With most analysts and media predicting a Democratic "wave" in November, what needs to happen for Republicans to reverse the "trend," if there is one?

If nothing else, a strategist might point to energy prices. The economy has been going exceptionally well, yet the President's numbers on handling it remain low. Gas prices are the one economic area which has gone sharply the wrong way. They are finally showing some relief.

Successes in the War on Terror will help, too. We are succeeding in a major offensive in Afghanistan right now, and the British bust thwarted a major plot which targeted Americans.

Things aren't nearly so dark for the GOP as the formerly Mainstream Media (fMSM) would have us believe. Over at Townhall.com, Donald Lambro lays it out:

Usually cautious elections tracker Charlie Cook summed up the GOP's future this way over Labor Day weekend: If "the political climate remains as it is today -- a very big 'if' -- Republicans will likely lose the House and their dominance of the nation's governorships but hang on to the Senate by a thread."

But interviews with key Democrats who are advising all levels of their party's campaign apparatus and with Republican officials suggest the big "if" that Cook worries about is a wild-card issue or event that could give the GOP a winning hand. Maybe not enough to avoid losses in the House and Senate and among the governorships, but possibly enough to keep both chambers in GOP control.

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The tightening of the generic numbers is one reason for the Democrats' reticence. But other factors have created self-doubts about their chances: One is the GOP's superior voter-turnout ground game and the higher redistricting walls they have built since the 2000 census to protect their incumbents. "The way the congressional district lines have been drawn (around GOP-held House seats) is going to be a challenge," Burton admitted.

As for those tightening voter-preference polls, Democratic officials told me they have seen similar movement in their internal surveys.

"What you are seeing is, yes, some Republicans are coming home in certain districts and there is some firming up of the Republican vote," another prominent Democratic adviser told me.

There "aren't as many vulnerable Republicans now as a month or more ago," he said.

Read the whole essay at the link above.

Hey - wait a minute! There "aren't as many vulnerable Republicans now as a month or more ago," he said . . . but but but didn't genuine expert media stars like Stu Rothenberg and Charles Cook just go on record predicting Democratic takeover of the House?

So, the trend is going . . . which way, again?

;-)