Sargent breaks down the Republican party’s unpopularity:
Polling released this week by the Washington Post and ABC News found the GOP’s unfavorability ratings among Americans at an all-time high of 63 percent. But a closer look at the numbers reveals that this has been accompanied by a massive collapse in 2013 of the GOP brand among core constituencies important in midterm elections: Independents, women, and seniors. The crack Post polling team has produced a new chart demonstrating that in the last year — since just before the 2012 election – there’s been a truly astonishing spike in the GOP’s unfavorable ratings among these core groups
The Crystal Ball has put out new House rankings:
To sum it up, the race for the House is getting more interesting by the day.
Republicans remain favored to retain control — call it Likely Republican in the parlance of our ratings — but the shutdown has shaken things up. At this point, we’re now expecting a small Democratic gain, instead of the small Republican gain we were forecasting earlier in the cycle. That prognostication is likely to change once Congress tackles the same old fiscal deadlock in January and February. Have Republicans learned anything from their October debacle? We shall see.
Nate Cohn remains cautious:
If there’s anything I could get people to understand about the next election, it’s this: Even a 2006 or 2010-esque tsunami might not give Democrats control of the House. That might seem shocking. In 2006, Democrats won 31 seats; Republicans won 63 in 2010. Today, Democrats only need 17 seats—which might not sound like much. But the fact is that Republicans just aren’t exposed. To turn the “tsunami” into an extended metaphor, an unprecedented share of the Republican caucus has evacuated to high ground.
The Dish 