RSS Feed MenuPolitical scientists Joseph Bafumi, Robert S. Erikson and Christopher Wlezien predict a 50-seat loss for Democrats in November. They write:
How many House seats will the Republicans gain in 2010? . . . Our methodology replicates that for our ultimately successful forecast of the 2006 midterm. Two weeks before Election Day in 2006, we posted a prediction that the Democrats would gain 32 seats and recapture the House majority. The Democrats gained 30 seats in 2006. Our current forecast for 2010 shows that the Republicans are likely to regain the House majority. . . . the most likely scenario is a Republican majority in the neighborhood of 229 seats versus 206 for the Democrats for a 50-seat loss for the Democrats.
How do they do it? First, they predict the national two-party vote using the generic polls (asking voters which party they plan to vote for in the November congressional elections). Then they apply the national vote swing on a district-by-district level to predict the outcome in each district. They account for uncertainty in their predictions (I assume by using a model similar to what Gary King and I did in 1994), which induces a probabilistic forecast of the number of districts won by each party.
Regular readers will know that this is not news. Way back in September, 2009 – over eleven months ago — we used an earlier version of the Bafumi/Erikson/Wlezien model to predict a Republican House takeover in 2010. As I wrote several months ago, it feels good for once to be ahead of the story.
sinz54 // Aug 28, 2010 at 10:07 am
It doesn’t even matter if the GOP fails to take over the House–as long as they win at least 30 seats in the House and 3 or 4 more in the Senate.
ObamaCare passed by only 15 votes in the House.
If the GOP had 30 more seats, ObamaCare would never have passed.
Current betting on Intrade.com is as follows:
GOP gains 30 or more seats: 86%
GOP gains 40 or more seats: 75%
GOP wins control of the House: 77%
BTW, FiveThirtyEight.com is predicting a GOP gain of 6 or 7 seats in the Senate too. Not enough to take control, but enough to put an end to Obama’s liberal agenda.
That “liberal realignment” that all the liberals had been hoping for, lasted exactly two years!
And we conservatives stopped it cold. We had few cards to play–but we played a weak hand very well, and put an end to any more talk of “liberal realignment.”
We did good.
dugfromthearth // Aug 28, 2010 at 12:36 pm
sinz54 – I assume you mean the ability of Obama to pass very liberal legislation. Because Obamacare is not going to be repealed. The changes made will stick. Closing the barn door after the horse has escaped may feel satisfying but don’t confuse it for stopping the horse.
Oldskool // Aug 28, 2010 at 1:30 pm
we conservatives stopped it cold. We had few cards to play–but we played a weak hand very well
If you go back a couple of months you’ll see that no less than Mr Frum predicted a victory in Nov is a short term gain at the expense of long term goals.
Once your guys start handing out subpoenas and gumming up the works next year, you’ll have hell to pay in 2012.
Maxwell // Aug 28, 2010 at 2:33 pm
Why does everyone insist that the next election is The Most Important Election Ever? As if it will determine, once-and-for-all, the metaphysical truth of one party or another’s platform? This year it’s the conservative’s opportunity to strut, but don’t forget how many of them just shrugged their shoulders about 2008. Of course, they said, the country’s in an economic down-turn, we are fighting two wars, etc. etc. For conservative commentators it was an unfortunate but understandable consequence of current circumstance. Now that they stand to gain seats, the upcoming election represents some sort of populist confirmation of their worldview. Nonsense.
Liberals are no better, of course. I remember after Obama’s ‘revolutionary’ victory seeing talking heads ask, with straight faces, ‘Is the Republican Party Dead?” Really this is just filler commentary; treating mid-term elections like horse races and insisting “This is exciting and important!” It’s neither. Ask yourself whether an election result would change your mind – if you would rethink your position if it turned out the majority of voters disagreed with you. Then tell me why I’m supposed to give a shit either way.
easton // Aug 28, 2010 at 4:45 pm
What liberal agenda is there left? Seriously, cap and trade is useless except for National Security reasons (to stop funding Al Qaeda via Saudi oil sheiks), because as far as the environment goes, China and India are ramping up their own greenhouse gas output. And immigration reform won’t happen either so things will continue as they have, which benefits both Democrats and business.
And Sinz doesn’t understand basic politics, all the Democrats who voted no were given a pass. Of course it would have passed, no Democrat would have voted no without the clear permission of the party, if they had they would have been out, and would have had to become Republicans (and the one that did lost)
armstp // Aug 28, 2010 at 6:02 pm
Generic polls are not good at predicting the house vote. Nate Silver has done a lot of work on this forecast and thinks it is a bit lame. It is also too early to call this. House races this season have been fairly notorious to predict.
llbroo49 // Aug 28, 2010 at 6:59 pm
I am convinced that many political scientist merely make up theories to sell to politicans and pundits. The surprise for this upcoming mid term would be if democrats held or gained seats. This happens every mid term. This is the equivalent of hearing that gas prices go up in the summer and that it is cold in the winter time.
Obama knew this would happen, the democrats knew this would happen, and the republicans knew this would happen. That’s why Obama pressed so hard to push through legislation that was important to him. As a matter of fact I would not be surprised if Obama didn’t intentionally leave some work undone. Immigration reform is troublesome for both parties, Cap and Trade is probably unworkable in this economic enviornment, and for shits and giggles let the republicans scream about gays in the military.
