Thursday, October 14, 2010

Here's An Interesting Thought

Washington and Illinois according to Real Clear Politics are likely to be retained by the Dems. If the rest of their predictions hold the senate would be 51 Dem to 49 Rep.

Real Clear Politics seems to lean to the left, and the polling averages they use are somewhat dated when they make their predictions. In other words I still think Washington and Illinois will be red states barring  voter rigging.

But let's say for the sake of argument  its 51 to 49 as they say, or 50-50. Now allow me to ask some questions.

How much would Obama offer  a senator to defect? The Cornhusker Kickback could look very small. Who could Obama target, Snowe, Collins, Brown?

At 50-50 Joe Biden becomes the deciding vote in case of a tie. If it's 50-50 what if Lieberman starts caucusing with the Reps., he's  mentioned running as a Rep in 2012. Would McConnell be offering anything for this move? What if it isn't Lieberman, perhaps the Dems have their own Arlen Specter looking for political survival. Ben Nelson -Neb, Pryor- Arkansas and Mary Landrieu-La could be targets to come across the aisle.

No matter the senate election results  come 11/2. Neither side is going to control anything as far as passing legislation, and the trench warfare of raiding the other side for  turncoats will begin in earnest 11/3.

The two numbers that really matter in the senate are 67 and 41. One trumps a veto, the other makes for a filibuster. Control of the committees, Bill riders, and setting the floor calendar will be biggies though.

Steve

No comments:

Post a Comment

Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.