ANKARA, Turkey – A wooden pole used to suspend suspects by their arms. A baton used to beat prisoners on the soles of their feet. Cables used to give electric shocks.

All are displayed at an exhibit ahead of a referendum on changes to the constitution that was crafted in the wake of Turkey's 1980 military coup, which was marked by torture and other abuses.

On Sept. 12, the coup's 30th anniversary, Turks will vote on a package of 26 reforms that the government says will strengthen democracy and bring the 1982 constitution more in line with European norms — a key plank in the nation's EU bid.

Opposition figures charge the government is pushing the amendments to try to increase control over the courts. One measure would give parliament a say in appointing judges.

The referendum is shaping up as a vote of confidence for Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan's eight year-old government. But it has also become the latest battleground between Turkey's government, led by a rising class of pious Muslims, and staunchly secular circles that once held power.

"The decision is yours," said Erdogan late Tuesday. "On the one hand we have the coup constitution, on the other hand we have the constitution of the people."

Turkish opinion polls point to either a vote split down the middle or a very narrow majority for the "yes" camp. The proposed changes include more rights for women and children and collective wage bargaining for civil servants.

They would also increase the power of civilian courts over military ones and possibly pave the way for the trial of the leaders of the 1980 military coup that curbed years of civil strife but also led to the arrest, torture and extrajudicial killing of many activists.

Legal experts, however, say a statute of limitations will prevent the prosecution of then military chief Kenan Evren and his immediate subordinates who seized power in the early hours of Sept 12, 1980.

The changes underscore differences between the government and the courts, traditional guardians of the secular legacy of Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, who founded the country in 1923 after the Ottoman imperial collapse.

If the referendum passes, the number of Constitutional Court justices would increase to 17 from 11. A council that oversees prosecutors and judges nationwide would also increase to 22 members, from seven, and four of the members would be appointed by the president.

Nobel literature laureate Orhan Pamuk has said he sees the referendum as a means of reckoning with the coup and declared he would vote "yes."

But some see the referendum as an opportunity to strike a blow against the Islamic-rooted government, which they fear is slowly putting an Islamic stamp on their secular life.

"There may be some good things, I don't know. But the government is not good for Turkey, that is why my vote will be 'no,'" said student Tugce Ince.

Kemal Kilicdaroglu, the new leader of the country's largest pro-secular political force, the Republican People's Party, has charged the proposed amendments don't go far enough to scrap "the legacy of the Sept. 12 coup." He has called for a new constitution as well as rewording a military law that coup leaders have used to justify their actions.

Evren, who later became the country's president, shut down parliament, suspended the constitution, imprisoned civilian leaders and disbanded political parties before returning power to civilians three years later.

Some 650,000 people were detained in the days that followed the coup and 230,000 people were prosecuted in military courts, according to official figures. Some 300 people died in prison, including 171 people who died as a result of torture. There were 49 executions, including that of 17-year-old Erdal Eren, whose hanging for allegedly killing a soldier horrified Turks.

Leftist victims of the military takeover are exhibiting torture devices as well as letters and photographs of comrades who died, went missing or were tortured in the exhibition dubbed "The Museum of Shame."

A replica of the gallows used to hang Eren, as well as a tweed jacket worn by the teenager, are on display.

"We want the tyranny of the coup leaders to be kept fresh in peoples' minds," said organizer Yilmaz Cerek. "We must not forget it and we must make sure that it is never forgotten."

His group, 78'liler or Generation 1978, has long campaigned for the prosecution of the coup leaders and other officers they accuse of torture.

Some members of the group will vote "yes" to the changes, though most oppose, like Cerek say the proposed changes are cosmetic.

Cerek, now 53, was a teacher when he was detained in a small town in northern Turkey during the coup for his membership in a left-wing organization. He was tortured and spent 3 1/2 years in prison.

