by Alan Abramowitz, Alben W. Barkley Professor of Political Science, Emory University
With only five weeks left until the 2006 midterm election, political analysts remain divided about the Democrats’ chances of regaining control of the House and Senate. While some indicators such as the generic ballot continue to show a strong Democratic advantage and the overwhelming majority of competitive races involve GOP seats, President Bush’s approval ratings have climbed a bit in recent weeks, giving Republican strategists and candidates renewed hope. In addition, many analysts believe that Republicans have an ace in the hole going into the final days of the campaign—their party’s well-oiled get-out-the-vote (GOTV) machine. Despite polls showing Democratic voters more energized than Republican voters, these analysts believe that the Republicans’ vaunted “72-hour program” will give the GOP a critical edge on Election Day.
But is the Republican GOTV machine really as good as it’s made out to be? Claims about the effectiveness of the GOP’s 72-hour program are based largely on the results of the 2004 presidential election, and especially on what happened in the large battleground states. And no state is cited more frequently to illustrate the effectiveness of the Republican 72-hour program than Ohio.
Does the evidence from Ohio actually support these claims about the effectiveness of the Republican 72-hour program? It is true that the number of Republican votes in Ohio increased dramatically between the 2000 and 2004 presidential elections, going from 2.35 million in 2000 to 2.86 million in 2005. That’s an increase of more than 500,000 votes, or 21.7 percent. Sounds impressive. But wait a minute—the number of Democratic votes in Ohio rose from 2.19 million in 2000 to 2.74 million in 2004. That’s an increase of more than 550,000 votes, or 25.4%. So which party’s GOTV program was more effective?
Okay, but everyone knows that the real key to a GOTV campaign is getting out your base. So how effective were Republicans and Democrats at getting out their base voters in Ohio? Well, one way to gauge this is to focus on each party’s strongest counties. In Ohio there were 14 counties that George Bush carried by a margin of at least 10,000 votes in 2000 and 6 counties that Al Gore carried by a margin of at least 10,000 votes. Between 2000 and 2004, the number of Republican votes in the 14 strongly Republican counties increased by 163,000, or 23.4%. That’s pretty impressive. But the number of Democratic votes in these 14 GOP counties increased by 113,000, or 26.4%! So while the Republican plurality in these counties increased by about 50,000 votes, the percentage increase in Democratic turnout was actually greater than the percentage increase in Republican turnout.
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And what happened in the six strongly Democratic counties? The number of Democratic votes increased by 193,000, or 24.9%, while the number of Republican votes increased by 97,000, or 21.7%. So not only did the size of the Democratic plurality increase by almost 100,000 votes in these six counties, but the percentage increase in Democratic turnout was greater than the percentage increase in Republican turnout.
One of the most difficult things to accomplish in a GOTV campaign is to mobilize your own party’s supporters without also mobilizing the opposing party’s supporters. Not only did Democrats do a better job of turning out their own voters in Ohio, but they also did a better job of not turning out opposition voters. Based on the actual turnout data, it appears that the GOP’s vaunted 72-hour program was actually less effective than the Democratic Party’s GOTV effort in Ohio. On November 7th, that Republican ace-in-the-hole may turn out to be a joker.
Month: October 2006
It’s too early to gauge the political ramifications of the still-unfolding Foley scandal/cover-up and it’s clear more revelations are forthcoming. Thus far, the blogs are a step ahead of the newspapers-of-record in sharing the inside skinny on the political fallout. A good place to start is “Fight the Foley Five” at Daily Kos, which reports on five GOP-held seats that may be endangered by the scandal and their Democratic opponents. Also check out The Left Coaster Steve Soto’s “Will The Foley Cover-Up Take Down The GOP House Leadership?” In his MyDD post, “Time For Hastert To Resign,” Chris Bowers says “there is simply no way that we lose FL-16 now.” The New Republic‘s Michael Crowley reports in “The Plank” that NRCC Chairman Tom Reynolds may be especially vulnerable:
Although the New York Republican chairs the National Republican Campaign Committee, a post usually held by a safe incumbent (thus allowing him to focus on other races) Reynolds has always faced an inconveniently dicey re-election fight. Indeed, as reader CS notes, a September 28 SurveyUSA poll showed Reynolds with a mere 45-43 lead over his Democratic opponent, Jack Davis…In all likelihood, then, Reynolds is effectively down by a few points. And now newspapers in his own district are running headlines like “Reynolds accused of inaction on Foley.”
And Josh Marshall’s Talking Points Memo covers the political fallout from more than a dozen different angles here.
