US Democrats with big edge in campaign's last week

By Staff
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Google Oneindia News

WASHINGTON, Oct 29: Democrats enter the final week of the fight for Congress with a commanding edge over Republicans, who hope a major voter turnout effort and shift in focus away from Iraq can limit their losses.

Recent polls show that growing Democratic momentum, fed by dissatisfaction with President George W Bush's leadership and the war in Iraq, threatens Republican power in the US House of Representatives and Senate.

The public's thirst for change in Washington has Republicans pondering how bad things will be in the November. 7 election and calculating whether they can stop Democrats from picking up the 15 House and six Senate seats needed to claim majorities.

''This is the most challenging environment for Republicans since the Watergate year of 1974,'' said Republican political consultant Whit Ayres, referring to the loss of 48 House seats after the resignation of disgraced Republican President Richard Nixon.

''But it is not an absolute sure thing the Democrats take either the House or the Senate,'' he said. ''Republicans are very good at goal line stands.'' Any Republican last stand this year will rely largely on the party's vaunted voter turnout effort, which most analysts say is usually worth one or two percentage points, and on turning the campaign spotlight away from the increasingly unpopular Iraq war.

Democrats expect to match Republicans' voter turnout with a fine-tuned effort of their own, according to Sen Charles Schumer, head of the Senate Democratic campaign committee.

''We know they won in 2004, we've been preparing since early 2005. ... Our voter turnout is going to equal the Republicans for the first time in a long time,'' Schumer, of New York, told ''Fox News Sunday.''

Republicans hope they can make the election of all 435 House seats and 33 Senate seats a contest between individual candidates and not a referendum on Bush or the war.

'SPECTER OF HOWARD DEAN'

''We need to energise Republican voters with the specter of a country run by Howard Dean and Nancy Pelosi,'' Ayres said, referring to the Democratic Party chairman and the Democratic House leader. ''And we need to do the little things of politics well -- identify our voters and make very sure they vote.'' Independent analysts suggest Democrats will gain 20 to 35 House seats, with additional competitive Republican House seats sprouting up. Democrats also are favoured to win Republican Senate seats in Pennsylvania, Ohio, Montana and Rhode Island.

To take a Senate majority, Democrats probably will need to win seats in two states among Tennessee, Virginia and Missouri, and hold their endangered seat in New Jersey.

History is with the Democrats, as the party holding the White House traditionally loses seats in a president's sixth year. A recent exception was 1998, when public unhappiness over the Republican-led impeachment of President Bill Clinton helped Democrats gain five House seats.

Polls have shown much larger majorities of voters believe the country is on the wrong track now than in 1994, when Republicans swept Democrats out of House control by picking up 52 seats.

Bush's approval rating, hovering in the mid to high 30s, also is much lower than Democratic President Bill Clinton's rating in 1994, which was in the mid to high 40s.

''Given the political climate, there seems to be no question there will be bad losses for Republicans,'' said Amy Walter, a House analyst with the non-partisan Cook Political Report. ''The question is how bad will they be?'' Republican consultant Rich Galen said the party already had suffered as much as it could from Iraq and should pound on national security and local issues down the stretch.

''It's hard to believe that anybody who is going to vote has not made up their mind about Iraq,'' Galen said. ''The question now is what moves votes? Local issues are what get people out to vote.''

REUTERS

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