly right.  People who have never really been involved in politics before are emerging everywhere.   They WILL vote.   They WILL get their neighbors and garden club and bowling clubs  to vote.   Sneer if you will, but they WILL donate and work for candidates who will stop this trainwreck.

Meanwhile the dems are sliding more and more into disappointment.  Unions are threatening not to work for candidates.   Liberals ar losing their taste for Obama "hope and change."  There's plenty of the latter but little of the former.   

What Obama and libs forgot:  the nation is basically center right.   Not left.  Every poll confirms that.

They voted for Obama because they were angry at Republicans and their spending  (even if the Dem Congress was partially responsible).   So what do the dems do?  They come in and multiply the offense many times over.   Maybe you guys don't remember.   Obama ran on reducing the deficit and tax cuts, bi-partisanship (ha) , not on mutli-trillion dollar new programs and unimaginable new deficits.

The Obama administration has a tin ear.   They are determine to ram down their agenda, no matter what the voters want. or say.   They mistakenly believe people will suddenly fall in love with 2,400-page monstrosity of a health bill that has more ramifications than they've considered. ideas. 

And when the government doesn't listen, it's going down.   Every Democrat outside of  New York and Califonia is in trouble.   Oh wait, Barbara Boxer is in deep, deep trouble too.  When a California Dem is less than 50 percent in California and only four percent behind in the polls, the Democratic party should shudder in fear.

They are just too darn arrogant to see what is in front of their face.

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Mr. Cook is correct in predicting a democratic train wreck. I'm not a political wonk but I've been sensing the public's anger for some time. You might say the election of Barack Obama and the assuming of power by his cabal was "The Perfect Storm" for the democrat party. The House is lost and unlike Mr. Cook I believe the Senate is lost as well. I do agree with him that the shift will be long term. We're looking at a party entering long term minority status. This is what happens when a party becomes dominated by the lefties and looses it's center.

Shhhhh!  Don't try to alert the Obamamaniacs.  Let them live on in their delusions.  Then, come November, BAM!  Right between the eyes!

Charlie Cook is a lifelong Democrat and has worked not only for Democratic elected officials but for various Democratic organizations.  He is a political analyst for NBC, hardly a bastion of conservative thought.  He has been right in his predictions more often than wrong; however, he acknowledges his biggest predictive failure was failing to recognize the size and scope of the Republican takeover of the Congress in 1994.  He also admits he was badly mistaken in announcing the political demise of Sen. John McCain just one year before he became the Republican nominee.  Cook may not be the sharpest knife in the drawer when it comes to political forecasting, but he is certainly no right-winger.

It's worth noting that in May 2006 Charlie Cook said "race-by-race analyses reveal formidable odds against a Democratic takeover of either the House or the Senate." And even as late as September he was putting the odds of a Democratic takeover of the Senate at "probably less than 25. Let's just say 20 percent, something like that." Does this mean he is a bad analyst? No. The point is, much can change between now and November and it's very hard to know for sure what's going to happen this far away from an election.

I think one has to list all the issues that this socialist pacifist Admin. has pushed to see how out of touch the Beltway commentators and the liberal posters are. 1. Care. Rahm said he will ram it through; Reid said in 60 days. The public is so against this but these tyrants do not care. 2. Stimulusporkulas failed to get any PRIVATE sector jobs.3. Today, Biden called for complete nuclear disarmament. What is he smoking? Iran, N.Korea, Pak, India, Islamostate will get them, China,Russia. Yipe. Complete leftist extremists run this WH and Congress. 4. Energy: climate???? No drilling of our huge domestic resources. This is madness. Our military will never run on Green. Never. Neither will we. 5. Border control, national security.  This Admin. seems to be the most inept one since Carter and Carter and Obama may be separated at birth! In my 71 years, I have never seen a more incompetent bunch. And dangerous for our Republic. 

Shoot the messenger. That always works.

E & E sound more like plants to attempt to move the subject....

However, that being said....and notwithstanding the incredible potentials for a return right in November....I am still very, very concerned that we are way to busy feeling euphoria when Obama is underway with counter-measures. Kicking the debt reduction/analysis issue down the road, vis-a-vis the "study", to get him past November is but a first step.

Obama may be completely lacking in actual experience and skills at the national level...but, he has the Chicago killer instinct of doing whatever is necessary to get to a solution he seeks. Thus he is not going to be afraid to plunge back into healthcare/cap and trade/etc. Even in the face of an obvious majority of American voters opposed. He could care less about the DEM majority after he passes a couple of his pet projects. Healthcare control, alone, will give him success at growing big government and moving our country much more toward socialism.

