Hotline has the national race suddenly narrowing to two points with the following analysis.

-- The race has tightened in the last day. After trailing by 5-7 pts. for the last 10 days, McCain is now just 2 pts. behind Obama.

--One potential reason: Obama's one-time lead on the question of who'd best handle the economy has evaporated. Today, Obama and McCain are tied at 42%. Independent voters favor McCain on the economy by an 8 pt. margin (42-34%).

There's more...

For some reason, The Hotline is calling Paul Volker "Reagan's Fed Chair".  They note that he was first appointed by Carter, but still call him "Reagan's".  I'm a bit baffled by this.  Take this explanation of Volker's tenure as Fed Chair:

Little wonder Reagan liked Paul Volker so much. He had already made the unpopular but necessary decisions required to tame out-of-control inflation under Jimmy Carter and the inflation arc that had been building for about a decade before Carter took office was already showing signs of coming under control by the end of Reagans second year in office.

Oh, and, of course, Reagan really liked the idea that he would get the credit for the hard decisions Carter made in choosing the right person for the right job of Fed Chairman at the right time (to his political detriment) while he had to make virtually no unpopular decsions with respect to inflation and interest rates.

There's more...

I looked through five of the more prominent prediction services on the net (Roll Call, Charlie Cook, Larry Sabato, CQ Politics, and the National Journal/Hotline).  The overall snap shot available from these five sites is consistent and also consistent with Chris Bowers predictions.  Some of the overall and specific findings are discussed below.

These predictions sharply conflict with the Rahm Emanuel mindset.  Rather than 25 seats being up for grabs, 75 to 90 seats are in play.  This includes anywhere from 62 to 70 Republican seats.  Some of the individual predictions may seem laughable (Ben Nelson's Senate seat is not likely Republican by any stretch of the imagination), but the overall predictions are consistent.  The field is expanding rapidly.  Larry Sabato, for instance, has changed his top tier races from the Dirty Thirty to the Ferocious Fifty.  

There's more...

So Speaker Denny Haster has announced a Toll Free "Tipline" for any pages to report abuses in the past.  They will be protected and leads will be followed up.  Now why would Hastert and the Republicans do this instead of the FBI?  Because they need more names -- more members with "Page Issues" -- and if all goes well for the GOP, some of those names will be Democrats.

There have been reports that other pages have been contacting ABC about experiences with other members of the House. Since those sources are protected, the GOP obviously wants any information taht could implicate others, especially Democrats, so that they can make this a bi-partisan scandal.

So where is the tipline located?...

There's more...

Here is what the Hotline had to say about Dr. David Hunter, who is running as a Democrat in the Open Fifth Congressional District in Oklahoma:
David Hunter (D): A former CoS in a major hospital, he's running in OK 05 after being heavily recruited by the DCCC. He's seen as a good fundraiser, and though he faces a better-known candidate in the primary, his opponent's legal troubles will help him. http://hotlineblog.nationaljournal.com/. ..
To learn more about Dr. Hunter, please visit his website:
http://www.drhunterforcongress.com/porta l/index.php

There's more...