Electoral Bumfight 2006

Everyone's talking about this little post over here from law professor Reynolds.

First of all, I'm not sure the Republicans are going to lose this one. The Vegas odds may be against them overall, but it might not be as lopsided as you would be led to believe from watching Hardball. There are some big problems with the way opinion polls are conducted these days - such that very few people, if any, know the real "pulse" of the electorate. The proliferation of cell phones and the increasing tendency of folks to lie, ruthlessly, in response to polling calls (so tired we have become by these irksome interruptions)- all of this creates distortion in the results.

But there's a strong sentiment among the chattering class (and the blogosphere) that the GOP deserves to have it's pants kicked this time around. Some claim that the Democrats never back away from their own leadership in the same way - and this may hold true for Washington political class. But if we're talking about voters, I'm sure there have been plenty of cases where Dems have stayed home because their leadership is so god-awful and uninspiring.

Dukakis? Mondale? Please.

On a related note, Kim Strassel in the WSJ compares the situation of the Florida GOP (thriving) and that of the Ohio GOP (going under, rapidly) - and concludes that the Republicans lose when they don't live up to their own ideas and ideology of government, especially in terms of fiscal resposibility. This underscores Reynolds's analysis, and tells the tale strictly in terms of practical real-numbers local government - Florida is booming right now, and the Republicans are in good graces with the electorate.

So our situation, here in Ohio, again once again mimics our key national problem: What do you do when your leadership is so ineffective and corrupt that it's time to throw the bums out - but the other group of bums (in this case, Democrats) is at best an even trade, possibly worse? Vote them in, let them screw things up in a new and different way, and hope the original group has learned their lesson by the time the next election rolls up?

Tags: Instapundit, 2008, Ohio Election