If he loses after that, I do not actually believe he will care. It is our job to get enough DEMs with common sense (yes, there are a few) to join in halting this Obama scheme. After all the incentive for the DEMs is to retain SOME strength until they get through the 4 Obama years!

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The American electorate is coming to the realization that Obama lied to the nation, that he would govern from the center and now that the 43% of the country that calls themselves conservative realize it, the dominos are falling and will continue to fall.  America looked Socialism in the eye and said, "not in my country"!

As a conservative, I respect Cook's expertise, and honesty. 

Though I have never been a Democrat, and am against leftist policies, I do hope that sane Democrats take their party back.  We need  2 parties.  It is not healthy for one party to dominate, but the Dem party has gone so far left, they have moved away from the people. We all have to keep a lid on our nutjobs.

Good article, excellent comments by everybody.  Nobody I know is going to vote Democrat because nobody is happy with the last year.  Certainly we can do better with limited government, less taxes, and more jobs through small business expansion.  Those are three things the Dems haven't been pushing.

The pollsters are all wrong when they say Obama is unpopular. The people who don't like Obama's policies are stupid. Specially the Tea partiers, Walmart shoppers, and Sarah Palin with her big hair and ostentatious heterosexuality. She doesn't even kill her defective baby!

The people who don't believe in global warming are also both stupid and uneducated. Ditto those who still follow their parents' religion. Of course, they are all manipulated by rich special interests. That's why "progressives", blessed with better breeding, owe to the rest of us the duty of telling us what to do, so we can be worthy of sharing the same planet.

Of course, we'll like it better after they pass laws they haven't read, and we don't want. What do we know? Just because we pay for them doesn't mean we should have a say. SOUNDS FAMILIAR!

  Responded on February 19, 2010 11:18 PM   Randall Allen

 Charlie Cook has always called it straight.  We may not like what he says but that does not mean he is not accurate.  We must understand and accept the problems being faced before we can develop a strategy to counteract the mess we are in as Democrats.

I just do not think Obama knows how to do anything, except talk.  There are no major bills passed. Obama passed Stimulus 2. Stimulus 1 was passed by Bush. He promised to transcend partisanship. And Gallup says this is the most partisan Administration in history. He promised to close Gitmo. Not done. He promised no taxes whatsoever for those making under $250k.  Obama's  Simpson-Bowles comittee will certainly recommend taxes for everyone on everything.

All he did was talk.  All he promised, he over promised and under performed.

Obama --breaks promises, smiles for camera, bankrupts country, blames all on Bush, bows to the world. 

Anything incorrect there?

If the Democrats continue pushing healthcare into the summer, it will definitely be too late for them to turn things around in any meaningful way.  The news out today is destructive to Dems in several ways.  First, the announcement that an agreement between Dems is in hand makes it look like the meeting planned with Republicans is just a charade.  It probably is just a charade.  Second, the announcement that the Dems are willing to use reconciliation makes it looks like the Democrats are using crafty legislative tactics and secret deals....definitely not bipartisan.  Third, returning the public option makes the Democrats look even more extreme than they already do.  The stupdity of all this is mind-boggling.  I'm beginning to think Republicans may actually retake the Senate. 

I would take Cook's description of the administration's priority miscalculations a step farther. Not only did he take his eye off the economic ball but Obama like Bush has consistently supported the rich, powerful and well connected against the economically suffering and frightened middle class.  From defending outsized Wall Street bonuses and ignoring re-regulation of the financial industry to protecting the insurance and pharmaceutical companies during the health care debates, this tone-deaf administration has consistently positioned itself on the wrong side of the economic challenges facing our country. 

FDR didn't quickly fix the economy or win every legislative battle but no one doubted that he was on the side of the ordinary American.  As Cook correctly notes it is probably too late to fix the economy before the 2010 elections but there is still time to get on the main-street side of the economic issue by sincerely supporting the middle class against the plutocrats with both words and decisive action.  That would be change that many voters could once again rally around.

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Wow, man you gotta love the Dems who commented here.  For one thing, Charlie Cook is not a pollster, he is a political analyst.   For another thing, there are very few analysts in all of American politics who are as respected as Cook. It would be a shortist and might include Larry Sabato and a couple of others, but Cook is very well respected and he earned that respect through the accuracy of his prognistications.  The only thing that could have made Ethan and Egan's posts more hilariously pathetic would have been a link to a Daily Kos/Research 2000 poll.

