House Pickups

Looks like Chris Murphy beat Nancy Johnson (who ran one of the nastiest ads in the entire cycle) in CT-05, Zack Space took Bob Ney's seat in OH-18, and Paul Hodes (another netroots candidate) is defeating incumbent Charlie Bass in NH-02. That brings us to six pickups, and there appear to be a lot more out there.

Webb down 20,000 19,000 to Allen in Virginia with 92% reporting.

I'm watching Ned Lamont concede the race in Connecticut. That is a disappointment. I have to say I didn't buy the whole "Lamont's ground game means 5 points" against a sitting US Senator. People knew Joe and there was basically no Republican in the race (Schlesinger was a stand-up comedian). I think he ran as dishonest a race as you'll ever see, with the comparisons to Nixon being very apt. The biggest hawk in the Senate ran as an antiwar Democrat - and he got away with it.

More later.

UPDATE: Wow, is Deborah Pryce and Mary Jo Kilroy close. Same with Tim Mahoney and Joe Negron (formerly Mark Foley's seat). Republican Geoff Davis just took KY-02, that's a slight disappointment. Republican Clay Shaw is down in FL-22. Rob Simmons and Joe Courtney are within 1,000 votes of one another in CT-02.

UPDATE: Fighting Dem Chris Carney in PA-10. I lived there very briefly in the mid-90s, and it's practically West Texas up there. You have to be surprised by that, even if the opponent had strangled his mistress (Don Sherwood).

It's so great to see netroots candidates like Paul Hodes and Chris Carney come through.

UPDATE: Now it's ALL THREE bellweather House seats in Indiana going to the Democrats. And Joe Sestak takes out crazy Curt Weldon! Patrick Murphy's up early on as well. Shaping up to be a solid, if unspectacular night.

UPDATE: Just a little something. I just saw Stephanie Herseth's name flash across on MSNBC. Now, in 2004 Herseth was the biggest netroots victory, winning a special election in South Dakota's at-large seat in Congress. She won by the skin of her teeth. When she flashed by I couldn't believe what I saw. 72% for Herseth! That's pretty incredible. It feels really good to get back in the game this time around. I hope we can pull off the double-whammy, but regardless, the Democratic Party is vital again. And I have to attribute that to the progressive movement.