Election Night Could Mean Trouble for Cotton’s Interests
November 2, 2010 If Rasmussen polling data is accurate, Senator Blanche Lincoln (D-AR) will lose her Senate seat tonight, and with it, her Chairmanship of the Senate’s Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry.
The Rasmussen Report of October 31 said: “Arkansas Senator Blanche Lincoln remains on track to be the one Senate Democrat sure to lose her job on Election Day.”
Republican Congressman John Boozman holds a commanding lead of 55 percent to Lincoln’s 36 percent. There are only 4 percent undecided, and 5 percent who prefer another candidate. Even if Lincoln were to turn all of the undecideds and those who prefer someone else, mathematically Boozman is safe, according to Rasmussen’s numbers.
If the GOP should take the Senate – which is unlikely, but it could be close – you would have to bet that Georgia Senator Saxby Chambliss, currently Ranking Republican on the Committee, would be the next Chair.
Barring a minor miracle, which would put Chambliss in Lincoln’s vacated position, the cotton industry is put in a precarious position. President Obama has said that the Farm Bill of 2008 should be reopened to:
- Reduce payment limits by 25 percent.
- Reduce the average gross income limit to $250,000.
- Terminate storage credits.
- Reduce Monetary Award Program (MAP) funding by 20 percent.
Lincoln says she often reminds Obama that he voted for the Bill that he now wants to reopen. In the opposing party, Chambliss won’t have much of Obama’s ear.
The pundits say that it could take from two to five days to unravel the Senate race in Nevada between incumbent Democrat Majority Leader Harry Reed and Republican challenger Sharron Angle. Rasmussen gives Angle a 4 point lead, and she’s been ahead in the last four Rasmussen surveys. But turnout will ultimately win or lose this one.
Lincoln will probably know her fate before the first owl hoots tonight.
Regardless of your political persuasion, losing Lincoln, and the low odds of Chambliss taking over her position, are not real swell things for the Cotton Belt.
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