We’re still waiting on official calls or concessions in 11 House races; all of them feature Democrat incumbents (whose names appear first in this list).
Raul Grijalva vs. Ruth McClung in Arizona’s 7th district.
Gabrielle Giffords vs. Jesse Kelly in Arizona’s 8th district.
Jerry McNerney vs. David Harmer in California’s 11th district.*
Jim Costa vs. Andy Vidak in California’s 20th district.*
Melissa Bean vs. Joe Walsh in Illinois’s 8th district.*
Ben Chandler vs. Andy Barr in Kentucky’s 6th district.
Dan Maffei vs. Ann Marie Buerkle in New York’s 25th district.
Solomon Ortiz vs. Blake Farenthold in Texas’s 27th district.*
Gerry Connolly vs. Keith Fimian in Virginia’s 11th district.
Rick Larsen vs. John Koster in Washington’s 2nd district.*
Adam Smith vs. Richard Muri in Washington’s 9th district.
The ones marked with an asterisk are ones where the GOP challenger has a narrow lead in the most recent numbers.
Sadly, 60 is the talking point number. Unless most of these resolve today, the mental impression of "only 60" will linger thanks to the MSM meme.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI have to say this is something I haven't seen mentioned elsewhere, but the genuine grassroot movement of the Tea Party was a huge positive in this election, and going forward. However, the professional PAC trying to disguise itself as a grassroots organization in the form of the Tea Party Express, and I think Sarah Palin is hurt by this too, was a disaster, outside of Joe Miller and I'm sure about him either as he handled some basic things quite badly toward the end of the campaign. As much as I dislike Daddy's Little Princess.
But they pushed forward both Sharron Angle and Christine O'Donnell, both of whom were perennial candidates that tried to ride this wave but the latter of whom never had any hope of winning. I'm not sure about Angle, but I do wonder how Danny Tark could have done, or what would have happened in the primary if the TPE had stayed out of Nevada. I just feel like the TPE are as much an astroturf organization as any on the left and I think cost us seats that could have been won.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseSo what are we looking at realistically as a final number? About 65? Heck of a night.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseBob Etheridge hasn't conceded yet, either.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseApart from these, are there any races out there which have been called...but might have been called wrong?
I ask because it was an unpleasant surprise to wake up this morning and learn that the AP -- followed by just about everyone else -- had made a big blunder in calling GA-2 for Keown.
And that wasn't the only screwup. Fox News called the Connecticut governor’s race for Malloy way early, and with Foley noticeably ahead in actual tallied votes. (Foley’s still ahead, but barely.) Last I checked they were standing by their call...most others still have it as undecided.
It was noted a little earlier that the Denver Post has called the Colorado Senate race. Surely that's a bit soon--but at least I don’t see national outlets picking up on the error like they did with the Keown call.
In the California Senate race, I don’t believe the networks had any business calling it the moment the polls closed as they did. Even if the final results show a significantly bigger margin than we saw late last night, that was still irresponsible.
Finally, one funny little detail: the Republican in the Vermont governor’s race conceded hours ago...but for some reason CNN still hasn’t called his race.
This kind of sloppiness worries me. Have we forgotten the lessons of 2000 already?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThe two Washington races still have a long way to go - lot of ballots still out there to count. There are still some votes out in NY-25 - looks like Buerkle could pull it out (the votes seems to be from GOP counties) but looks unlikely. I don't think we'll pull out either of the Arizona seats.
VA-11, KY-6 and TX-27 look like they'll be a while - I assume there will be some provisional, military, and absentee ballots that might still be uncounted and then there will be recounts (all three races currently feature leads of less than 1,000 votes).
Any way you cut it, it was a great night on the House side even if we did leave some races on the table (it's bound to happen).
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseA question regarding absentee,military and provisional ballots. Have these already been included in the totals, if not when can we expect them to be included. I'm thinking that military and remaining absentee ballots may be enough to overcome both Chandler's and Connelly's small leads. Also Adam Smith's district WA CD9 includes the very large Fort Lewis Army base, so although his lead appears the largest of those on this undeclared race list, understanding when/if military ballots have been or will be counted could greatly alter the perspective of this race.
Any help on this from Geraghty or the readers would be appreciated
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseOf these, I really hope Raul Grijalva loses. Nobody who implores people to boycott the citizens of his district, to say, "Please, punish the people of Arizona, my constituency, on behalf of my demagoguing a racial issue" is fit for office.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI like that, Ditch. "only 60". It's like saying, "Oh, I was pretty lucky. I only lost my thumb and three fingers on that hand."
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse@Blog Goliard - I believe the call in CT was based on where the outstanding vote is. At this point, despite a narrow Foley lead, most of the votes that have not been counted appear to be in Bridgeport and New Haven, both heavily Democratic areas. Malloy should be able to make up his current deficit given those.
That said, I agree that there were some questionable practices last night - especially given the experience of 2000. But, overall, if the only thing the number crunchers get wrong is a single House race, that's not a bad track record - just at the federal and governor levels they were tracking nearly 500 races.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseYes, Ditch, "only 60"...and countless governorships, state houses, amicable to cons proposition results, judgeships, dogs and cats voting for Rs, etc., in other words: who cares what the MSM says. Reality says 'x' and the MSM can say it's 'y' until they're, err, blue in the face, but it changes nothing: the Dems got hammered hard.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse@reldim: Yes, I see what you mean. Scrolling through the town results on the CNN website, it looks like Malloy should be able to make up twice or even three times his current deficit with ease. Would be a surprise at this point if Foley's lead held.
But last night when Fox called it, I believe there was still only 15% of the vote in. Even if the "right" guy wins in the end, I still consider a call like that a blunder.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI think Conelly will hold on in VA-11, but he is officially living on borrrowed time. The dems in the state senate aren't going to spend their political capital on a 2nd termer in a swing district, they will be consumed with protecting their own hope of keeping their majority in the state senate. Likely most of Connelly's best precincts will go to Jim the Moron in VA-8 and VA-11 will pick up moe of Prince William & Loudoun county (strong GOP areas both). Connelly might believe a Obama tide will keep him afloat in '12, but more likely he'll take a swing at the US Senate when Jim Webb either retires (he's very unhappy in the Senate) or is appointed SecDef to replace Gates and McDonnell appoints a replacement (now THAT is an interesting though exercise, to appoint a placeholder or hand the seat to George Allen, or maybe to Bollinger to avoid a nasty fight in the GOP Gov primary in '13, Machiavelli we need you!).
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