Or even Joe? Will he return to (D) (no, I don't think we should welcome him with open arms, but rather look with grave suspicion upon him), or go (R) on us?

Gimme some love and some comments here, folks. This is a serious question I was wondering about today.

I doubt you'll see the Maine senators or specter flip, or they would have when jeffords did.  

Lieberman, I believe, will try and relish his independent status.  He'll love playing kingmaker.

If defections happen, they'll be in the house.

I don't see obvious benefit in flipping: they're not going to get committee chairs, and many are already likely to become ranking members.

A-HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA...

Ahem....sorry.

Gordon is thinking about retirement.  Arlen, I dunno, but with his cancer and all, if it gets to be a drain on him....I suspect he's presently in his last term one way or another.

Snowe...give her Fisheries and environment as related to coastline, tidal, waters/oceans....maybe.

Yes, this has been on my mind too, but I think it's wishful thinking.  I hadn't considered Shelby or Smith, but it still seems doubtful, overall: these folks are such fixtures that they are staying put.  Why wouldn't Chafee just go independent and caucus with Dems, to save himself tons of stress, money, and a Senate seat?  I don't know either, but it sort of sets a bar.  Frankly, Jeffords took me totally by surprise and he'd been my Senator for a long time before that.

Not saying it couldn't happen, but I wouldn't look for it.  That said, I'd wager on Specter if I wagered on anybody, but the odds probably improve after we win a big margin in the Senate in '08.

Specter is only an administration critic on Sunday mornings.

If you were Shays in CT. wouldn't you consider a switch.  He was probably saved from losing by the Lieberman fiasco, but if he went to the other side, I'm sure he would coast in his blue district.  There is the matter of his pro-war stance and his nasty shot at Ted Kennedy, but I think Shays has a lot more in common with Democrats than Republicans.

Richard Shelby would probably prefer to be a Democrat.  When he changed parties, he made a private announcement that he wouldn't get elected in Alabama if he didn't.  He had, for a few years afterwards, a relatively liberal voting record for a Republican, but the state pushed him farther and farther right.  If you look carefully, you will still see some difference between Shelby and Sessions of Alabama, who was always Republican.  I'm sure that, if the state were something other than    60% Republican, he would consider switching back, and you could probably work with him.  He has had a good relationship with the Black community in the past.

Two (R) Senators could easily say,
"There go my people! I must follow
them, for I am their leader."

They would be Sununu in newly blue
New Hampshire, where he would join
the two new Representatives, and
work with the (D) governor and
legislature on matters concerning
the state he "represents."

The other is Voinovich of newly
scrubbed-blue Ohio.

I'd take them in, begrudgingly,
find a couple of nice little
subcommittee chairs and all.

But not likely to happen.

Seems the main motivation for any
Member contemplating a switch would be
if the conscience were so offended
by the unending lies, the cheating
and stealing, the authoritarianism ...
but since Jeffords, I haven't seen
any (R) in Congress show much sign
of taking great offence.

The second motivation would be power
and, well, more power, or less. So
sure, offer them little subcommittees
or whatever. Harry Reid will know
just what to do. If they stay where
they are, well, at least they will
have good seats to watch the action.

Coming from Oregon I can tell you Gordon Smith would not flip. He's a lot more right wing than the MSM make him out to be. He did an image altering to pass himself off as another Mark Hatfield.

I'm guessing there aren't any big candidates, except maybe Susan Collins, if she becomes convinced it's the only way to be a player. Richard Shelby has already flipped once and Alabama is still solid Repug.

Pro choice, fiscal conservative loses primary to right wing wacko, who in turn beats underfunded Dem candidate.  (Add this to the list of ones that got away.  Seriously.  Renier may not have been the strongest candidate, but she could have won this race.)

Schwarz flips to the Dems and beats Walberg in 08.  The best Dem on the bench is Mark Schaurer, and he'll bide his time for a statewide office--I expect it'll be Gov Schaurer in '10.  

Two new Dems have joined the bench as state reps, but they'll need more time.  Speaking of which, one of these new state reps, Marty Griffen, won the Jackson MI district, birthplace of the GOP.  (When it was a much different party.)

Do we even want them? When you get your ass beat as badly as the GOP just did, you'll get enough of the moderate fringe of the GOP triangulating and being "bipartisan" that you can effectively get lots of things done as if you had a slightly larger majority. There's already a majority in place and a large payload of Democratic senators who want the perks of the majority. No one's going to be excited about losing out on a committee chair to gain the dubious services of Olympia Snowe.

