Outside the Beltway

Republicans Have Huge Money Lead In Close House Races

James Joyner · Tuesday, October 17, 2006 · 4 comments

Jeff Birnbaum and Zach Goldfarb report that the Democrats spent their money early, leaving the GOP with an advantage of “more than 2 to 1 in money on hand” to make a last-minute push in several key House races.

This has Matt Yglesias and Scott Lemieux somewhat pessimistic about their side’s chances of taking over. Perhaps rightfully so. It could well be that the Democrats raced off to an early lead partly on the virtue of spending a lot of ad dollars early and that the Republicans decided to hold off until the stretch run since, as the old adage goes, most Americans don’t pay attention to politics until after the World Series. And Joe Gandelman reminds us of another one: “what matters is the first impression — and the last impression.”

Then again, it sure feels like inertia has set in. Survey after survey shows Democrats ahead, even in some seats that were once considered ridiculously safe. More importantly, the Republican base seems depressed, not just because it looks like they might lose but because it’s getting harder to argue that voting Republican is actually worthwhile. (See P.J. O’Rourke’s latest for a particularly pungent version of that view.)

The mathematics still make it hard for the Democrats to take back the Senate and there are just too many variables in the 435 House races to make safe predictions. And no party has ever taken control of the House and not the Senate. Maybe the money advantage will be enough to stem the tide.

Election Night should be interesting, as neither side has any real reason to be confident at this point.