WASHINGTON, DC – Arizona Republican operative Steve May has found a new weapon in his fight against Democrats this fall: homeless people. In a colorfully-written election story, The New York Times spotlights May's efforts to recruit a ragtag group of "drifters" and "street people" to run on the Green Party ballot. According to the Times, May "freely admits that their candidacies may siphon some support from the Democrats":

"Did I recruit candidates? Yes," said Mr. May, who is himself a candidate for the State Legislature, on the Republican ticket. "Are they fake candidates? No way."

To make his point, Mr. May went by Starbucks, the gathering spot of the Mill Rats, as the frequenters of Mill Avenue are known.

"Are you fake, Benjamin?" he yelled out to Mr. Pearcy, who cried out "No," with an expletive attached.

"Are you fake, Thomas?" Mr. May shouted in the direction of Thomas Meadows, 27, a tarot card reader with less than a dollar to his name who is running for state treasurer. He similarly disagreed...

Gathered around was a motley crew of people who were down on their luck, including a one-armed pregnant woman named Roxie whom Mr. May befriended sometime back and who introduced him to the rest.

One-armed pregnant women aside, Arizona Democrats are not pleased with this development. They've filed a formal complaint with the state and warned voters to avoid supporting the Green Party outsiders. Unsurprisingly, the Times article has capture the interest of the blogosphere.

• The Dems' Response Could Have Been Worded Better, points out Nitasha Tiku at New York magazine. Since we're talking about homeless people here, it seems like Democrat Jackie Thrasher could have phrased his response differently: "What's happening here just doesn't wash," he said. "It doesn't pass the smell test."

• The Sword Cuts Both Ways, writes Booman at Booman Tribune: "This is a side effect of making ballot access too easy. We normally complain about access being too hard (either too costly, or requiring a ridiculous number of signatures), but if you make it too easy, the other side can just put up a slate of homeless people to drain away some potentially decisive votes."

• Smart Money's on the Tarot Card Reader—if this were a movie, writes Stephen Dubner at The New York Times: "In the movie version, of course, the Green Party candidate -- a drifter who sometimes works as a tarot card reader -- would somehow win the local election, quickly jump onto the national political stage and become president, teaching us all a lesson in humility and leadership." He calls this effort "unbranding," connecting it to the corporate tactic of putting a rival's product in the hands of an "undesirable endorser." Such as, say, Snooki.
  

• Here's the Back Story to Why This Strategy Works, writes Richard Winger's Ballot Access News blog:

The reason it is so easy for write-in candidates to be nominated in the primaries of newly-qualifying parties in Arizona is because the Socialist Workers Party won a lawsuit in 1980. The SWP had complained about the number of signatures needed to place a member of the party on the SWP's primary ballot. The U.S. District Court Judge upheld the number of signatures needed for a candidate to get on the primary ballot... but struck down the companion law that required a minimum number of write-ins for anyone to win the primary of a newly-qualifying party. ...

If the Green Party had known that these candidates would be filing declarations of candidacy, the party could have recruited bona fide Greens to also file write-in declarations of candidacy, and the bona fide Greens certainly would have received more write-ins than the candidates recruited by the Republicans.

Former GOP presidential candidate Fred Thompson on Tuesday compared President Barack Obama’s treatment of the American people to a dog urinating on a fire hydrant.

Thompson’s comment came in response to Obama’s contention Monday that his Republican opponents “talk about me like a dog.”

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“Obama: some people in DC ‘talk about me like a dog.’” Thompson wrote on his Twitter feed (@FredThompson). “Maybe it's because he keeps treating this country like a fire hydrant.”

Thompson’s tweet followed a number of critical swings at the president's announced plan Monday to request $50 billion in additional infrastructure funds.

Obama to “spend ANOTHER $50B on top of failed stimulus,” Thompson wrote. “If he walked into a wall, he'd say problem was him not walking fast enough.”

Thompson, a former senator from Tennessee, currently hosts a radio show with his wife.

WASHINGTON – A group that opposes secrecy in government says the federal government significantly reduced its backlog of document requests from the public last year, but also slowed its pace of opening previously confidential material to public view.