Well, a congressional session rightly adjudged as one of the most futile in memory finally limped to the finish line over the weekend. And its record was so bad that even the non-judgmental Reuters news service could barely suppress a sneer of contempt:
Leaving behind a pile of unfinished work, members of the scandal-rocked U.S. Congress adjourned and went home on Saturday to ask voters to re-elect them in five weeks.With polls showing President George W. Bush’s fellow Republicans could lose control of Congress in the November 7 contests, their leaders even decided to depart a week early to give members more time to campaign.”It’s been a ghastly congressional session, particularly the last year,” said Stephen Hess, a congressional scholar the Brookings Institution. “They figure the best thing to do is get out of town. They aren’t doing anything here.”
No kidding. The eruption of yet another Republican ethics scandal, and yet another Republican ethics scandal coverup, seemed to put an appropriate exclamation point on the session, and on what the country can now demonstrably expect from single-party GOP rule in Washington. And Republicans know it. That’s why they continue to signal that their campaign to hold onto power will not focus on their accomplishments, such as they are, but on smearing Democrats. Sen. Mitch McConnell, the sleazemeister who is about to become Republican leader in the Senate, put it succintly: “A lot of Americans have forgotten what Democrats do when they are in the majority. We are going to remind them.”If this tactic works, it will require a national short-term memory lapse of historic dimensions.
It’s too early to gauge the political ramifications of the still-unfolding Foley scandal/cover-up and it’s clear more revelations are forthcoming. Thus far, the blogs are a step ahead of the newspapers-of-record in sharing the inside skinny on the political fallout. A good place to start is “Fight the Foley Five” at Daily Kos, which reports on five GOP-held seats that may be endangered by the scandal and their Democratic opponents. Also check out The Left Coaster Steve Soto’s “Will The Foley Cover-Up Take Down The GOP House Leadership?” In his MyDD post, “Time For Hastert To Resign,” Chris Bowers says “there is simply no way that we lose FL-16 now.” The New Republic‘s Michael Crowley reports in “The Plank” that NRCC Chairman Tom Reynolds may be especially vulnerable:
Although the New York Republican chairs the National Republican Campaign Committee, a post usually held by a safe incumbent (thus allowing him to focus on other races) Reynolds has always faced an inconveniently dicey re-election fight. Indeed, as reader CS notes, a September 28 SurveyUSA poll showed Reynolds with a mere 45-43 lead over his Democratic opponent, Jack Davis…In all likelihood, then, Reynolds is effectively down by a few points. And now newspapers in his own district are running headlines like “Reynolds accused of inaction on Foley.”
And Josh Marshall’s Talking Points Memo covers the political fallout from more than a dozen different angles here.
Matt Bai has a lengthy portrait of DNC Chair Howard Dean in the Sunday New York Times Magazine. Bai sheds favorable light on Dean’s leadership as a champion of long-term (50 state) strategy and greater participation of Democratic “outsiders,” who have been overshadowed by “insider” consutlants. But Bai also gives fair vent to Dean’s critics, who believe his strategy will hurt Democratic chances on November 7.
And speaking of long-term strategy, WaPo’s Zachary A. Goldfarb has a short, but encouraging update on an important topic that doesn’t get enough attention from political journalists (or the DNC web pages) — the battle for control of the state legislatures, where congressional districts are defined and future candidates for congress are prepared for leadership. Goldfarb’s article, “Democrats Hope to Swing State Legislatures Their Way,” says Dems have a solid shot at winning majorities of state legislatures in Colorado, Indiana, Iowa (both houses), Maine, Minnesota, Montana, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Oregon and Tennessee.
Matt Bai has a lengthy portrait of DNC Chair Howard Dean in the Sunday New York Times Magazine. Bai sheds favorable light on Dean’s leadership as a champion of long-term (50 state) strategy and greater participation of Democratic “outsiders,” who have been overshadowed by “insider” consutlants. But Bai also gives fair vent to Dean’s critics, who believe his strategy will hurt Democratic chances on November 7.
And speaking of long-term strategy, WaPo’s Zachary A. Goldfarb has a short, but encouraging update on an important topic that doesn’t get enough attention from political journalists (or the DNC web pages) — the battle for control of the state legislatures, where congressional districts are defined and future candidates for congress are prepared for leadership. Goldfarb’s article, “Democrats Hope to Swing State Legislatures Their Way,” says Dems have a solid shot at winning majorities of state legislatures in Colorado, Indiana, Iowa (both houses), Maine, Minnesota, Montana, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Oregon and Tennessee.
