A year ago tonight, the votes were counted and Barack Obama won the presidency and Democrats strengthened their holds in the two federal chambers. Republicans nationally and in Iowa licked their wounds, then looked ahead.

State Rep. Chris Rants, R-Sioux City, showing me a host of vote totals from various statehouse races on his laptop, pointed to where some of the statehouse elections could have turned for the GOP with not too many more votes. Rants said Republicans needed to do the grunt work of registering more voters to the party, then turning them out.

So are Republicans cutting into the voter registration lead of Democrats? From the early November voter registration totals from the Iowa Secretary of State office, Dems still are sitting on a very substantial lead, one of well over 100,000 people.

The number of active Democratic Party registrations is 682,641 compared to 577,789 registered Republicans (and with 704,824 active no party registrations in Iowa). If you throw the inactive registrations, the number becomes 723,626 for Democrats and 609,976 for Republicans.

Maybe many of those registered Democrats voted for Obama in 2008, have soured on him (and other Dems) and will switch for the 2010 election in which an Iowa governor position, U.S. Senate post and five congressional seats will be on the ballot. Or maybe that’s a substantial voter registration lead that gives Republican Party of Iowa Chairman Matt Strawn cause for concern.

Consider that the registration totals have barely moved in the last three months: At the beginning of August there were 683,117 Democrats and 577,223 Republicans.  Basically, Democrats have dropped by about 475 and Republicans gained 550. Yeah, it’s 12 months out, but the numbers provide an interesting snapshot.

Back in January 2004 when I was still relatively green at The Journal, I wrote a piece that looked at the number of tri-state women in elected office. Today The Journal’s front carries an update some 5.5 years later and the numbers are remarkably similar — basically 20-22 percent of state lawmakers are women, although that bumps up a bit higher when looking at Iowa county and school board elections, where women are about 33 percent of officeholders.

In 2004, the Iowa Legislature had 32 women, including two in Northwest Iowa. The number of females in 2009 is 34, although the number of lawmakers from the area is now but one (Marcella Frevert of Emmetsburg).

Dianne Bystrom of the Carrie Chapman Catt Center for Women and Politics at Iowa State University shared that Iowa has an “average” environment for electing women. Bystrom related that states that have have a greater number of women state lawmakers tend to be more urban than rural, have a growing population and have residents who skew more left than right politically.

She also related that Iowa is with Mississippi as the only two states that have never elected a woman governor, congresswoman or senator. But she said it’s a matter of opportunity, since a couple of the five Iowa congressional districts could definitely be won by a female candidate. She noted the 5th District here is solidly Republican, so a GOP woman with name recognition could win. She mentioned Siouxland Chamber of Commerce President Debi Durham (the 2002 lieutenant governor candidate) as a possible congressional candidate who could win if incumbent Steve King was not in the picture.

Alternately, Bystrom pointed to the solidly Democratic 1st congressional district as a place a Democratic woman could win (Bruce Braley is in his second term there). In the case of both the 1st and 5th districts, she said, it’s a matter of political party officials  wanting to make a statement — and make history.

There’s increasing talk about the chances for Republicans in 2010 to seize back some seats in the federal chambers,  in the Iowa Legislature and the Iowa governor position. That’s fueled by polls showing improvement for Republicans vs. Democrats on a generic ballot with no names, just party affiliation, and whether the country is on the right track/wrong track. It’s also instructive to note the reality of the voter registration totals, which at this point still show a big advantage in Iowa for Democrats.

The Dems gained strongly in the 2006 election, then following a huge degree of interest in the 2008 presidential caucuses and the fall general election the party surged to a lead of more than 100,000 registered voters. Looking at the Iowa Secretary of State voter registration totals last updated Aug. 3, the Dems are holding firm even as Republicans are getting enthused about their gubernatorial candidates and trying to register more voters. Ousting Iowa Gov. Chet Culver won’t be easy, given the 100K-plus margin.

Looking at active voter registrations, there are 683,117 Democrats and 577,223 Republicans.  Throw in the inactive voter registrations and the totals become 724K for Dems and 610K for the GOP.

Within Iowa’s 5th District here, the strongest district for the Republican Party, there are 140,895 active Republican registered voters and 98,972 for Democrats.  But considering all active and inactive registrations (there are 2,102,501 Iowans registered to vote all told), the 5th District has the least number of registrations of the five districts — in order, the 1st District leads with 437,411, followed by the 3rd (430,521), 4th (430,323), 2nd (411,952) and the 5th (391,775).