A report Tuesday from OpenTheGovernment.org said the government's record is mixed, but suggested the Obama administration could be less secretive than its predecessor, the Bush administration.

"The record to date is mixed, but some indicators are trending in the right direction," the report from a coalition of 75 public interest groups said.

The biggest improvement was in the processing of requests under the federal Freedom of Information Act. The backlog of requests declined by 40 percent, although more than 77,000 cases remained open at the end of the 2009 government spending year on Sept. 30.

At the same time, the rate at which the government declassified documents previously stamped "Top Secret," "Secret" or "Confidential" declined by 10 percent from 2008 to 2009. There was, however, a 10 percent drop in decisions to classify documents initially. The 183,224 decisions to mark new material classified were the fewest since 1999, the group said.

___

Online:

OpenTheGovernment.org: http://www.OpenTheGovernment.org

WASHINGTON, DC – The political world was caught off-guard Tuesday by Richard Daley's announcement that he would not seek a fourth term as Chicago mayor. If Daley's out, who's in? What about White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel, who told interviewer Charlie Rose earlier this year that the mayor's office "has always been an aspiration of mine"? On Twitter, users weighed in on a potential Emanuel candidacy, and even suggested a few alternatives:

LONDON – At the end of nearly every training session, Matt Whitmore downs a pint of milk straight from the bottle.

"I do it pretty religiously," said Whitmore, 25, a gym trainer in London. He first started drinking milk after exercise about 10 years ago when he couldn't afford expensive supplements or protein shakes. "Milk helps me recover faster and I feel great afterwards," he said. "And now, I hate to train without it."

Researchers are giving scientific support to a view that Whitmore vouches for from experience: that milk may be just as good or even better than sports drinks for serious athletes recovering from exercise. The health benefits of milk — which has carbohydrates, electrolytes, calcium and vitamin D — have long been established. But for athletes, milk also contains the two proteins best for rebuilding muscles: casein and whey.

Muscles get damaged after an intense bout of aerobic exercise like running, playing football, or cycling. The casein and whey proteins in milk are precisely what the body needs to regenerate muscles fast.

Glenys Jones, a nutritionist at Britain's Medical Research Council, said milk's protein content makes it an ideal post-exercise drink. "Milk provides the building blocks for what you need to build new muscles," said Jones, who has no ties to the dairy industry.

She said sports drinks mainly replace lost carbohydrates and electrolytes, and don't usually have the necessary nutrients for muscles to regenerate themselves.

Experts have generally been divided over whether milk outperforms sports drinks. Dairy producers have been eager to break into the multibillion-dollar market, often sponsoring research into milk's athletic benefits that some call biased. So the debate continues, but milk has been getting a lot of attention.

In a study published in the journal Applied Physiology, Nutrition and Metabolism in June, researchers found people who drank milk after training were able to exercise longer in their next session than people who had sports drinks or water.

"It's the form of the carbohydrate and the nutrients in milk that is most important," said Emma Cockburn, a lecturer in sports coaching at Northumbria University in northeast England who led the study, which was partially paid for by the dairy industry.

Cockburn advised athletes to drink milk immediately after working out. "The damage caused by exercise leads to a breakdown of the protein structures in your muscles, but that doesn't happen until 24 to 48 hours later," she said. If athletes drink milk right after training, then by the time it is digested, the milk's nutrients are ready to be absorbed by the muscles that have been hurt.

Drinking milk also may help athletes recover quicker if they are performing multiple times in a day. For people who can't stomach the idea of plain milk, experts recommend adding some chocolate or other artificial flavor. At the Beijing Olympics, six-time gold medallist Michael Phelps regularly downed a flavored milk drink in between races.

Scientists at Loughborough University have found low-fat milk is better than sports drinks for replacing fluids lost during exercise. Scientists suspect there may be two reasons for that. Not only does milk have a lot of electrolytes, but it is emptied from the stomach more slowly than sports drinks, keeping the body hydrated for longer.

