{"id":2781,"date":"2010-09-22T08:23:45","date_gmt":"2010-09-22T12:23:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/?p=2781"},"modified":"2010-09-22T12:01:46","modified_gmt":"2010-09-22T16:01:46","slug":"four-hurdles-for-the-republicans-in-november","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/2010\/09\/22\/four-hurdles-for-the-republicans-in-november\/","title":{"rendered":"Four hurdles for the Republicans in November"},"content":{"rendered":"

Republicans hope to win a majority in at least one house of Congress this November, but they also hope to reclaim the high ground in the larger American narrative.<\/p>\n

Conservatives have long claimed that they represent a “silent majority” within the larger society.<\/p>\n

That claim took a big hit in 2006 and 2008, when voters gave control of the entire Federal government to Democrats.<\/p>\n

In their effort to wrestle the “public mandate” away from Barack Obama, Nancy Pelosi, and Harry Reid, here are ten things that could trip up the surging GOP.<\/p>\n

1.\u00a0 Failing to win a majority the House of Representatives.\u00a0 This is the big one, obviously\u00a0 Most pundits still think the GOP has a lock on winning enough seats to boot Nancy Pelosi out of the Speaker’s chair.\u00a0 Failing to meet those expectations would be… messy.<\/p>\n

2.\u00a0 Losing big governor’s races.\u00a0 Despite the Republican Party’s tea-party fueled momentum, Democrats are competitive in the Big Five governor’s races, in California, Florida, Illinois, New York, and Texas.\u00a0 (Yes, Texas…<\/a>)\u00a0 If they manage to steal those governorships away from the GOP, Democrats would have executive control in every big state in the U.S.\u00a0 That would also give Dems huge advantages going into the 2012 presidential race.<\/p>\n

3.\u00a0 Landing in scandal land.\u00a0 The tea party movement has elevated a lot of unknown politicians, who have only been thinly vetted by anyone, journalists or party bosses.\u00a0\u00a0 Incumbents are unpopular, and boring, but they tend to be known quantities.\u00a0 Republican leaders are worried about skeletons.\u00a0 Which is why so many newly minted candidates are lying low until after election day, avoiding interviews and unscripted moments.<\/p>\n

4.\u00a0 Winning Southern.\u00a0 If the GOP emerges from November’s vote with a majority caucus that is even more lop-sidedly Southern, it will be tough for the party to argue that it rflects the national zeitgeist.\u00a0 Polls show Republicans are already unpopular in the far West, the Midwest, the Great Lakes and the Northeast.\u00a0 To claim a mandate, they need more Scott Brown-type wins.<\/p>\n

If Republicans clear most or all of these hurdles, they’ll start 2011 with a very strong hand to play against President Barack Obama and a (likely) Democratic Senate.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Republicans hope to win a majority in at least one house of Congress this November, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[886],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2781"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2781"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2781\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2782,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2781\/revisions\/2782"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2781"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2781"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2781"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}