Senate Should be GOP's 2012 Priority
Here’s some early advice to the Republican Party: focus on the Senate in 2012. The presidency probably isn’t winnable but a big pickup in the Senate could advance a good, conservative agenda even with a Democrat in the White House.
Presidency first. For all the conservative happy-talk that President Obama will lose, that’s darn unlikely so long as there’s no true double-dip recession (and slow growth won’t count): right now the President beats ever plausible Republican candidate in a head-to-head matchup and turns in the best numbers against the Republicans (Palin and Gingrich) with the highest name identification.
Obama will be able to outraise and out-debate any Republican candidate. The individuals who could best move the party in a positive direction—Chris Christie and Marco Rubio—have both made it clear that they’ll sit out 2012. I’ll almost certainly vote for any Republican nominee who isn’t Sarah Palin and would put good money on the proposition that the nominee will be Mitt Romney. But I don’t think the presidency is winnable for the GOP.
On the other hand, the Senate picture looks very good for Republicans: Democrats have 23 seats to defend, Republicans only ten. While a few GOP incumbents (Utah’s Orrin Hatch, for example) might face credible challenges for their party nominations, it seems unlikely that any of the seven seats defended by Republican incumbents will switch parties. (Despite the huge overall advantage Democrats have in the state, this includes Massachusetts’ Scott Brown.) Only one of the seats held by a retiring Republican Senator, furthermore, is in a place (Nevada) where Democrats would have a credible chance of scoring a pickup. By comparison, the right Republican candidate could be competitive in most places where Democrats hold seats.
All this said, resources are going to be key: Michigan’s Senate seat is surely winnable for Republicans (the state just elected a GOP governor) but there’s no strong announced candidate yet. With a huge Obama reelection effort in Florida (yeah, he’ll win the state), furthermore, whoever wins the Republican nomination--several good looking candidates have stepped forward--is going to need to buy lots of TV ads in the states’ 10 major 100,000+ household television markets. Even Texas’ open seat race is going to require a lot of money. And so on down the list.
With good candidates and the right resources, Republicans will probably pick up eight or nine Senate seats even with an Obama victory and a 13-seat pickup for a filibuster-proof majority isn’t altogether outside the realm of possibility. (Although, by my count, that would require the one currently unannounced Democratic incumbent, Wisconsin’s Herb Kohl, to decide not to run and the defeat of an incumbent now universally considered “safe.”) But hardly any of the races against Democratic incumbents will be GOP walkaways particularly with the Democratic core turning out to vote for a base-friendly administration.
Republican donors and thinkers, in short, may do well to focus on the Senate. That’s where the party has, by far, the best chances for real political success.