Rumsfeld was the elephant in the room and now he's gone, this soothes a lot of the jumpy Republicans, some of whom just had the biggest scare of their career last night, because they have some political cover again now that the "stay the course" page has been ripped out of the playbook.

I don't think there will be any defections. Lieberman will find it convenient to caucus with the Dems, since they will be the majority and he can get some really juicy committee assignments. And the other Senators have kept their party affiliation this long, why would they change now?

As for the House, most of the Northeastern moderates who could have switched parties were defeated last night. Nancy Johnson and Jim Leach come to mind. There will be only a handful of Republican moderates left in the 110th Congress, with most of the caucus being a far-right minority.

I don't think we'll see any defections.

I do think we'll pick up some 'flips' through resignation.  I think you'll see a lot of old timers who won't relish being in the minority, losing their relevence, staffing, office, committee chairs, etc and decide to walk away.  Or maybe they're going to be named in ethics investigations and don't want to deal with that.  

Hastert and Reynolds are two that strike me as walking away and letting their Democratic governors appoint their replacements.  There might be a few others.  In the Senate, Specter might be the best candidate to walk away.  He completely loses relevence and he has health issues.  Maybe Smith in Oregon, but I don't know how much of a drop-off in power he would experience.

He could defect to Connecticut for Lieberman and try for the Senate seat in 2012....

A defection is an indication that the losing party has become too extreme and gives the party an incentive to change their ways.  On the other hand, it saves millions of dollars in trying to contest what would otherwise be a very competitive seat.  Just in terms of sheer utility, I think we should only embrace Repugs with open arms who would allow us to free up resources in other races across the country.

A politician will not switch parties unless 1) they are in great fear of losing their job and the switch will be advantageous; and 2) they have become so disgusted with their party that they want to make a statement.

Case in point: Shelby switching in Alabama and Rodney Alexander switching in Louisiana.  Shelby saw the writing on the wall and realized that he would have a bullseye on his back for the rest of his political career if he remained a Democrat.  With Alexander, Karl Rove gave him an ultimatum that he would basically be targeted indefinitely.  The moves, though unfortunate, were the right things to do if you wanted to save your own skin (See Lieberman, Joseph).

There are very few GOP senators who have to worry about job security in a blue state.  Snowe and Collins come to mind as prime candidates for a switch simply for their moderate views and Maine's Democratic tilt, but they are simply too popular to ever have to worry about being beaten.  I wouldn't expect Specter or Smith to switch either.

I think the greatest statement that the Republicans have gone too far is for John Warner to caucus with the Democrats in what would probably be his last two years in the Senate.  Perhaps Senator-elect Webb could convince him to jump...

I agree with folks that say that most of the GOP senators are unlikely to flip any time soon. But I'd also point out that this a long-term project, and while we can't expect a quick "payoff", the effort will have other benefits:

1. As things go now, Lieberman has far too much leverage.  We can't trust him at all at this point, especially since his threat to flip make him a problem: and since he'd flip the Senate with it, the temptation is there.


2. It's unlikely that the GOP will try to piss off the other "moderates" (better: "saner conservatives") as they did to Jeffords.  So we'll need to entice people a bit more.  Making nice with folks like Snow on issues where they differ with the rest of the GOP caucus is a good start.


3. Getting closer to the moderates will create conflict in the GOP. Folks like Mitch McConnell are pretty ruthless partisans, and it's going to be hard for him to resist heavy-handed attempts to keep the caucus disciplined.  And even if he doesn't: folks like Grover Norquist and the Club For Groth haven't gone away.


4. Speaking of GN and the CFG: remember that they knocked off a centrist GOP Congressman, and damn near knocked off Lincoln Chaffey even before we finished him off.  Believe you me, Snow, Collins and the rest of them noticed that and remember.


5. When we try to appease Lieberman, we move the country to the right.  When the GOP leadership tries to appease their sane wing, it moves the country left.  'Nuff said.

Let's McConnell et al's job as hard as possible.  It will make it easier to get bills out of the Senate, and it will reduce Lieberman's power.  This is all good, so let the games begin.

If Joe looks ahead to 2008 he will soon realise that the Senate is highly likely to be controlled by the democrats due to the seats up for re-election, so the attraction of switching to the Republicans at this point in time is minimal.