As usual it is hard for the incumbent party to generate much in the way of excitement from its base in an off year election. This means many young people and minorities that were excited in 2008 won’t get excited again until 2012.
ktward // Aug 28, 2010 at 11:36 pm
The fine print in Bafumi et al’s model should not be glossed over (emphasis mine):
This prediction comes with important caveats … we should be wary of the possibility that the underlying model of the national vote works differently in 2010 or is influenced by variables we have not taken into account. Because the 2010 campaign started to heat up earlier than usual, the usual tilt toward the out party may already be complete, with no further drift to the Republicans. It is also uncertain how voters will react to the tea-party movement as the public face of the Republican Party.
The key will be to follow the generic polls from now to November. If the polls stay close, the Democrats have a decent chance to hold the House. But if the polls follow the past pattern of moving toward the “out” party and move further toward the Republicans — even by a little — the Republicans should be heavily favored.
IMO, analytics rule and I pay attention to the quants; TMC & 538 remain my go-to spots.
But the Tea Party effect on 2010 elections simply cannot be predicted– it’s a novel factor with the potential to impact November’s outcomes. (We’ve already seen unexpected results in many GOP primaries.)
So I guess we shall see.
exguru // Aug 29, 2010 at 12:56 am
Let’s not count on black voters returning in record numbers to re-elect Obama in 2012. It has now been proven Americans will elect a black president. Did anybody care about Catholic nominees after we elected the first Catholic president in 1960? No. And not so many will care about electing a black president again, either.
Dick Morris is looking for a GOP gain of 65-80 seats in the House, and he thinks the GOP will gain control of the Senate, too. It doesn’t matter what the economy does in the next sixty days, because it takes longer than 60 days to reverse the public’s feeling about that.
llbroo49 // Aug 29, 2010 at 1:44 am
exguru // Aug 29, 2010 at 12:56 am
Blacks aren’t stupid, they realize a one term President is seen as a failed Presidency. Now in 2016, when another minority runs, there might be some voter apathy.
ktward // Aug 29, 2010 at 2:20 am
Dick Morris is looking for a GOP gain of 65-80 seats in the House, and he thinks the GOP will gain control of the Senate, too.
(Oh. Well if Dick Morris says so …)
Partisan prognosticators — e.g. Morris — are ubiquitous: pick whatever color you like & wave their big foam finger around.
Admittedly, when it comes to politics the quant-wonks aren’t as easy to like. They largely live and die by their wonkitude, foam finger color notwithstanding.
buddyglass // Aug 30, 2010 at 9:05 am
I was going to post the intrade and 538 numbers, but sinz beat me to it.
I’ll post some details, though. Intrade.com has approximately a 50% chance of Republicans gaining 45+ seats. That means there’s approx. a 50% chance of them gaining less than 45 seats, so 45 is the approximate “expected value” of Republican gains.
Fivethirtyeight doesn’t have a fixed prediction yet, but they break up the House seats as follows:
168 – strong D
55 – lean D
31 – tossup
18 – lean R
163 – strong R
As a rough estimation, if each party gets its “lean” races and the tossups are split evenly, that would result in a composition of 238 D to 197 R. Currently the Republicans have 178 seats. So that would be a fairly modest pickup of 19 seats. Some of those “lean D” races may be closer to “tossup” than 538 suggests.
Those guys are pretty sharp- I look forward to them releasing House predictions.
buddyglass // Aug 30, 2010 at 9:51 am
Oh yeah- Cook political’s Aug. 27 prediction is for Republicans to pick up “between 35 and 45 seats” in the House.
http://www.cookpolitical.com/
jabbermule // Aug 30, 2010 at 10:44 am
buddyglass // Aug 30, 2010 at 9:05 am:
“…if each party gets its “lean” races and the tossups are split evenly, that would result in a composition of 238 D to 197 R.”
Sounds like quite a case of wishful thinking…here’s a reality check:
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2010/house/2010_elections_house_map.html
buddyglass // Aug 30, 2010 at 11:52 am
I have a lot of faith in the fivethirtyeight guys. To be completely clear: they’re not predicting a Republican pickup of only 19 seats. That was my rough math based on their breakdown of the races into different categories.
Applying the same rough math to your RCP link yields a breakdown of 211.5 D vs. 223.5 R, which would represent a pickup of 45.5 seats.
Applying the same math to CP’s categories yields a breakdown of 234 D vs. 201 R, which would be a pickup of 23 seats.
So the categories from CP and 538 seem to be much more “Democrat friendly” than RCP’s.
jabbermule // Aug 30, 2010 at 12:27 pm
buddyglass // Aug 30, 2010 at 11:52 am
“Applying the same rough math to your RCP link yields a breakdown of 211.5 D vs. 223.5 R, which would represent a pickup of 45.5 seats.”
Which is basically what everybody is predicting.
buddyglass // Aug 30, 2010 at 1:18 pm
“Which is basically what everybody is predicting.”
Well, possibly not the Cook and 538 guys, with the caveat that the 538 guys haven’t come out with an actual “number” yet.
RCP and Intrade have 45 as the over/under. Cook says the Republicans should pick up “35 to 45″ seats, so for them 45 seems to be the high end.
Candy83 // Sep 2, 2010 at 2:35 am
Flip 2006, and it gives you a good in-advance view on what the 2010 congressional results will look like. (That, of course, is considering the governor races.)