The Wedge Party, State by State
To: Mickey Kaus
Re: Dellinger on His Head
You can win a state delegation either by controlling it outright or by controlling enough seats to enable you to win it via coalition with one of the two major parties. You need to win (or tie) enough states to prevent either party from gaining an absolute majority (26), which, in practice, means preventing the Republicans from doing so (see below). Once you've deadlocked the process, you can offer the option of voting for your candidate as a compromise, who, being a centrist, is likely to be less unappealing than the other two options. Imagine the House sorting through Frist, Clinton and McCain for example. Would the Dems throw their support behind McCain if he could prevent Frist from winning outright? Republican support would also be possible, at least on a state-by-state basis.
Currently, Republicans control 30 delegations. One is Arizona, where they have a 6-2 edge, which would be an obvious target for McCain (he'd need only two seats to deadlock, with the support of Dems). Four states have only one Representative and are Republican: Alaska, Delaware, Montana, and Wyoming. Eight states have a Republican majority of one: Colorado (4-3), Connecticut (3-2), Georgia (7-6), Missouri (5-4), Nevada (2-1), New Mexico (2-1), North Carolina (7-6), and Utah (2-1). Also, there's New Hampshire (2-0), which he could deadlock by winning a single seat. Also worth mentioning are Michigan (9-6), Ohio (11-6, 1 vacancy), and Pennsylvania (12-7).
So, if McCain ran candidates in the 12 states with a majority of 1 (+ New Hampshire), he'd need to win as few as 5 out of 38 Republican seats to keep them from getting to 26 in the House. That still leaves the other possibilities mentioned (Arizona, Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania). Of course, such an insurgency might disrupt other incumbents, so it's hard to say -- not to mention the general chaos that would ensue the election...
But it's not impossible, and control of the House would be a hell of a consolation prize (the McCainites could win seats in NY & other states that aren't in play delegation-wise, making this a plausible goal. By 'control' I mean swing votes, of course, with no party in the majority.). Let the snowball roll!
Addendum: Idaho (2-0), Kansas (3-1), and South Carolina (4-2) could be deadlocked with a single takeaway. So there's nine more smacks at the apple.
Re: Dellinger on His Head
You can win a state delegation either by controlling it outright or by controlling enough seats to enable you to win it via coalition with one of the two major parties. You need to win (or tie) enough states to prevent either party from gaining an absolute majority (26), which, in practice, means preventing the Republicans from doing so (see below). Once you've deadlocked the process, you can offer the option of voting for your candidate as a compromise, who, being a centrist, is likely to be less unappealing than the other two options. Imagine the House sorting through Frist, Clinton and McCain for example. Would the Dems throw their support behind McCain if he could prevent Frist from winning outright? Republican support would also be possible, at least on a state-by-state basis.
Currently, Republicans control 30 delegations. One is Arizona, where they have a 6-2 edge, which would be an obvious target for McCain (he'd need only two seats to deadlock, with the support of Dems). Four states have only one Representative and are Republican: Alaska, Delaware, Montana, and Wyoming. Eight states have a Republican majority of one: Colorado (4-3), Connecticut (3-2), Georgia (7-6), Missouri (5-4), Nevada (2-1), New Mexico (2-1), North Carolina (7-6), and Utah (2-1). Also, there's New Hampshire (2-0), which he could deadlock by winning a single seat. Also worth mentioning are Michigan (9-6), Ohio (11-6, 1 vacancy), and Pennsylvania (12-7).
So, if McCain ran candidates in the 12 states with a majority of 1 (+ New Hampshire), he'd need to win as few as 5 out of 38 Republican seats to keep them from getting to 26 in the House. That still leaves the other possibilities mentioned (Arizona, Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania). Of course, such an insurgency might disrupt other incumbents, so it's hard to say -- not to mention the general chaos that would ensue the election...
But it's not impossible, and control of the House would be a hell of a consolation prize (the McCainites could win seats in NY & other states that aren't in play delegation-wise, making this a plausible goal. By 'control' I mean swing votes, of course, with no party in the majority.). Let the snowball roll!
Addendum: Idaho (2-0), Kansas (3-1), and South Carolina (4-2) could be deadlocked with a single takeaway. So there's nine more smacks at the apple.
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home