WaPo Model: GOP Has 86 Percent Chance of Winning Senate in 2014

[Geee]

Town Hall:

I wrote about a similar finding back in May, poking fun at the precision of this model (eighty-six percent, not eighty-five) as silly, while confessing I wasn't -- and still am not -- nearly as bullish on Republicans' chances as these Washington Post/Election Lab analysts are. Nevertheless, there's little doubt that Democrats are in for a difficult fight to maintain their Senate majority:

Our model suggests that the GOP has a very good chance of winning the Republican-leaning states: Alaska, Arkansas, Georgia, Kentucky, and Louisiana. That gives them five seats. They also have a better than 50-50 chance of winning Iowa, where Joni Ernst’s recent surge has made the race neck-and-neck—a trend that is consistent with what our model suggested about the Iowa race back in May. Meanwhile, Democrats have a good chance of winning Colorado, Michigan, and North Carolina.

 

That summary also assumes that Republicans will hold on to large leads in the contests to fill open seats in Montana, West Virginia and South Dakota. It also strangely lists Iowa is a likely Republican pick-up, while categorizing North Carolina as solid for Democrats. I'm dubious of both propositions, but this is all an imprecise science. Here's how the Election Lab Senate projection map looks at the moment, less than four months out from the midterms: