WSJ: Republicans Could Take Back Senate

Republican control of the House after the November midterm elections is a given, but can the GOP win back the Senate, too?

Taking back both chambers of Congress would be a dramatic repudiation of Obama's failed policies.

From a Wall Street Journal analysis of the November Congressional races:

Leaders of both parties have believed for months that Republicans could win the House, where every lawmaker faces re-election. But a change of party control in the Senate, where only a third of the members are running and Republicans must capture 10 seats, seemed out of the question.
Battle for the Senate

That's no longer the case. The emergence of competitive Republican candidates in Wisconsin, Washington and California—Democratic-leaning states where polls now show tight races—bring the number of seats that Republicans could seize from the Democrats to 11.

Democrats now control the Senate 59-41 — after the death of Democratic Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, who was replaced by Republican Sen. Scott Brown — including two independents who usually vote with them. That means Republicans need 10 seats to take a 51-49 advantage.

Republicans would have to win virtually every competitive race to retake the Senate, without losing any seats of their own — clearly an uphill climb. The trouble for Democrats is that many trends are against them. Surveys show that Republicans are more motivated than Democrats to go to the polls, and that voters are looking for new leadership in Congress.

"I think there is definitely a chance" of losing the Senate, said Democratic strategist Gary Nordlinger, a Washington-based media consultant. "I wouldn't call it a probability, but there is certainly a chance."

Read the full story by Naftali Bendavid at the newspaper's Web site.