US Senate goes down to the wire

In the Senate, it's too close to call.

On the eve of the 2006 midterm elections, a last-minute tightening in the polls of Senate contests from Montana to Rhode Island to Maryland has thrown some doubt into the calculations of pundits who had come to see a Democratic takeover as possible.

Many analysts – including conservatives – can see a clear path to a Democratic net gain of five seats in the 100-seat chamber, which would bring the partisan balance sheet to a 50-50 tie. That would effectively keep control in the hands of the Republicans, with Vice President Cheney casting tie-breaking votes in his role as president of the Senate.

But it was that elusive sixth seat that had kept many analysts from firmly predicting a change in control. Now, the last-minute volatility both in the nationwide polls gauging voter preferences and in individual races leaves the outcome even more in doubt.

"There tends to be a tightening at the end, when people begin to perhaps reappraise the preferences that they had early on," says Ross Baker, a political scientist at Rutgers University in New Jersey. "New evidence comes in. People are reluctant to abandon old party allegiances."

Politicians themselves can become brand names in their home states, and thus, voters in Rhode Island and Montana who once appeared set to throw out their two Republican senators Lincoln Chafee and Conrad Burns may be having second thoughts, judging by the tightening of polls there. Senator Chafee, a first-termer whose father was long-serving Sen. John Chafee, can count on some reserve affection for the Chafee name and for Lincoln's status as the Senate's most liberal Republican; Senator Burns, who was caught up in the Jack Abramoff scandal, also may be coming out the other end of that crucible.

"My sense is that Burns may have gone through his roughest patch a couple of months ago," says Dr. Baker. "Sometimes voters are willing to hold onto an incumbent despite the warts."

And sometimes they're not. With the national mood toxic toward the Republican-controlled Capitol, and analysts foreseeing a "wave" election likely to sweep the Democrats into power in the House, it may too much for the most vulnerable Republican incumbents to withstand.

Still, not only do Democrats have to win the Montana and Rhode Island seats to build a Senate majority, they must also succeed in traditionally Republican areas. Two GOP incumbents are also widely seen as heading for defeat – Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania, the No. 3 Republican in the Senate, and Mike DeWine of Ohio. If Burns and Chafee go down and no Democratic-held seats change control – a big "if" – the Democrats must win two out of the three "fire wall" seats, in Tennessee, Virginia, and Missouri.

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