Why do political extremists, left AND right, always think that momentarily being ahead in the polls means that they are right, virtuous and blessed by whatever conept of God gives them the warm comfies?  If leading means you are right, how do you explain the fact that the pendulum keeps swinging.

Shifting poll numbers couldn't have anything to do with the fact that, by and large, the American people are short-sighted, self-obsessed, lacking in patience, and easily led around by various biased news outlets (again left AND right) whose goals are controversy rather than enlightenment.

Hey Liberals how's all that Hopey Changey stuff working out for you? Americans are largely rational thinkers they see the world and understand the danger of Government controls. What Obama and the Liberals want is Oppressive Government making decisions and putting limits on what the people can and cannot do. It amazes me that minorities who largely support liberal Democrats can't seem to recognize the chains that big government liberals bind them with. Government Slavery of the people (Marxist Socialism) is antithesis to what American values are all about.

Giver me Libery and Freedom or give me DEATH.....

I think Cook is off as to how many seats the Dems will lose, particularly in the House (his predictions in the Senate and Governor races are probably an accurate snapshot).  Much of the inaccuracy will probably be corrected by Labor Day, but it comes down to relying too much on past results, particularly in the Congressional seats.  In that he relies heavily on the Presidential contests and does not factor in the Gubernatorial or US Senate contests within those districts to get a more accurate reading of the districts disposition. As to the incumbents in question relies too much on their results from the last election rather than an average of the past 4+ election cycles, particularly the "off election year cycles" when less folks come out to vote.  He particularly relies too much on voting percentages differential, rather than a mixture of the percentages differential, the registration gap and the vote differential.  As the year goes, retirements bring the general disposition numbers into play and polling in individual races determine all other changes.  By Labor Day, most of the primary elections and the polling will provide enough information for Cook to re-evaluate his predictions. But as of right now he is under estimatemating the number of seats the Dems will lose.

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 Cook said, ""I mean, in fact, in an even-numbered year there's only been one month of double-digit unemployment in the post-War era. One month. And now we're going to have probably about a year."

This does not seem to be accurate. According to a calculator on davemanuel.com that lists the Bureau of Labor Statistics as his source, unemployment rates in Sept., Oct., Nov,. and Dec. 1982 all topped 10%; in 1983 (not an even-numbered year) every month from January through June topped 10%; July, August and September were above 9%.

Much of the 1970s and 1980s had sustained high unemployment, tho except for the recession years, not topping 10%.

BLS has a calculator http://www.bls.gov/data/ but it doesn't work on my Mac.

Cook's historical memory -- or his data crunching -- seems to be flawed.

 Guys:

Forget Cook--who needs the analysis of the obvious?  Evan Bayh is NOT running for re-election in Indiana.  He isn't running because he will get killed in the election.  He will get killed because he is a democrat.  Moderate? yes.  High approvals in the past?  absolutely!

Evan Bay was a 2-term governor in the state and a 2 -term senator with a storied name in Hoosier politics.  He is NOT running because he would have not only lost but he would have gotten KILLED.

Got it?

Goodbye dems.  

Next, lets drown the republican aristocrats like Collins, Snowe etc

Lets wipe out the 

All these rants about how liberal Obama is and how he has pushed through all this socialist reform.  I wish.  What are you talking about?  Did he pursue Bush/Cheney for war crimes?  No. Is Gitmo closed? No.  Did he end the war in Afghanistan?  No, he increased it with a big troop surge.  Did the unions get Card Check? No.  How about Health Care and the Single Payer option?  No and the people who tried to testify in favor of Single Payer were arrested.  How about Don't Ask, Don't Tell?  Hundreds discharged in his first year and no Executive Order to stop it.  Bush pushed TARP and Obama did little about giant bonuses.  Wall Street Reform?  Bank Reform? Immigration Reform?  No, No and No.  How about big tax cuts?  Yup, we got those even though nobody seems to have noticed. 

So please tell me.  What would have been different with a third term for Bush?

