Picking up on a diary from 2006 about tracking competitive districts, I continued the tracking for the 2008 and 2010 elections. With the new district data, I can start the "Outlook" series for 2012.
In 2008 I tried a "Partisan Factor" (PF), inspired by a comment in the aforementioned diary, in which I averaged the margins in registration, 2002-Gov., 2004-Pres., 2004-Sen., and 2006-Sen. In 2010 I used just the registration and the 2008 presidential numbers. For 2012 I will try a new "Partisan Factor" using the registration margin, 2008-Pres., 2010-Sen., and 2010-Gov, with different weights.
Also, for the 2008 and 2010 races, the numbers represent the difference between the parties given their share of the 2-party vote. For example, in CA-03, Obama won 56.3-43.7, Fiorina won 51-49, and Brown won 53.8-46.2.
Taking into account some suggestions and comments, I made some changes to my previous attempt at redistricting California. I conceded an additional 2 seats to the GOP, which concomitantly makes a number of other seats more strongly Democratic. The additional 2 safe GOP seats are CA-4 and CA-48. Here's what version 2 looks like, overall:
I decided to try my hand at redistricting California's Congressional districts for 2010-2012, using Dave's Redistricting App. After playing around with it a bit, here's what the map I came up with looks like overall:
Here's the 2008 Obama/McCain vote in California, on the precinct level:
(bump cause I like congressional and numbers - promoted by Lucas O'Connor)
Turnout from Tuesday's primary by party. Every district with a Republican leaning PVI plus Barbara Lee just for fun and comparison's sake. Of the Republican leaning districts, Dem turnout was higher in 8 and close in several others. Might be an interesting November. Just sayin.
Numbers on the flip.
Update: I should have mentioned in the first place, there are still no Democratic candidates in CA-02, CA-19, CA-22, or CA-25. Turnout was dead even in the 19th and higher for Dems in the 25th, just for starters.
BENAWU posted another of his great Congressional race tracker updates yesterday, announcing that 317 out of 435 House races have confirmed candidates (or presumed returning incumbents). But despite this early success, in California there are only confirmed challengers for 10 out of 19 sitting Republicans. Only Texas has more unfilled races right now, and it's friggin Texas. As BENAWU notes, all of these districts had challengers in 2006, so some level of infrastructure exists for a challenge. Now many of these districts are going to be tough sledding for any Democrat thanks to redistricting in 2002, but anyone who's been paying attention the last few years knows that the Republican party is potentially vulnerable almost anywhere. The goal of filling every race proved its worth last year with surprising success in supposedly safe districts across the country. Just ask Jerry McNerney or Nancy Boyda or Jim Webb for starters.
Last week I ran down the unused money from last year's unopposed and underopposed California members of Congress. It was a long list. 22 districts held by Democrats fielded no Republican challenger who met a very low bar of fundraising legitimacy. Really not impressive, but really not surprising either. So what about the flipside? How did Democrats do in going after Republicans?
Democrats left only one California seat unopposed, and failed to raise money in one other. Of the 21 Republican-held seats, only 4 qualified as as unopposed or underopposed (challenger raising less than $25,000). It suggests two things to me. One, Democrats are already doing a pretty good job of funding candidates in red districts (although there's still room to improve of course), and two, that strong funding only goes so far given the way these districts are drawn. So as I would be cautioning anyways, fundraising is only one piece of the puzzle. It still takes the right candidate in the right context.
