Rocking The House--Another 30 Seat Dem Gain in 2008?

The conventional wisdom (which, as Molly Ivins dutifully pointed out, is often wrong) is that the Democrats will pad their respective majorities in the Congress this year, but that said gains are likely to be marginal.

Looking at the landscape, there are signs that (just as in 2006) the Democratic wave might be considerably larger than initially anticipated. I base this on three factors--fundraising, candidate recruitment, and polling data.

Follow me beyond the fold for the information...

1. FUNDRAISING
According to the FEC (as of today), Democratic House candidates have raised a net amount of just over $206 million. Republican House candidates trail at $148.7 million. This is just shy of a 3-to-2 advantage in fundraising.

The differences are even more acute in several of the more competitive contests. New figures will be out next week, as the deadline for the first quarter filings for 2008 is April 15th. But the year-end reports for 2007 already showed a considerable gap in favor of the Democrats in several key races. Here are some examples, with the total amount raised in 2007 in parentheses:

REPUBLICAN-HELD SEATS
AZ-01: Kirkpatrick (D--403K) vs. Hay (R--169K)
ID-01: Minnick (D--410K) vs. Rep. Sali (R--332K)
IL-11: Halvorson (D--427K) vs. Baldermann (R--103K)
MI-07: Schauer (D--577K) vs. Rep. Walberg (R--576K)
NJ-07: Stender (D--622K) vs. Whitman (R--200K)*
NY-29: Massa (D--628K) vs. Kuhl (R--525K)
OH-02: Wulsin (D--501K) vs. Schmidt (R--382K)
OH-15: Kilroy (D--828K) vs. Stivers (R--404K)
OH-16: Boccieri (D--385K) vs. Schuring (R--269K)
VA-05: Perriello (D--266K) vs. Goode (R--171K)
*--Did not include potential GOP frontrunner Leonard Lance, who had not filed as of 1/31/08.

DEMOCRATIC-HELD SEATS
CA-11: McNerney (D--1,400K) vs. Andal (R--534K)
CT-02: Courtney (D--1,266K) vs. Sullivan (R--186K)
CT-05: C. Murphy (D--1,419K) vs. Cappiello (R--399K)
FL-16: Mahoney (D--1,852K) vs. Rooney (R--552K)
IL-08: Bean (D--1,926K) vs. Greenberg (R--410K)
PA-04: Altmire (D--1,210K) vs. Hart (R--388K)
WI-08: Kagen (D--920K) vs. Gard (R--371K)

There are only a handful of seats where the Democratic incumbent is looking at being heavily outraised. Nancy Boyda in Kansas-02 comes to mind, and one might expect Nick Lampson (TX-22) and Chris Carney (PA-10) to be in similar straits when their competitive primaries are resolved.

2. CANDIDATE RECRUITMENT
One of the most underreported stories of the campaign season is the number of potentially vulnerable Democratic incumbents who may well be facing minimal opposition.

Every new day seems to bring a new tale of a prized Republican recruit thinking better of it and heading for the exits. Some (like Tim Baldermann in IL-11) elected to hit the eject button after already winning their nominations.

Among the potentially vulnerable Democrats who, thus far, seem to have earned a near-pass from the Republicans in 2008: Ed Perlmutter (CO-07), Ron Klein (FL-22), John Barrow (GA-12), Brad Ellsworth (IN-08), Leonard Boswell (IA-03), Tim Walz (MN-01), John Hall (NY-19), and Charlie Wilson (OH-06). Granted, all eight of these incumbents have announced challengers who might put it together down the line, but as of the last quarter, all of their challengers had raised modest sums of money, at best, in order to defeat House incumbents.

Indeed, 57% of the House challengers raising more than $150K for the 4th quarter of 2007 were Democrats.

3. POLLING DATA
One poll today, released by the team at the non-partisan Capital Survey Research, underscores the challenge for GOPers in 2008. In the first public poll out of Alabama's 5th District, the presumed Democratic nominee (state senator Parker Griffith) has a double-digit lead over the presumed Republican nominee (94/96 nominee Wayne Parker). Griffith's sixteen point edge in the poll (48-32) has to be jarring to the folks over at the NRCC.

Consider--this is considered to be the #1 pickup opportunity for the GOP in this election cycle, one of only two (OR-05 is the other) Democratic-held seats that the Cook Political Report rates as a tossup. An open seat, in the heart of Bush country.

And the presumed Republican nominee is down 16, according to an independent poll.

A March NBC/WSJ poll had the generic house ballot (a flawed, but not useless measure) at Democrats 49%, Republicans 35%. When the Democrats reclaimed the House in 2006, the margin was approximately eight points (53-45).

Other independent polls in the 2008 cycle that portend a good Democratic year:

1. WY-01--Trauner (D) leads 41-40, according to a 1/23 Mason Dixon poll.

2. MI-07--Schauer (D) leads an informed ballot 49-48, according to a 3/2 EPIC/MRA poll.

3. LA-06--Cazayoux (D) leads by three points, according to a 3/18 REPUBLICAN poll.

4. KY-03--Yarmuth (D) leads Northup (R) by two, according to a 1/14 REPUBLICAN poll.

5. AK-01--Berkowitz (D) leads Young (R) by seven, according to a 12/6 Research 2000 poll.

THE BOTTOM LINE
Democrats seem unusually well-suited to build on their majority, and the extent to which the GOP has failed to generate any energy for their bid to reclaim the majority is truly startling. Indeed, when John Boehner claimed this week that the GOP would gain seats, and that they had a shot at reclaiming the majority, the general reaction was "What the hell is THAT guy on??!!??"

If the Democrats pick up LA-06 in next month's special election, one has to wonder if another wave election is in the offing. Special elections do not always portend general elections (see: SD-AL, KY-06, and the 2004 general election). However, there is little in the election cycle to date to dampen DCCC and Democratic enthusiasm.