TIME: Why Some Top Republicans Think They May Still Have the Last Laugh

[DeepModem Mom]

Why Some Top Republicans Think They May Still Have the Last Laugh
BY MIKE ALLEN

.... Besides Bush's residual popularity in some crucial states and districts, Republican officials say the other reasons they're optimistic are:

1) No Republican is being taken by surprise, unlike many Democrats in 1994. Shortly after Bush's reelection, White House and Republican National Committee officials began working to convince House members that the formidable reelection record for incumbents (since 1996, 97.5 percent) was not something they could take for granted. "What we attempted to do last year," said one of these officials, "was to go out of our way to say to people: 'You face a potential of a race. In order to win as an incumbent, you better have a plan,' " including an intensive focus on voter registration, a message plan that would unfold in phases, and a ground organization that was operating in a measurable, quantifiable way. One official involved in the process said Republican officials deliberately "scared" lawmakers, telling them: "You face a very tough road. You better be ready."

2) Absentee ballot requests and returns, closely tracked by the party, are meeting or exceeding past levels for Republicans in key states and districts. Republican officials say White House Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove and party operatives are scrutinizing this data with the same intensity that they followed metrics like voter registration earlier in the cycle. For at least 68 races, they have been getting reports once a week on the number of voters registered, phone calls completed and doors knocked on. Now, they're getting a second report on the number of absentee ballots requested, absentee ballots returned and early votes cast. "We can look at that data flow and make an assumption about what's going on and plotting it out," a Republican official said.

3) When the national parties, national campaign committees, state "victory" committee accounts and competitive campaigns are added up, Republicans maintained a substantial financial advantage over Democrats at the last filing period. "We didn't look on it as one pot," said one official involved in the process. "We looked upon it as four pots, with synergy available through all four."

4) Republicans say the district-by-district playing field favors them in several structural ways not reflected in national polls. Here is their thinking, starting with statistics from the President's 2004 race against John F. Kerry: "There are 41 districts held by a Democrat that Bush carried, and 14 seats held by Republican that Kerry carried, so we're fighting on better turf. You see it in the open seats, where Bush carried 18 of the Republican open seats and Kerry carried two. So we're fighting on better turf."

5) The get-out-the-vote machine designed by Rove and now-Republican National Committee Chairman Ken Mehlman in 2001 was dubbed the "72-hour" program, but officials say that's quite a misnomer and that it's really a 17-week or even two-year program. "In Ohio, we are making more phone calls this year than we made two years ago," said an official involved in the process. "Now, that's not the case necessarily in Virginia, which was not a battleground state. You have to build that. In other places, we built that and built it early."...

http://time-blog.com/allen_report/2006/10/why_some_top_republicans_think.html

[underpants]

1. Nope none of those make the "wins" plausible

try again but that's Time for running their pre-emptive excuse.

[BurgherHoldtheLies]

2. So true. In fact, GOP voters should be so confident they just stay home next Tues.

I'm sure the far superior GOP machine provides for enough overkill that it isn't really necessary for the average GOP voter to trek down to their polling station.:evilgrin:

[bleever]

3. Pfffffffft.

"Furthermore, Republican party leaders point to the tendency of Democratic voters to be dope-smoking slackers who are 27% more likely to still be eating Halloween candy. On a district by district basis, the highly-developed micro-targeting of areas where SweetTarts and Starburst were disproportionately distributed (compared to Malted Milk Balls and Three Musketeers) allows them to reach out to more highly energized potential voters."

[aquart]

4. They're assuming registered Republicans will vote Republican.

This year, that's a dangerous assumption.

And to make any assumptions about districts that voted for Bush.....a man the nation hates.......oh, dear.

[peacetalksforall]

5. Five Five Five

Mike Allen list five reasons Republicans are optimistic.

Former Sen Daschle lists five races that are crucial (listed in the NYT last Sunday).

Rove has already declared that we may not know winners for five days after the election. - In other words they need five days to secure and defend specific thefts.

(They have also announced that 72 hours prior to the election are critical to them (meaning all their thefts have to come together for them and they will ruin things to the best of their ability for Democrats and Independents (except, of course, for Joe Leiberman, who they will probably commit a criminal act to promote).

The Daschle message is at People for the American Way - titled Be Afraid - Be Very Afraid. This is the paragraph from it:

"This Sunday’s New York Times reported that “control of Congress appears to rest on a relatively few races in which the candidates are separated by razor-thin margins.” Next Tuesday, every single vote must count!"