Sunday, November 05, 2006

Analysis: How many seats will change hands in the 2006 elections?

Do you need to revise your previous predictions?

Last chance to comment on the latest polling, the "mood of the country", voters sticking with or running away from their party, final campaign swings, ad blitzes and last minute political scandals and events . . .

3 comments:

tonileep said...

I agree with both. I think that many Democrats will gain seats in the House of Representatives. I would say probably around 30 seats. However, I believe that they will only obtain a couple of seats in the Senate. I think that any close race between the Democrats and Republicans that the Democrats will win. I think that this is a very good year for the Democrats and they will be taking control.

Megan B said...

Now that the elections are over, and we know that Democrats have taken both the House and the Senate. Logical questions, that have varying view points, which arise after a shift in power, are why? And how will this affect the policies of our government in the next few years? What will happen next?

In my opinion a majority of the American voters “wanted a change in the direction of the country” (how many times have we heard that one). I do think that the wanted the corruption involved with the national politics to decrease. The voters drew a connection with corruption to the Republican party. Although the cases of corruption were just individuals who were primarily Republican, the whole party got the blame. I think that even the old saying that “all politics is local” was proven wrong during these past congressional elections. National issues such as corruption and the Iraq policies won out over local issues, and the pork barrel politics that are often used.

How will this affect our nation? I don’t think the U.S. will immediately pull out of Iraq, but I do think there will be many changes in the way our country strategically fights the combatants. With the resignation of Donald Rumsfeld from the post of Secretary of Defense and his replacement Robert Gates, and the new democrat controlled congress, there are sure to be changes to the policies in the War on Terror. But is the resignation of Rumsfeld, just a precursor to other major changes in the Whitehouse staff? I don’t think so; I think Vice President Cheney can feel secure at his post (as long as he doesn’t take Bush hunting with him). There may be other minor changes in the staff, but nothing as major as the “resignation” of Rumsfeld. As for a major policy changes, in my opinion the Whitehouse and the Congress will be at a stalemate for control, thus nothing of importance will be achieved in the next two years.

tonileep said...

I must say that with the elections for 2006 I was somewhat surprised. I did expect the Democrats to gain the House of Representatives; however, I did not think that they would also gain the Senate. I guess the American people have spoken and want a change in how things are working. I think it will be quite interesting to see what will happen in the next couple of years and how the Democrats will take control of their new power. Also, It will be interesting to see how the presidental election will go and see if the American people want a Democrat president as well.