How to Pick Winners

[Geee]

National Review:

One of the interesting things about recent elections is that Republicans have tended to do better the farther you go down the ballot.

They’ve lost the presidency twice in a row, and in four of the last six contests. They’ve failed to win a majority in the U.S. Senate, something they accomplished in five election cycles between 1994 and 2006.

But they have won control of the House of Representatives in the last two elections, and in eight of the last ten cycles.

And they’ve been doing better in elections to state legislatures than at any time since the 1920s.

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One reason for this is that, as I have written, Democratic voters are clustered in large metropolitan areas, which helps them in the Electoral College but hurts in legislatures with equal-population districts.

But there’s another reason, which has been particularly glaring in races for the U.S. Senate: candidate quality.

Over the years, I’ve noticed that Democrats tend to have a disproportionate share of candidates with sharp political instincts and ambition.

Probably that’s natural. Democrats tend to want more government, and smart Democrats like to go into politics. Smart Republicans tend to take other paths.