Though the vitamins and proteins found in milk are present in soy milk or dietary supplements, experts say milk has better proportions of those nutrients.

Milk also may help athletes shed fat and build muscle. In a small Canadian study, experts found women who drank milk after lifting weights gained about 4.4 pounds (2 kilos) of muscle and lost about the same amount of body fat. Women who drank sports drinks put on about 3.3 pounds (1.5 kilos) of muscle but didn't lose any body fat.

"It may be that some of the components of milk — the protein, the vitamin D and the calcium — act in a synergistic fashion to promote fat loss," said Stuart Phillips, a professor of kinesiology at McMaster University who led the research. Phillips has advised the Canadian Olympic Association about milk and the dairy industry paid for part of his research.

But some experts warned that drinking milk after exercise isn't for everyone. Catherine Collins, a spokeswoman for the British Dietetic Association and a dietician at London's St. George's Trust, said while milk may be beneficial for elite athletes who burn thousands of calories a day during their intensive training, occasional gym-goers may be better off drinking sports drinks or plain water.

"If you're just a gym bunny trying to lose a bit of weight, water is probably sufficient after exercise," she said, warning that chocolate milk in particular could add unwanted calories.

At the Vancouver Olympics, dairy farmers trucked in about 85,000 extra quarts (80,000 liters) of chocolate milk. Canadian athletes won a record-setting 14 gold medals. "I don't know if the milk helped, but it can't have hurt," Phillips said.

Still, even those who promote milk as a recovery drink say it cannot entirely replace sports drinks. Because it is harder to digest, people should only drink milk after they are finished exercising, not during.

In comparison, sports drinks like Gatorade have easily digestible sugars so athletes can chug it during events to get an instant boost.

Whitmore says it may be a tough sell to persuade people to swap their sports drinks or even water, for milk. "Most gym goers have very particular routines," he said, acknowledging he takes a bit of ribbing for his milk habit from his rugby teammates. "They call me the Milky Bar kid."

Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-N.Y.) engaged in a nasty, lone radio debate in her Democratic primary against upstart Reshma Saujani on Tuesday morning, in which the two traded barbs — but managed to up the ante after the event, as the incumbent literally fled from reporters and the challenger said she might not vote in the general election if she loses.

Saujani's spokesman, James Allen, walked back her words an hour later, e-mailing a statement saying that "Reshma will vote a straight Democratic ticket on Nov. 2 no matter the outcome of the primary."

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During the debate, aired on WWRL 1600 AM and moderated by Daily News editorial page columnist Errol Louis, Saujani hit Maloney out of the gate for two fundraisers that Maloney held on one of the days during which she served on the conference committee for the financial services reform bill.

Maloney insisted, as she has before, that she had nothing to do with the fundraisers, a claim Saujani immediately seized on, saying, "She lied."

But Maloney mostly stayed on the high ground, focusing on her work in Congress, though she did rap Saujani for attacking President Barack Obama's economic policies and said Saujani sounded "like the Republicans" when criticizing Democratic efforts in Washington.

Afterward, Maloney walked briskly away and refused to stop for questions as a gaggle of about six reporters and one TV cameraman rushed after her out of the studios. The group ended up shoving into an elevator with her — pressing the congresswoman against the wall — to try to talk to her.

But Saujani, a former Hillary Clinton fundraiser who worked for an investment firm, made her own biggest news after the debate, telling reporters that Maloney had done a "mediocre" job over the past 18 years. "I've learned a lot about Carolyn Maloney in this process, and it breaks my heart ... she has not served this community well, and she is not doing a good job," she said.

"A lot of people are going through a lot of pain for her lack of service," she said. Saujani also indicated "it's not over" if she loses, suggesting she'll run again next time, and added, "I might not vote (in the general election)" if Maloney is on the ballot instead of her.

