Serve Up A Nice Steaming Plate Of Crow

…for Stu Rothenberg. From April of last year:

Over the past couple of weeks, at least three Republicans — House Minority Whip Eric Cantor (Va.), former Speaker Newt Gingrich (Ga.) and campaign consultant Tony Marsh — have raised the possibility of the GOP winning back the House of Representatives next year.

That idea is lunacy and ought to be put to rest immediately.

None of the three actually predicted that Republicans would gain the 40 seats that they need for a majority, but all three held out hope that that’s possible. It isn’t.

So how seriously should we take his prognostications now?

24 thoughts on “Serve Up A Nice Steaming Plate Of Crow”

  1. Hey, to be fair, the TP hadn’t yet gotten into full swing and the conventional (and historically accurate) wisdom said the GOP would be “wandering in the wilderness for a generation.”

    The times, they are a changing.

  2. From the latest Rothenberg report,

    So how did we do in predicting the results? The last Rothenberg Political Report House projection was as follows: “Likely Republican gain of 55-65 seats, with gains at or above 70 seats possible.” For the Senate, we said: “Republicans likely to gain 6-8 seats.” Not bad, I’d say. Not bad at all.

    First rule of prognostication: Never remind them when you’re wrong.

    Second rule of prognostication: The more specific the prediction, the more wrong it’ll be.

  3. Rand, I don’t think jeff wants us arguing. The quote was from:

    “You’re either with us or against us in the fight against terror.” – George W. Bush (from a November 2001 press conference with Jacques Chirac)

    http://www.everything2.com/?node_id=1360414

    I left the prepositional phrase about terror off of the quote because I was not making a crack at ex President Bush but amightywinds mind set about working with other countries.

  4. There’s only one way to make a prediction, which my little brother used to do when dad took us to the dog track. You find eight high rollers and tip them all with a different winner. Then find the one guy that won and collect your tip.

    To do it twice you need 64 guys… or 7 guys with bad memories.

  5. I might take Stu more seriously if he quick wisecracking about “damaged” candidates like West, and “obviously damaged” candidates like O’Donnell, especially when his solution is to promote more “electable” candidates. That’s worked so well…

  6. He said gaining 40 seats was lunacy… I wonder what he’d have thought of a number in the sixties?

    Credit where credit is due though… Obama has failed miserably in growing the economy, but he’s worked a miracle when it comes to growing the Republican party!

  7. So how seriously should we take his prognostications now?

    Given that you declared Obama unelectable, you might not be the best person to critique other political fortune tellers.

    Rothenberg forgot that election results are perishable. In 2008 the economy was terrible, voters blamed the party that held the White House, and the Dems swept to power. In 2010 the economy was terrible, voters blamed the party in the White House, and the GOP swept to power (though less convincingly). 2012 could go either way: if the economy is still terrible, and the voters still blame the Democrats, we’ll get a GOP president and a GOP Congress. If the economy improves, or Obama manages Truman’s trick of getting voters to assign responsibility to Congress as well as the White House, Obama will get four more years.

    What isn’t so perishable is what the Obama and the 211th Congress have put on the books: health care reform, financial regulation reform, the equal pay act, student loan reform, the stimulus investments in health research, clean energy, transportation infrastructure, electronic medical records, broadband, etc. The effects of those actions will be felt for decades. The point of winning an election isn’t to win the next election. The point is to actually do the things that you think will make the country better. By that yardstick, it was the most successful Congress in decades.

  8. What isn’t so perishable is what the Obama and the 211th Congress have put on the books: health care reform, financial regulation reform, the equal pay act, student loan reform, the stimulus investments in health research, clean energy, transportation infrastructure, electronic medical records, broadband, etc. The effects of those actions will be felt for decades. The point of winning an election isn’t to win the next election. The point is to actually do the things that you think will make the country better. By that yardstick, it was the most successful Congress in decades.

    And why should we use that yardstick? The list of things you mention demonstrate that a successful congress is not a good congress.

  9. The effects of those actions will be felt for decades.

    Yep. The phrase “failed policies of the past” isn’t perishable either. It will be around long enough for you to get sick of hearing it.

  10. Heh. This is my favorite quote from the piece:

    ‘But there are no signs of a dramatic rebound for the party, and the chance of Republicans winning control of either chamber in the 2010 midterm elections is zero. Not “close to zero.” Not “slight” or “small.” Zero.’

    My own personal biggest missed ‘certainty’ in 2008 was that I was absolutely sure Hillary Clinton wouldn’t get the nomination. I even thought that betting against Obama on intrade when he was 20-30% would be a sure way to make a buck. Lucky for me I didn’t actually waste any money that way. (This is a side benefit of being married to a reasonable person who, when you consider doing something new and unusual with an obvious downside that you think couldn’t happen will, when it actually happens, look at you and say ‘what were you thinking? That was a crazy waste of money! How could you be so stupid?’)

    I did think Obama would be elected once he and McCain were nominated, and I also knew I wouldn’t like the way he governed.

  11. Jim said:

    …and the 211th Congress have put on the books…

    Now that’s some forward thinking, when you consider the 211th Congress won’t be sworn in until January of 2209.

  12. And guess what? He was!

    The fact he got elected only proves what an outlier 2008 was.

    The only thing it definitely proves is that he was electable. Facts and reason seem to be foreign concepts on the right.

  13. Just because you “think” something will make the country better, doesn’t mean it will.

    And therefore … what? Is it such a controversial idea that legislators should implement good policies and avoid bad policies, to the best of their ability to discern the difference?

  14. Therefore, when they pass awful policies under the delusion that they are good policies, and in the face of massive public resistance to them, they should expect to lose elections.

  15. Therefore, when they pass awful policies under the delusion that they are good policies, and in the face of massive public resistance to them, they should expect to lose elections.

    Yes. You wouldn’t want legislators to enact policies that they don’t believe in out of fear for their re-election chances, simply because political opponents have rallied opposition to the ones they actually think are best.

  16. To offer a specific example: if the newly elected GOP Congress thinks it would make the country better to repeal Obamacare, they should do that, regardless of whether it improves or hurts their chances for re-election in 2012.

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