E & E and those of a similar mindset should refresh themselves with the Kubler-Ross 5-stages model (1) Denial, (2) Anger, (3) Bargaining, (4) Depression, and (5) Acceptance to figure out how long it will take them to accept reality for what it is and how divorced it has turned out from "Hope and Change"  If 8.5 months, they are still in denial, they won't get to angry until after the election.  True believers won't want to bargain at all but if President Obama wants to get reelected he'll become best friends with the GOP speaker of the house John Boehner and GOP senate majority leader mitch mcconnell or jon kyl.  E & E and the others will then spend much of 2011 depressed as their once in a generation hope to remake american society comes to naught and will go back to accepting in 2012 that they are a permanent intellectual minority as a tim pawlenty or mitt romney beat barack obama at the only thing he does well--campaigning. 

it doesn't have to end this way for them, but then that would require liberals, leftists and progressives to see the world as it is rather than how they want it to be.  fixing is always easier than remaking which is america remains a conservative people, not in the movement or ideological sense but in terms of being skeptical about the ability of politicians and big government to do things well.  i believe in change as much as they do, but understand that lasting and meaningful change begins with me, and not around me.  and therein lies  the fundamental difference. 

~cmh

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"We're probably going to have a year of ... 10 percent unemployment, which hasn't happened since the Great Depression... in an even-numbered year there's only been one month of double-digit unemployment in the post-War era. And now we're going to have ... a year."

The 3rd quarter unemployment rate alone may presage a blood-bath from sea-to-shining sea.

Obama and the Democratic party are in deep, deep trouble.  In fact, the trouble is so deep that it makes the trainwreck in the Republican camp look pretty good.  Democrats are in complete disarray, trying to figure out what the heck just happened to them.  They went from being the populist party to the bad guys in less than a year and there is no clear way out of the swamp.

The explanation is really simple.  Americans elected Obama because they were disgusted with Bush.  Between the war in Iraq and the banking crisis, we were ready for a change.  Now in fairness, Obama did say quite a bit about what he wanted to do, but MOST of us assumed this was just campaign rhetoric.  The man talked in such soaring hyperbole that none of us believed he'd try to tack that much.  But he did.

Rahm called it the Big Bang.  He said that the financial crisis had created mobility in the infrastructure and that it could be leveraged (exploited) to make big changes.  Realizing that it's tougher to get big bills passed in the later years of a term, they decided to queue up one monster bill after another and just keep running them until they were forced to stop.  By the time America woke up, the whole landscape would be different.  America would love them and the Republican party would be annihilated.

And so they began.  But what they didn' t realize was how fast Americans would catch on.  Nor did they anticipate how much anger there would be for the exploitation.  It was like a giant spring coiling up.  The more the Democrats exploited, the more pressure that mounted for the recoil.  And simply put, that coil is now unloading.

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Cook has always been touted as very experienced. He has seemed to be practical and not too swayed by his personal view. The idea that he is anti-Dem is laughable and uneducated.

It's puzzling that the Democrats would willing put themselves in this position so soon after regaining control of both the White House and Congress until you look at the bigger picture.  Regardless of party professional politicians both attain and retain political power by buying votes.  Unfortunately with structural deficits running in the trillion dollar range for years (if not decades) and the Treasury basically looted dry there's not a lot of money left to pay off current political backers or attract new ones.  Hence you go out and get more.  The interesting part about both health care "reform" bills now stalled in Congress is that they collect the money for 3-4 years before the program actually starts phasing in.  That says to me that the Democrats plan to spend the money buying votes between now and 2012 and worry about paying for ObamaCare later. 

Over 40% of our local Tea Party Chapter are seniors, and I've heard that's not uncommon.

Democrats have done their best to insult, ignore and talk down to the millions of us who don't want our Medicare Advantage plans cut, don't want meds from Canada banned and are terrified over additional cost burdens:   The Republicans are offering better choices and they treat seniors with respect.

Ethan and Egan are typical juvenile leftys who trash anyone who doesn't echo their favorite talking points taken from their favorite narrow-horizon media.  Their comments are just noise.  Do they really get what's going on?  Nobody cares.  

This was an unforced error by Obama. Not a single poll in America said or has ever said HC reform was the top priority. From day one, it was always about jobs.

Articles warned the democrats not to act like they had a mandate.  Obama didn't landslide his victory.  He only won 29 states, 3 fewer than Bush did in 2004.

Obama didn't listen to the polls, the tea parties, the protests, the marches. That's no one’s fault but the democrats.  All those town hall people didn't go home and say "Ok, I'm not mad anymore."  Just because you hang up the phone on someone doesn't mean they're not mad anymore.

In 1946, the democrats got wiped out because Truman and the democrats were pushing national HC when prices were spiking and wages were stagnant.

