Obama isn’t the only candidate whose numbers are rising. So is the collective fate of a Senate that could remain in Democratic hands. There’s any number of guesses for why it’s happening, but as Nate Silver breaks it down, the odds of Democrats retaining the Senate is now over 70%.
That has consequences not only for imagining a legislative strategy in the upcoming lame-duck session poised to possibly become one of the most important in American history, but how President Obama makes strategic campaign decisions based on that reality. The clearest consequence for the campaign is the degree to which President Obama doubles-down on taxes; the more he talks about top marginal rates, the easier it is to argue he has a mandate in that area when it’s time to repeal the cuts in January.
Silver also points out another possibility: that Obama wins but Democrats retain only 50 seats, the most likely statistical scenario. It’s a good reminder that either way, Democrats aren’t going to come close to cloture-immunity this time around.