"I'm being honest," Saujani said, though she said she was "absolutely not" implying the district might be better served by a Republican, as the two women are running in a heavily Democratic district. "I plan on [Nov. 2] voting for myself."

WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama's proposed tax breaks for business sound like ideas that have enjoyed broad Republican backing in the past. But in today's toxic political atmosphere, he's unlikely to get much — if any — GOP help.

Still, his plans put Republicans on the spot, making it harder for them to say no to legislation they once embraced.

In a speech on Wednesday in Cleveland, Obama will ask Congress to let businesses quickly write off 100 percent of their spending on new plants and equipment through 2011.

Its part of a raft of new Obama proposals to spur job creation and help businesses — and to try to give his party a much-needed boost ahead of November elections that will determine which party controls the House and Senate.

Clearly frustrated by the halting economic recovery and mindful of polls showing Republicans poised to make big midterm gains, Obama had his economic advisers come up with a fresh set of proposals with job-creating potential.

Among them: a $50 billion program to rebuild roads, railways and airports and to create a new infrastructure bank to oversee long-term projects. Legislation containing multiple public works projects has usually been popular in Congress across party lines.

The administration has not spelled out exactly how it would pay for all the new proposals, but suggested it would offset tax cuts by closing various corporate loopholes and levying targeted tax hikes on big business, particularly on the oil and gas industry and on multinational corporations. Some of these tax proposals were included in the budget Obama submitted to Congress earlier this year but were never acted on by Congress.

Rep. Dave Camp of Michigan, the senior Republican on the tax-writing House Ways and Means Committee, called Obama's business tax measures serious proposals worthy of consideration. But he said that "raising taxes to cut taxes is at best a zero sum game."

The proposed tax break for research and development has been around in one form or another since 1981 and in the past has drawn bipartisan support. However, Congress previously extended it just for short periods of time, usually just for one or two years, with frequent lapses that make it hard for businesses to plan. The credit most recently lapsed in 2009.

Obama has long advocated making the credit permanent.

His proposal to let companies quickly write off 100 percent of their investments in new plants and equipment is similar to proposals advanced several times by President George W. Bush — with considerable GOP support at the time.

The idea is to give companies an incentive to spend and invest now, rather than later. The administration claims the change would put nearly $200 billion in the hands of businesses over the next two years.

Under the current law, a company gets to deduct 50 percent of the costs upfront, and the remainder over three to 20 years, depending on the nature of the investment.

"This measure would provide tax incentives for businesses to invest in the United States when our economy needs it most," says a White House fact sheet.

A senior administration official said the expensing provision would potentially benefit 1.5 million corporations and several million individuals. The tax break would be retroactive to this Wednesday.

Obama's expensing and R&D tax credit proposals would generally help large businesses the most. A separate bill is before the Senate to give special tax breaks and loan incentives to small businesses. Obama has said that legislation should be Congress' first order of business when it returns next week from its summer recess.

Chris Edwards, director of tax policy for the libertarian-leaning Cato Institute, said he favors both a permanent research tax credit and Obama's proposal for 100 percent expensing, calling both "very positive" steps and a sign that the administration is getting seriously worried about the economy.

Still, he added, "the administration would nullify the benefits if they are matched by various tax proposals for businesses."

Thomas Mann, a political scientist at the Brookings Institution, said Obama's three proposals — infrastructure spending, a permanent R&D credit and upfront 100 percent business write-offs — "constitute a re-entry into the make-the-economy-grow argument."

"All of them had support among conservatives and right-of-center economists for many years. That makes it more awkward for the Republicans just to say no," Mann said. But that isn't stopping them, he added.

The Obama proposals would require congressional approval, which is highly uncertain given Washington's partisan atmosphere and the fast-approaching midterms.

"We understand what season we've entered in Washington," said White House spokesman Robert Gibbs. Still, he said, even if Congress doesn't take up Obama's new proposals before the elections, "the president and the economic team still believe that these represent some very important ideas."

The acceleration of the business write-off for plants and equipment would have a net long-term cost of $30 billion, far less than the amount the legislation would put in the hands of businesses, the White House contends. That's because if companies take their write-offs upfront, they can't depreciate the costs over a longer period for future tax breaks — as they do now.

Republican leaders greeted Obama's most recent proposals cautiously, given past GOP support for various components.

"The White House is missing the big picture," said House Minority Leader John Boehner, R-Ohio. "These aren't necessarily bad proposals. ..." But he said they don't address the larger problems of "excessive government spending" and Democratic tax policies, including the impending expiration of Bush-era tax cuts.

Obama and Democratic congressional leaders want to renew the Bush tax cuts for households earning under $250,000 a year. Republicans want to extend all of them, saying a recession is no time to raise taxes.

Obama's recently departed budget director, Peter Orszag, suggested in an op-ed article in Tuesday's New York Times that policymakers seem locked "into a budget scenario out of which there are few politically plausible routes of escape." As a compromise, he suggested extending the Bush tax cuts until 2013 "and then end them altogether."

Gibbs said he had never heard Orszag make such an argument in internal White House deliberations and that the president did not agree with him on such a "compromise."

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Associated Press writers Julie Pace and Stephen Ohlemacher contributed to this report.

Former GOP presidential candidate Fred Thompson on Tuesday compared President Barack Obama’s treatment of the American people to a dog urinating on a fire hydrant.

Thompson’s comment came in response to Obama’s contention Monday that his Republican opponents “talk about me like a dog.”

Continue Reading

“Obama: some people in DC ‘talk about me like a dog.’” Thompson wrote on his Twitter feed (@FredThompson). “Maybe it's because he keeps treating this country like a fire hydrant.”

Thompson’s tweet followed a number of critical swings at the president's announced plan Monday to request $50 billion in additional infrastructure funds.

Obama to “spend ANOTHER $50B on top of failed stimulus,” Thompson wrote. “If he walked into a wall, he'd say problem was him not walking fast enough.”

Thompson, a former senator from Tennessee, currently hosts a radio show with his wife.

WASHINGTON – Their control of the House in peril, Democrats are scratching to survive in races all across the country. Disgruntled voters, a sluggish economy and vanishing enthusiasm for President Barack Obama have put 75 seats or more — the vast majority held by Democrats — at risk of changing hands.

The party could become a victim of its own successes during the past two elections, when candidates were swept into power by antipathy for President George W. Bush and ardor for Obama. Now, eight weeks from Election Day, the Democrats are bracing for the virtual certainty of lost House seats and scrambling to hold back a wave that could hand the GOP the 40 it needs to command a majority

Obama, grasping for a way to turn the tide, on Wednesday plans to propose $30 billion in new investment tax breaks for businesses to go along with tens of billions in spending he called for on Labor Day to invigorate the slow recovery. But even if Congress acts on the requests — a long shot in a highly charged political season — there's little time left for Democrats to salvage their election chances.

With Obama's popularity slumping and the party demoralized, dozens of first- and second-term Democrats as well as longer-serving congressmen who haven't faced serious challenges in years are toiling to hold onto their jobs in places that tend to prefer Republicans. And polls show independent voters leaning toward the GOP.

When asked which party they want to control Congress, voters are split or leaning toward Republicans, national surveys say. Perhaps even more ominously for Democrats, voters are overwhelmingly sour about national issues, especially the economy.

More than 60 percent said the nation was in a state of decline and on the wrong track in the latest Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll, in which voters likely to turn out in November gave Republicans a gaping 9-point edge when asked which party they wanted to control Congress.

Much can change between now and Election Day, and a GOP House takeover is far from sure. The political parties, individual campaigns and outside groups that spend heavily to influence elections have scarcely begun to distribute the hundreds of millions of dollars they plan to pour into key congressional districts across the country for advertising and on-the-ground organizing that can turn out crucial voters.

And most voters have yet to focus on the contests.

Still, Republicans are confidently predicting Democrats' defeat.