In 1994, the democrats were pushing universal health care and got wiped out.

In 2010, the democrats are pushing HC reform while the nation is struggling for jobs.

How many times do the democrats need to be taught this lesson?

And they call us stupid?

Cindy Merrill:

That's right, keep the government out of your Medicare!    You tell 'em! 

So, Cindy, if you tea-partiers are so concerned about out of control goverment spending, hate taxes, and will come out with pitchforks if some whippersnapper even looks funny at your government-provided Medicare or your government-provided Social Security, what DO you think we should do cut and what DO you think we should do to get the budget under control?

Interesting that Ethan and Egan were the first two comments and are obviously trying to pre-empt Cook's message.  Wonder which leftist group "astroturfed" here.  Let them rant on like two ostriches hiding their heads at the pay of the democratic party or, more likely, George Soros.  

It's amazing how the bald faced lying Obama regularly practices is never mentioned as a factor in his plummeting popularity.

Just cover your ears and blame Bush.

Mr. Cook, stop saying those mean things.  We are so lucky to have Mr. Obama and what we need is more of him and his fabulous ideas 27/7.  People just aren't listening as they should.  Mr. Obama makes great personal sacrifices for us and we don't respond with gratitude and thanksgiving.  Don't be on the wrong side of history Mr. Cook.  The Republicans will never triumph over the patriotic Democrats and own leader, Mr. Obama.  (Thank you too, Mrs. Obama).

 Charlie Cook's comments are simply a dry analysis of where we are at. Obama had an agenda. The economy's unexpected collapse before his election forced him to focus on the economy first (which he did with the stimulus) and then moved back to his agenda. It gave the impression that the economy was mere distraction from his agenda. For people who are hurting financially no one wants to feel like their problems are mere distraction. Cook is right to say that Obama's pivot from jobs runs parallel to Bush's shift from Afghanistan to Iraq. 

Charlie is speaking of a miscalculation of the Obama administration. He is not speaking about problems in policy. There are still 9 months to adjust. The message is the problem in one sense. Democrats need to relate the things they are doing to the immediate economy (job creation). Also, the Obama administration needs to actually show some understanding of the limits of what government can do. He needs to recognize what Charlie Cook points out is a natural fear that Americans hare feeling towards that which is "big". If they do these things 2010 could bring as much change to the Dem fortunes as 2009. All politicians seem to be prone to counting their eggs before they have hatched. What the tea parties represent is volatility, which is yet to be channeled towards anything constructive. This volatility can just as easily turn on the Republicans as it can be used to help them. What once looked like a repeat of the '94 election can just as equally turn into the creation of another Ross Perot. 

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Mr. Cook certainly has an inkling of what is coming but I am predicting 80+ seat switchover to Conservatives not just R's but Conservatives such as Marco Rubio.  I can guarantee you that Connelly out of Virginia will be losing his brank new spanking seat he just won in the wave of 08 to a Repbulican and there are 4 other seats in VA that are going to flip.  You take those 5 seats in ONE state and multiply that through the south and north such as PA and OH etc. you are looking at a SLAUGHTER! 

This is not at all wishful thinking because the anger is palpable in my state alone.  There is no anger at the 700+ million being cut from schools because WE all know there are too many administrators in the schools that public employees are overpaid with benefits and its killing our State.  So each and every candidate that runs on trimming out the public employees will win.  When the rest of America has to worry about work the 12 % who make up the unions are going to have to worry with us!

I laugh out loud at the posters here who are intent on shooting the messenger. I suppose they think the Dems are actually in great shape.

 If the Democrats actually try to push HCR by reconciliation, I think Cook is wrong: It's going to be even worse than what he says. 

I think the GOP lost their way in the last few years of the Bush administration. Way too much spending above all else. 

But Obama and Co. are absolutely mad to keep pursuing a hard left agenda. I knew a year ago it was going to cause them huge problems. The frustration out here is at an all time high in my adult lifetime. With the economy and recession (not Obama's fault, but his tax/reg proposals aren't helping) and health care, people feel as if they are not being listened to, and it's the Dems in charge. So they are going to PAY majorly in Nov. House to the GOP, and the Senate with be +6-8 for the GOP. 

It's fine with me that the progressives continue to look at the world through their "Tea-Colored" glasses.

