Politics Daily: Rarer Than a Unicorn, We Find a Nervous GOP House Incumbent (6 terms)

[Omaha Steve]

http://tomwhite2010.com/newsroom/politics-daily-rarer-unicorn-we-find-nervous-gop-house-incumbent

By Walter Shapiro, Senior Correspondent, Politics Daily
September 22, 2010

PAPILLION, Neb. – Affable six-term Congressman Lee Terry looked up from his pork chop and sauerkraut at a Catholic Church festival (St. Columbkille Parish) to explain why he is facing a formidable challenge in November. "The district has shifted and Tom White is a credible opponent," Terry said as we sat on picnic benches in a light Sunday afternoon drizzle. "On the face of it, it looks pretty good if you're the other side."

This is a campaign season when dozens of skittish Democratic House incumbents – if they were willing to be candid with a tape recorder running – would say roughly the same thing. But Terry is a Republican running from an Omaha-based congressional district in what many pollsters believe will be a history-making GOP year. While Terry is decidedly favored in November, the Obama White House is hopeful enough to send Joe Biden to Omaha next week to hold a fund-raiser for Tom White, a state legislator and lawyer.

It is impossible to pick up a newspaper, click on a cable news channel or scan a political Web site without being told with absolute certainty that 2010 will be a tidal-wave election like 1994 (the Gingrich Revolution) and 2006 (the Pelosi Uprising). In epic years like these, party labels virtually are all that matter – and the best thing that an incumbent from the out-of-favor party can do is to lash himself to the mast and hope for the best.

But what if (avert your eyes: heretical notion ahead) the Republican wave crests too early and 2010 turns out to be a less decisive election than expected? What if politics is not an algorithm – and statistical models fail to fully account for human factors like candidate quality and campaign tactics? What if Tip O'Neill was half right – and some politics is indeed local?

The battle in Nebraska's 2nd Congressional District could be a counter-intuitive indicator that helps determine whether the Republicans gain the 39 seats needed to take control of the House. If the Democrats win a few GOP-held seats (Dan Lungren in California, Hawaii's Charles Djou and Louisiana's Joseph Cao are other endangered incumbents), it could make the Republican's take-over arithmetic daunting.

Over breakfast Sunday morning, I asked Tom White how he possibly hoped to prevail when most Democratic strategists in Washington were perched on window ledges wondering whether to jump now or be conservative and wait until November. "Part of the fun of being isolated in Nebraska," White said with a dry wit, "is being isolated in Nebraska."

FULL story at link.