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Update: Title fixed. Apologies--my editor is a sucky blogger.
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There seems to be some buzz that the 2010 elections are looking up for Democrats lately. For example, even right-wing pollsters F&M; and Rasmussen shows Joe Sestak making the Pennsylvania Senate campaign competitive. Even while a divided Democratic field is likely to result in a Republican win in the HI-01 special election, the Democratic candidate in the PA-12 special election surprisingly seems headed to victory. Also, both PPP and Rasmussen show Elaine Marshall within reach in the North Carolina Senate campaign. Further, earlier today PPP also put President Obama at his strongest job approval numbers since October.
There are indeed glimmers of hope out there, but the broad indicators do not yet show enough movement toward Democrats to suggest a trend. Over the past month, Democrats have gained about 2% net on Republicans in the national generic congressional ballot, while President Obama has gained about 3% net in job approval. Here are the six month trends from Pollster.com, removing Zogby interactive polls from the mix:
Six month trend, National Generic Congressional Ballot
Six month trend, President Obama job approval
The electoral environment has been pretty stagnant over the past six months. This recent 2-3% improvement for Democrats could be the start of an actually upward trend of Dems, or it could be yet another small, possibly random movement well within the margin of error for polling averages (which is, according to my research, 1.8% total error at 50% confidence, 6.0% total error at 95% confidence).
Even if the electoral environment is static (and it probably is), it does at least feel like there is more to be optimistic about as a Democrat lately. The Republican rise has at last been stopped, the economy probably is going to keep slowly improving, primary challengers are making things interesting for both parties, and legislation, however watered down, is starting to pass. It all lacks the epic feel of the 2008 elections, or of the health insurance reform fight, but it also lacks the apocalyptic feel of the special election for Massachusetts Senate. It seems likely that Democrats have already hit rock bottom, and 2010 will only keep getting better from here on out.
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