This admin and congress stink to high Heaven of corruption.  Mr. Redistribute the Wealth has looted the Treasury (of his tax-cheat Treasury Sec.) to buy car companies, compensate ACORN for their upcoming voter fraud efforts and pay his union buddies for overselling their benefits packages.  Hell Care is just the guise to unionize the nations' health care workers, who will always vote dem if they want to keep their jobs.  2012 can't come soon enough for me.

I didn't vote for Obama and I thought it wasn't a good idea, and it wasn't going to turn out well when it became apparent that theLiberal/Leftist wing of the Democrat Party was going to have control of the Federal government for at least two years and good Lord maybe longer.

But what really got me energized and joining the Tea Party movement was that Obama lied about health care reform.  During the 2008 election on more than one occasion Obama explained how he was going to bend the Health Care cost trend DOWN.  When the Democrats finally put their HC plan in front of the CBO it was determined that it was not going to reduce cost but rather add ONE Trillion $'s more to the national deficit over 10 years. 

Guess what I was one of those people who found their way to D/C in September 2009.  Boy for all the" insanity " of spending that was complained of during the BUSH administration the Democrats decided to double, triple down after an Economic tumble/collapse.  The Democrats have completely lost their minds and are liars as well.  I will do everything in my power in the next 1-3 years to rid ourselves of these liars and maniacs.  Let them wander in the wilderness for a generation and maybe they can come up with a more rational and truthful platform then they presently espouse.  It's those crazy babyboomers and their last Harrah.  But it is all old and have little to offer going forward into the 21st Century.

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Bush's Iraq? You mean one of the current administration's "greatest accomplishments"?

The Republicans use their tactics of denying the President so well now it has become a way to engineer his every move. Good for Republicans but as we are seeing it seems to be responsible for the exodus of Democrats seeking re-election.

Behind the walls of Democrats word has it that without a strong leadership from Obama their political stamina is gone while others are indicating that he was not ready for prime time...out of his league so much he can't finish a regular White House workday now.

Lamest Duck President Already

It's become blatantly clear that just as the Republicans will Not do what the President wants neither will any of the big government law enforcement officials. Now that point made, I am sorry mostly about Eric Holder I thought he had a backbone, he can’t even follow one of President Obama’s directives and that would be to keep the feds away from medical cannabis in States where its legal use has been mandated.

Don't you just love the shoot-the-pollster folks?!

Blame the pollster, insult the voters and then stuff health insurance reform down their throats!

Yeah, that's worked so well so far. 

 E &E is certainly the same 33 year old trolling  loser kept locked in his parents basement in front of a computer spouting a Soros funded line The bot behing E E's post is busily cutting and pasting pieces of far left agitprop on a pay  by the post basis. By posting twice under two names he doubles his paycheck but that still leaves himself plenty of time to prowl porn sites

 If the troll behing the E & E posts check from Media Mattersor one of its fronts  is enough next month perhaps his mommy might let the family's failure out of the basement for a couple of hours. Any  political website on the internet not towing the Soros line even momentarily  has its assigned trolls and when there is a post criticizing the manchild occupying 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue they swarm it.

Bush's popularity was far lower in 2006 than Obama's is in 2010.  Yet for most of 2006, the political prognosticators struggled to find the mere 15 seats that Democrats would need to win in order to take control of the House.  Assuming that the Democrats take LA-02, DE-AL and IL-10, the Republicans would need to win over 40 seats to take control of the House this year; but the prognosticators and pollsters are already predicting, at this early date, that that will indeed happen.  It leads a person to wonder where their biases lie.

 I have known Charlie Cook since 1984.  He is an analyst yes, but he is actually a handicapper.  His opinions are major movers of campaign donations, endorsements and a bona fide reason for seeking office or retiring from office.  If you took his DNA I would bet it has a strong Louisiana Democrat strain in there, but he understands why elections are won or lost.  Charlie never wants you to be impressed what "Charlie Cook says".  At the end of the day he wants you to say, "That makes sense!"  Not many like him; ignore him at your peril if you hold or seek public office.

The liberals can believe whatever they want to believe and the White House and the liberal press can try to spin it anyway they like, but the American people have clearly decided what they think of the failed liberal/Socialist agenda. We will give the them a spanking in November they will never forget.

If I was a liberal Democrat in office today, I'd be checking with contacts for a new job come 2011--they're going to need it.

I think it is hilarious that the first two comments utterly fail to address a single substantive point raised by Cook, but instead attack him personally.

