Is a Democrat-majority Senate a good bet in the midterms?

At first glance, the upcoming midterm elections seem more likely than not to result in a Republican-controlled Senate — at least, that’s what the polls and the pundits think. It’s not an overwhelming consensus, as most believe Republicans will only scrape by.  

The betting markets disagree, but in a strange way. As of this writing, two of the most cited national ratings have the partisan balance in doubt. The Cook Political Report’s Senate ratings have Democrats gaining one seat, with three toss-up races (Maine, Michigan and Ohio), for a 49-48 lead for Republicans. RealClearPolitics is historically more cautious about calling races, and this midterm is no exception. It has eight toss-ups, but it has North Carolina leaning toward the Democrats.

Those ratings are good news for Democrats, as very rarely does the party out of power lose an incumbent or open seat to the party holding the White House. If that holds, Georgia, Michigan and New Hampshire will stay in the Democratic column. That would shift the RealClearPolitics map to 48 for the Democrats and 47 for the Republicans. 

The polling points to a nail-biter of an election night. The RealClear polling averages have the Democratic candidate leading in North Carolina by nearly 7 points, in New Hampshire by close to 4 points and in Georgia by almost 3 points. After that, it gets very tricky. In Texas, the three polls taken since the primary have Ken Paxton (R) leading by 2 points, by 1 point and tied. Ohio is dead even, but that is due to one recent poll that had Democrat Sherrod Brown up 8 points. All previous polls had Republican Sen. Jon Husted leading. Until more polling comes in, Ohio is a toss-up.

Michigan Democrats may hand Republicans a big........

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