Why things could get better for Dems

You can put me in the column of folks who don't think things have gotten better for Democrats in September. Yes, things have gotten better in some individual races (California Senate, Washington Senate, Ohio Governor come to mind.) But they've also gotten worse in some individual races (West Virginia Senate, Ohio Senate, Wisconsin Senate come to mind.) And looking at the national indicators I just don't see a whole lot of progress.

I do, however, think Democrats could end up doing better in November than the polls suggest right now for two big reasons- 1) most races right now have a lot more Democratic undecideds than Republicans and 2) the enthusiasm gap isn't going to do anything but shrink.

First a look at the undecideds. We have polled 14 Senate or Gubernatorial races since Labor Day. In 12 of them there are more undecided Democrats than Republicans and it's usually by a wide margin- the average across those 14 contests is 17% more undecided Democrats than Republicans.

GOP voters are incredibly unified this year and most Republican candidates don't have much room to grow with their base over the final month of the campaign. There's no guarantee that the undecided Democrats will end up coming home but more than likely they will. Last year's New Jersey Governor's race is a good example of this.

Comparing our poll in mid-September to our final poll of the race Jon Corzine gained 8 points with Democrats while Chris Christie saw just a 3 point increase with Republicans. Obviously it wasn't enough in the end for Corzine to win but he gained a lot of ground and if the same thing happens for Dems who are down by 5 points right now rather than double digits it could put them over the top.

Here's the party breakdown of the undecideds in races we've polled since Labor Day:

Contest	% of undecideds who are Dems	% of undecideds who are GOP
Illinois Senate	46	27
Illinois Governor	58	14
North Carolina Senate	57	21
New Mexico Governor	62	24
Michigan Governor	37	25
Wisconsin Senate	40	16
Wisconsin Governor	35	11
West Virginia Senate	46	39
California Senate	51	20
California Governor	51	21
Delaware Senate	45	34
Kentucky Senate	46	36
New Hampshire Senate	25	37
New Hampshire Governor	11	47

And now a look at the enthusiasm gap. Republicans have been extremely excited about voting in this election all the way since the summer of 2009. GOP voters really can't get any more enthused about voting this year than they already are. Democrats have been significantly lagging on this front for most of the cycle but there are indications it's getting better. For instance our July national poll found 51% of Democrats 'very excited' about voting this fall. In September that figure had increased to 59%.

We also saw in our polling of the New Jersey and Virginia Gubernatorial races as well as the Massachusetts Senate contest that the electorate started looking more Democratic as the election got closer- the party's voters who weren't interested in the election 1 or 2 months out started getting more engaged in the final weeks. It wasn't enough (largely because the party had weak candidates in all 3 of those races) but again it could be in a race with different circumstances.

It's going to be a bad election cycle for Democrats- there's no doubt about that. But as Democratic interest in the election increases and the party's undecided voters come home it might not be quite as bad as it looks today.