I earnestly hope *all* democrats follow the fine example set by Ethan and Edgar. When someone tells you something that you don't like, simply ignore them and pretend reality is different!

And this is the root cause of the democrats problems - an utter unwillingness to address reality, but instead to act as though the world behaved as they wished it would.

Also, you should know, Rasmussen is perhaps the most accurate polling operation out there. Cook is not as accurate, but is generally quite reliable. Certainly better than Zogby.

...talk about how Democrats can improve their image with voters, particularly those who identify with the Tea Party movement.

Newsflash:  The Dems won't improve their image with conservatives - especially with the Tea party movement.  They and the MSM have waged a nasty and orchestrated battle to marginalize the TP movement by asserting that ANYONE even remotely associated with it was one of the rare ultra right wing "tea-baggers".  They have smugly called them all manner of names and lumped every fringe group (yes, both parties have them) into the mix until their rants overflowed for all conservatives.

What they failed to grasp (until the Scott Brown debacle) is that their strategy and tactics were turning off many conservatives and (read carefully) i n d e p e d e n t s. 

So.  The libs and MSM are blindly arrogant if they think they have some magic spell that will get the growing number of moderates & independents to come to their side.  I can't wait for the next two years.  It's waaaaay past time for the DNC and RNC to stand toe to toe with Americans they have disenfranchised.  Can you say "smackdown"?

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My thermometer said I had a fever last weekend, so I took it outside and shot it.  Damn lying right-wing thermometer! (*cough*)

This is 1994 all over again -- I was a staff member of a Democratic House subcommittee and a few of us saw it coming then.  But most of the extreme left-D's then, as they do now, had their heads up their hubris.  Back then it was the "crime bill" loaded up with pork and social engineering programs.  Some people never learn.  The only interesting game now is what is going to happen to the Senate.

Before starting his newsletter, Cook was a Democratic staffer on the Hill for 12 years.  Cook's polls are done by RT Strategies, headed by Tom Rhiel, a Democratic pollster.  So there's not much reason to think he's got a GOP bias.  How accurate have the Cook/RT polls been?  Well, in poll taken at about this time of 2008 (Feb. 28-Mar. 2) RT had Obama beating McCain by 9 points, 47-38.  Obama eventually won by just 7 points, 53-46.  Cook didn't have RT do any polling after June of that year, so you can't really compare his "final numbers" to other pollsters for accuracy.  But in his last newsletter projection in 2008, he predicted 40 states correctly.  The other 10 he called "toss-ups," and those 10 states split 5 a piece for McCain and Obama.  Seems pretty accurate.    http://donklephant.com/2008/11/01/charlie-cook-talks-electoral-predictions/ 

Cook has been a little bearish on Democrats in the last two elections, for example predicting in his final predictions a 20-35 seat pick up in 2006 (Dems picked up 31) and 4 to 6 in the Senate (Dems picked up 6).  He was also a bit slow to recognize Democratic momentum in 2008.  But this could be interpreted in either of two ways - either he has been unduly bearish on Democrats; or he has been unduly bearish about anti-incumbent/anti-ruling party moods.  So if his current predictions are accurate, the Dems lose their majority in 2010, barring some major change.  If he's too bearish about Dem prospects (or, if you prefer, too bullish about Repub prospects), the Dems still look to lose a lot of seats, though not their majority; but if he's being too bearish about anti-incumbent/ruling party sentiments, then it's "Katy, Bar the Door," and the Democrats are looking at losses of historic propotions.  

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I really hope the democrats keep their heads in the sand, it really bodes well when they want to kill the democrat messenger who brings them the truth. In 1994 no one predicted that the republicans could take the house, there were a few who said they would gain but no where near the scale that they did. This time around just about everyone is looking at the races and saying it is going to be a blood bath. And now with Obama trying to ram through this health care bill, it is almost a certainty that the republicans are going to take over. I say keep going democrats, it is the thing that is going to destroy the democrat party and the progressives for a generation to come. Misreading the public angst about Bush was your first mistake, most voters were mad at him because of the spending and yet if you look at the facts which of course democrats never do, his spending was much like Reagans until you reach TARP. But TARP funds have been paid back with interest the way they were supposed to be so now any debt from TARP is Obama's because he is using it as his personal slush fund and the taxpayers are not amused. So before you start comparing Bush to some big spending democrat, check out the actual numbers, I think you will be surprised, I know I was.

