Political Games - Where the fuck’s the reset button?

November 7th, 2006. Mark your calendars. That’s the mid-term elections. One-third of the U.S. Senate seats, and all of the House seats, will be up for election [side question: is it 33 or 34 Senate seats this year?]. And based on yesterday’s results in Ohio [specifically, the 2nd Congressional district], it’s going to be a gooood year indeed for the left!

I want to provide my own analysis on this. Let’s say the Dems can add 10-15% to their vote totals in every hostile congressional district in the nation. How would that impact the elections? Using CNN’s site for the results [grrrr at that front page. grrr!!], I can do a complete analysis of all the districts! Sorry if you didn’t want to read a long post: there are 200+ Republican seats in the House, and most of them can now be challenged *evil grin* Sooooo here we go!

In Alabama, Districts 01 and 03 are suddenly in play. 06 should be challenged to see if an upset is possible. So that’s, 2 seats.

Alaskan House Seat appears out of play, but it’s just outside the Hackett range, and the 3rd parties kinda set the numbers off-kilter…

In Arizona, Districts 01, 02, 05, and 08 are all in play. The Dems also failed to run anyone in 03 and 06, so those are unknows. Let’s say 3 seats.

In Arkansas, District 03 is in play. I won’t count it towards the Dems though… I’m trying to be as ungenerous as possible.

For California, Districts 03, 04, 11, 24, 25, 26, 44, 46, 49, and 50 are all in play. A few others are in Hackett range, and 22 was unopposed. So let’s say… 5 seats.

Colorado’s 04, 06, and 07 are all in play. Add another seat!

Connecticut’s 02, 04, and 05 are in play. 1 more seat.

Delaware’s seat is in Hackett range, but it’s too far out to be added.

In Florida, Districts 06, 08, 12, 13, 15, 18, and 22 are all in play. Furthermore, 04, 07, 09, 24, and 25 were unopposed. Add another 5!

In Georgia, only District 11 is in play, but 01, 06, 07, and 10 were unopposed. Add 1 more seat.

In Illinois, Districts 06, 10, 11, 13, and 15 are in play. Add 2 more seats.

In Indiana, Districts 02, 08 and 09 are in play. Add another seat.

Iowa’s 01, 02, 04, and 05 are in play. Add 2 seats.

In Kansas, 02 is in play, and 01 was unopposed. Add another.

In Kentucky, 03 and 04 are in play, and 05 was unopposed. 1 more seat.

Louisiana… uh… ok there were 2 runoff elections that I don’t have the results for, but Districts 03 and 07 are in play [heck, I think we have one of those anyway!], and 04 was unopposed. Let’s say 1 more seat.

Michigan’s 04, 07, 08, 09, and 11 are in play. Add 2 seats.

In Minnesota, Districts 01, 02, and 03 are available. Add another seat.

Mississippi’s 01 and 03 were uncontested. Impossible to know if seat in play.

Missouri’s 06 is in play. No added seats though.

In Nebraska, Districts 01 and 02 are in play. Add a seat.

In Nevada, District 03 is in play. No new seats though.

New Hampshire’s 01 and 02 are both in play. Add a seat.

New Jersey’s 03, 05, and 07 are in play. Add a seat.

In New Mexico, Districts 01 and 02 are in play. Add a seat.

In New York, Districts 03, 13, 24, 26, and 29 are in play. Add 2 seats.

In North Carolina, 05, 08, 10, and 11 are in play. Add 2 seats.

In Ohio [hehehe], Districts 01, 02, 03, 04, 07, 12, 14, and 15 are in play. Add 4 seats.

In Oklahoma, 01 is in play, and 03 and 04 were unopposed. Add another seat.

In Pennsylvania, Districts 03, 04, 06, 07, 08, 15, 16, and 18 are in play, and 05, 10, and 19 were unopposed. Add 5 more.

In South Carolina, Districts 01 and 03 were unopposed. Don’t add any though.

Tennessee’s District 07 was unopposed. No additions.

In Texas, 01, 02, 19, 21, 22, 24, and 32 are in play, and 03, 10, 13, and 14 were unopposed. Add 4 seats.

Utah’s 03 is in play. Don’t add any.

In Virginia, Districts 02, 04, 05, 10, and 11 are in play, and 01, 06, and 07 were unopposed. Add 3 more seats.

Washington’s 04, 05, and 08 are in play. Add 1 more seat.

West Virginia’s 02 is in play. Don’t add any seats.

Lastly, Wyoming’s seat is in play. Don’t add any though.

I want to make it clear that those seat numbers are in reality meaningless. I’m not taking into account dozens of factors [strength of local/state parties, for instance], and I’m also not including margins that Hackett himself would have bested [”Hackett range”]. Nor should we simply limit ourselves to these districts. We need to get out there and put a candidate into each and every congressional district in this country, no matter how red we think it is! We need to do a massive grassroots support for each and every one of those candidates, no matter how bad the odds might look. If we do that, on the Republicans’ home turf, we will force them to waste away their funding resources, and in some of these places, we will win. Then we can change this country from the reactive agenda they pursue, and begin to act Progressively to change this nation for the better.

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So President Bush has sorta, half-assedly come out in favor of “exposing” kids to Intelligent Design in public schools, presumably in science classes. To which the science community… well, it wasn’t exactly shocked by this announcement, but the science community responded in outrage. Now, I could go on a lengthy diatribe rebutting the assertions of those advocating intelligent design or other creationist pseudosciences, or outlining the many proofs for macroevolution, or even attempting to explain the vast amount of information we have on human evolution, but it would be a waste of breath. Instead, I’ll simply mimic what Wonkette had to say about it:

Teaching [Intelligent Design] as [an] “alternative” to evolution is a little like teaching “magic” as an alternative to physics, which […] would at least explain the president’s belief in the missile defense program.

Edit: Besides my response to Dale in comments below, I’d like to also add this from The Drunken Lagomorph:

God is a pretty smart gal/guy. Don’t you think that He/She, when creating the world, would put evolution in place? Kind of a “low-maintenance� plan? It’s a genius system, really. One that may be of divine creation in itself. Why should God upgrade the world every few thousand years? Why not build in an adaptation system (i.e. evolution) to do the upgrading for Him/Her?

I do NOT think that keeping an open mind to scientific discoveries and being a Christian are mutually exclusive. God gave us our brain and curiousity and intelligence. Isn’t the blind disregard of scientific progress in order to unquestioningly adhere to old myths and superstition a slap in God’s face? [emphasis in original]

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