Sean T at RCPVerified account

@SeanTrende Interesting. An indication of generally worse R senate candidates?

@DannyVinik I actually think it has something to do with the libertarians and good recruiting by Ds.

@SeanTrende Hmm libertarian idea is interesting. Are the 14 R candidates that ran ahead from earlier in 2000s? Or scattered across years?

@DannyVinik 6 in 00, 0 in 04, 4 in 08, 5 in 12.

@moelane @baseballcrank POTUS R.

@SeanTrende @moelane It's really a staggering indictment of the NRSC.

@baseballcrank @SeanTrende @moelane Wow. No kidding.

@SeanTrende That's bad, right? And how are you defining competitive, +/- how many points?

@GWhistorian Just through experience and recollection.

Goes a long way toward explaining why the GOP doesn't control the Senate today despite having won solid control of the House. @SeanTrende

@StarzandStrypz Metro areas tend to be Democrat. Harder to get Republican Senators in many states. @SeanTrende

@VictorB123 There's some truth to that, but Dems still do a much better job recruiting good candidates in competitive states. @SeanTrende

@StarzandStrypz Republicans COULD have had a winning R Senate candidate in DE, for example with Mike Castle. Ran O'Donnell @SeanTrende

@VictorB123 Yes. Then there's Sharron Angle, Rick Berg, Todd Akin, Dick Mourdock, Ken Buck... too many blown opportunities. @SeanTrende

@StarzandStrypz But worse, those candidates primaried a candidate that was beating the Dem head to head. @SeanTrende

@VictorB123 "The GOP," as you put it, is to blame for passively sitting around & allowing a bunch of clowns to go unvetted b4 its too late.