"Republicans have the intensity," said Rep. Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., head recruiter for House GOP candidates. "The map is growing by the day."

Democrats acknowledge the strong headwinds but counter that, with a solid fundraising advantage over Republicans and years worth of preparation for what they always knew would be a brutal election, they can fight off the GOP onslaught.

"We've got some very, very tough political territory on an off year with a weak economy, so it's a major challenge in a difficult political environment. That said, we will retain a majority in the House," said Democratic Rep. Chris Van Hollen, the party's House campaign chief.

The current breakdown is 255 Democrats, 178 Republicans and two vacancies that appear likely to be won by the GOP.

Democratic incumbents are at risk from California to New York and particularly in the unemployment-stricken Rust Belt, where six in Pennsylvania and five in Ohio face stiff challenges. Hotly contested races are unfolding in every region, including three each in Arizona, Florida, Illinois and Indiana, and two in Alabama, New Hampshire, New Mexico, Wisconsin and Virginia.

Among the most vulnerable Democratic incumbents are freshmen Reps. Betsy Markey of Colorado, Steve Driehaus of Ohio and Tom Perriello of Virginia. They had little time to settle into elected office before casting votes for key elements of Obama's agenda that are proving controversial, including the health care law and the so-called cap-and-trade measure to curb carbon emissions. Markey and Perriello, like some four dozen other Democrats, are fighting to hold onto districts that voted for Republican presidential nominee John McCain in 2008.

At the same time, a handful of influential, senior Democrats — including Missouri's Ike Skelton, the chair of the Armed Services Committee, and South Carolinian John Spratt, the Budget chairman — are facing formidable re-election battles in a year when voter dislike of elected officials, excessive government spending and the political establishment is on the rise.

Reps. Allen Boyd of Florida and Earl Pomeroy of North Dakota — both in the House more than a decade — and Paul Kanjorski of Pennsylvania and Chet Edwards of Texas — veterans of 20 years or more — also face tough fights.

And Democrats are facing tight races to hang on to most of the 20 seats where the incumbent retired, left or is pursuing another office — typically the most difficult for a party to defend. Those include two each in Arkansas and Tennessee, and long-shots in Louisiana, Kansas and upstate New York, where Rep. Eric Massa resigned in March amid an investigation into whether he sexually harassed male staffers.

Most of the 23 open Republican seats are not regarded as seriously in play, although Democrats have good chances of claiming two being vacated by GOP lawmakers running for the Senate, including one in Delaware now held by Mike Castle and one in the Chicago suburbs held by Mark Kirk.

Only a few Republican incumbents are at serious risk in otherwise Democratic districts, including Joseph Cao in New Orleans and Charles Djou in Hawaii. Democrats also believe they have shots at ousting Republican Reps. Dave Reichert in Washington and Lee Terry in Nebraska.

As bad as things are for Democrats, they do lead in the money race. However, with their list of endangered incumbents expanding, they face painful choices about which races to abandon in the interest of spending where they realistically can win. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi put out an urgent fundraising appeal Tuesday beseeching supporters to help raise $500,000 by Friday for an "Emergency Rapid Response" fund to pay for TV ads defending Democratic candidates.

Otherwise, Pelosi wrote, "we may not have all the resources we need for every race until November."

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, the party's House campaign arm, had $36 million in cash at the end of July compared to the National Republican Congressional Committee's $22 million. But the gap has been closing steadily as Election Day nears, and a handful of GOP-backed outside groups have plans to pour tens of millions into House races in the coming weeks. Unions are also planning to funnel large sums into the contests on behalf of Democrats.

Democrats have booked $49 million worth of TV advertising time in 60 congressional districts, the vast majority to protect vulnerable Democratic incumbents, while Republicans have reserved $22 million for advertising in 41 districts, all but one now held by Democrats.

"The opportunity is there," to wrest the House, said Guy Harrison, executive director of the National Republican Congressional Committee. "We just have to execute."