reality-based educator

He said it tonight on Hardball. While the House prediction is not all that extraordinary, the Senate prediction is.

Last week Pat thought the nasty ads GOPer's unleashed on Harold Ford were the end of the Dem's chances to take back the TennesseeSenate seat. He also thought the George Allen campaign's use of sexual excerpts from Jim Webb's military novels might put Allen over the top with suburban women in Northern Virginia.

But now Buchanan says he's hearing that Jim Webb has caught up to George Allen in the Virginia Senate race (see Josh Marshall with news that Webb is actually ahead in a soon-to-be released independent poll) and Ford has caught up to Corker in the Tennessee Senate race, putting the Senate back in play for Dems.

In addition, Hotline Blog reports that two internal DSCC polls show both Webb and Ford surging ahead of their Republican opponents.

So with eight days to go, the Senate looks to still be in play for both parties and maybe, just maybe, the dirty advertising and nasty politics GOPer's used in Tennessee and Virginia have backfired against Republicans.

We'll see. I must admit, I'm a bit dubious that the nasty ads and negative campaign tactics won't work. They've ALWAYS worked in the past and I can't seen them NOT working this time around.

But I hope I'm wrong. If the negative campaigning and dirty ads actually backfire against the party that unleashed them, that just might make future elections a little less superficial and issue-less.

UPDATE: Rasmussen has Webb up over Allen 48%-46% in his latest poll, 51%-46% when leaners are added in.

Also, Majority Watch has released their latest polls in the 60 most competitive House races and the results show a Blue Wave. Mike McL at the Daily Kos says based on the Majority Watch polling, Dems will have 240 seats to 193 with 2 ties in the House. Kos, however, offers a cautionary notes about the Majority Watch poll:

I can't tell whether the Majority Watch polls are too optimistic for our side, or merely reflective of a terrible environment for Republicans. As with any poll, take with a grain of salt. And considering this is a new, untested polling operation, doubly so.

I'd say the Majority Watch polls are a little too optimistic for my taste. But, you never know until the actual voting is done, right? Maybe Majority Watch is right on with their polling. Or maybe Rove's right and the GOP holds onto power in both chambers. I guess it all comes down to whose got the Diebold source code and how many Democratic votes get changed into Republican ones.

SECOND UPDATE: Charlie Cook says there are no signs that the Blue Wave is abating. Cook sees the GOP losing 20-35 seats in the House and 4-6 in the Senate.