Voting this morning/projections

Turnout was not heavy in my Alexandria, Virginia precinct, but there was a line. It was heavier than the usual midterm election is a safe Democratic district. Many people who first voted in 2008 were there.

This is a District where the President did nothing. If Obama voters turned out with no urging here, they are likely to show up in other parts of the state where the President did make an appearance.

My projection is that of the 63 seats that are at risk, half will go to each party - meaning that the Republicans will gain only 32 seats, leaving the Democrats with a seven seat majority (without some of its weakest members who voted GOP anyway).

This will continue the run of good luck for San Francisco, which gets to keep its Speaker.

On a related not, Sharon Angle will fall to large Latino turnout in Las Vegas. Murkowski or McAdams will win in Alaska and O'Donnell will lose in Delaware. The Tea Party Express and their hero, Sarah Palin, will be blamed for the fact that the Democrats are keeping Congress. Her presidential bid (and mine) will end tonite).

Finally, Bristol Palin will be voted off of Dancing with the Stars.

If I should be wrong, a rump group of Republican moderates will begin to vote with the Democrats on fiscal issues in both houses (especially the debt ceiling) - while the tax cuts on the middle class will be made permanent during the Lame Duck Session, along with the repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell. Taxes on the rich will go away and the Republicans will have to swallow Clinton era inheritance taxes.

The secret to bipartisanship during the Clinton years was never the leadership cooperating with Clinton (except on a very few issues, like NAFTA, Welfare Reform and Capital Gains Tax Cuts), but because a group of moderate Republicans consistently rolled the leadership. This will happen again.