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 I believe Cook is right on with his analysis.  The Democratic trifecta has ignored jobs and the economy to concentrate on selling their healthcare and tax and trade schemes to America.  Unfortunately for them, we know it's snake-oil by the way they're selling it = No one gets to see it until after the vote-including those voting on it.  And while they're partying with Wall Street in the White House every week, taking junkets all over the world with their families on the taxpayer dime and buying banks and car companies or giving GE he gift of a nice new railroad to shlep tourists from Tampa to Disneyland (GE owns Disney and Immelt is on Obama's economic recovery board).  The rest of America gets an Obama comand that CO2 be reclassified into a greenhouse gas so he can tax the crap out of every American by fiat ....  No, it's not going to go well for that corrupt trifecta come November.... 

Obama ran on reforming health care, among other priorities.  It was debated ad nauseum and I voted for him, at least partly, because I saw the chance for real reform.  It was essential to his election and as important an issue to be tackled as anything else Charlie Cook claims is a priority.

History will judge it as much and I feel good about HCR's chances, and long term effects.  To act like reforming our healthcare system isn't an urgent priority is shortsighted and silly.

Whether or not Democrats lose big in the coming cycle, they certainly deserve it.

George W. Bush and Barack Obama are both possessed of the same great fault, and as that fault undid the one, it will almost certainly undo the other. When confronted with an enormous crisis, each chose to focus on sideshows rather than the problem at hand. For George Bush, it was the diversion of resources into Iraq and a long-term occupation of Afghanistan; for Obama it is a diversion of resources toward Climate Change and sweeping health care reform in the face of a fiscal 9-11. In both cases, their undoing is, I think, the result of a messianic impulse leading them to attempt to artificially create a legacy, when a far greater legacy could have been had by simply dealing with the issue at hand. It is as if Abraham Lincoln, faced with a civil war, had responded by trying to annex Canada.

            When all is said and done, Bill Clinton’s legacy will be greater than either of them. He took care of business and played the hand he was dealt, rather than trying to change the rules of the game.

Bitsko, your comment is very interesting. For starters, I agree that Bill Clinton's legacy is sound and may one day be recognized as the greater of both G.W. Bush and Obama. However, remember that Clinton also tried to reform health care and failed. Now, I wouldn't argue that Obama's healthcare plan is a huge win for anyone; but, I will argue that he was able to make a small change to the system. Now, as for healthcare being Obama's Iraq, that's where I think you're a bit imprecise . Those two issues don't jive. They're not both about policy. If anything, healthcare is bush's failed education policy.

Peace, Love , and Health Insurance

Wonderful to read!

Yeah, that's right...Don't like the facts? Attack the messenger. Cook's got no horse in this race, he's just pointing out what's going on. If you can't accept that the races in NJ, VA, and Mass. weren't messages being sent to Obama and Congress....well, that's cool. It just means like minded fools like you will continue to contribute to losing Dem races. Good luck with that!
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If a Democrat President states repeatedly that his stimulus has created millions of jobs and a poll by CNN and CBS finds that only 6% of the people believe that it has created any significant numbers of jobs, he has a communications problem. 7% think Elvis is alive. Only 8% believed the statements on the economy he made in the SOTU address.He's overexposed.People tune him out because he has no credibility. Too many obvious lies. Dubai Golf

I think they made some grave miscalculations and as it became more clear that they had screwed up, they just kept doubling down their bet. The Obama Administration has stated that its general agenda is to "revive the economy, provide affordable, accessible health care to all. -Article-O-Pedia

Pretty insightful comments there, except for the part about districts being lost to the Dems for a generation or more. One of the reasons the Repubs are going to clean up is the refusal of Dems like the the guys who wrote the first two comments to see what's happening.

Just wanted to say I love the blog. Thanks for the article.

George W. Bush and Barack Obama are both possessed of the same great fault, and as that fault undid the one, it will almost certainly undo the other. When confronted with an enormous crisis, each chose to focus on sideshows rather than the problem at hand. For George Bush, it was the diversion of resources into Iraq and a long-term occupation of Afghanistan; for Obama it is a diversion of resources toward Climate Change and sweeping health care reform in the face of a fiscal 9-11. In both cases, their undoing is, I think, the result of a messianic impulse leading them to attempt to artificially create a legacy, when a far greater legacy could have been had by simply dealing with the issue at hand. It is as if Abraham Lincoln, faced with a civil war, had responded by trying to annex Canada.

yep the battle he'll never win. Can't get blood from a rock, where will the money come from? True protein discount code