The warnings for Democrats in national polling data remain bleak and unmistakable,
from a demoralized progressive base to a revitalized hardcore right, with disenchanted
independents veering Republican. With employment trending poorly and no second
stimulus in sight, the current question is not whether the Democratic Party will be
beaten in the midterm but just how badly.

Before Republicans start to dream again of Karl Rove's hundred years of GOP domination,
however, they might consult the latest working paper by political demographer Ruy Teixeira,
who predicted the return of the Democrats back when things looked worst for his party during
the early Bush era. According to Teixeira, a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress,
every long-term trend in population, occupation and education still portends a Democratic
America in the 21st century.

By now many Americans are aware that the United States is becoming "majority-minority"
within the next few decades, a change that Teixeira predicts will occur by 2042. Between now
and then, the strongly Democratic orientation of minority voters -- African-Americans,
Latinos and Asian-Americans -- will continue to shape electoral results in most states.
At the same time, the share of conservative white working-class voters, who tend to
vote Republican, is declining...