The stat Republicans can embrace? ‘No Party’ registrations still outpace even those of Democrats.

Shortly into President George W. Bush’s second term, by mid/late-2005 the possibility of the Republican Party seeing electoral losses in 2006 began to be discussed. That’s what happened. In 2007, the perception that the 2008 elections would again be favorable for Democrats took hold, and lo, it occurred.

We’re hearing a lot now that, with the dropping national approval rate of President Obama at a time of energy and health care reform measures and some unease with Iowa Gov. Chet Culver here over the state budget, 2010 is tracking well for Republicans. After all, history has shown presidents typically see a paring back in the number of federal seats held by his party.

But early this afternoon, a Politico blog says Republicans should be mindful that gains might not pan out, given the self-identified party affiliation totals presenting a good picture for Democrats.  From the piece by Josh Kraushaar: “According to a new Gallup survey of over 160,000 adults across the country, there are only six states in the country with more self-identified Republicans than Democrats. The six states are Utah, Wyoming, Idaho, Alaska, Alabama, and Mississippi. Democrats hold the advantage in 42 other states and the District of Columbia.”

And Kraushaar namechecks two big surprises of our tri-state area, that traditionally Republican Nebraska has an equal number of self-identified Republicans and Democrats. And he cites South Dakota with an exclamation point — even “South Dakota(!)”, you know, as seeming incomprehensible to think more people polled by Gallup Poll said they self-identified with the Democratic Party.

Kraushaar’s conclusion — while the poll was taken a few weeks ago before Obama’s popularity fell to the present percentage of about 52,  the GOP “still has a long way to go in convincing voters that Republicans offer a better way forward.”

Conversely, I’ve heard Iowa Republicans saying in late July that on a generic ballot — no names, just a ballot with a GOP place and Dem place — Republicans are trending positively.

Ok, we won’t know for sure until Nov. 4 if South Dakota remains a firmly Republican State and the electoral votes go for John McCain. But as of today, South Dakota becomes the first in the tri-state area to accept absentee voting, so those who want McCain as president can get their voting out of the way. Same as a Democrat in Vermillion can cast a ballot for Barack Obama, as well as a host of federal and state level candidates.

Absentee balloting begins in Iowa on Sept. 25 and in Nebraska on Sept. 29. This is a big year in Iowa, since it marks the first year with same-day voter registration. That same-day registration option was available in the June primary and September school board elections statewide, but there will be a ton more interest in the general election, Woodbury County election official Vicki Ritz said. She predicted those who make the “preregistration” deadline of Oct. 25 will have a speeder time at the polls than those who register same-day.

A study out today by the Center for Information & Research on Civic Learning & Engagement confirms youth voter turnout was up in the 2006 election. Looking back over the last three midterm elections, the center showed the number of youth voters was the highest in 2006, although it was lower on a percent basis than 1994. Clearly there was a sizable dropoff in youth voting in 2002, as measured by the number of voters from age 18-29 (8.9 million voters) and the turnout rate (22.5 percent).

In 2006, 10.8 million persons in the 18-29 age range voted, for a 25.5 percent turnout. In 1994, 10.6 million people in the group voted, which equated to 26.1 percent.

Moving from considering just midterm elections to looking at 2004 and 2006, said CIRCLE’s director Peter Levine, “we have now seen two consecutive elections with substantial increases in youth turnout. The increase in 2006 is particularly striking because the turnout of the whole adult population hardly rose at all. It seems likely that the Millenial Generation is more involved in politics than Generation X or that deliberate efforts to mobilize young voters are effective — or both.” Levine expects the increasing youth voting trend to continue in 2008.

Those across the river in South Dakota should be proud, the state had the third-highest youth voting turnout out at 39 percent, trailing only Minnesota (43 percent) and Wisconsin (40 percent). An abortion initiative in South Dakota last fall no doubt helped prod the youth vote.

Many people mull how to get more voter participation. Just this fall, our newspaper has editorialized that the Iowa school board elections, in which 10 percent is considered good turnout, could be moved from September to November, when the general elections are held. But what about how to increase the November participation?

A nonprofit organization, Mexicans and Americans Thinking Together, is launching a national push to get Americans to sign a petition urging members of Congress to make election day either a national holiday or moving it to the weekend. MATT is focusing on how to raise Latino voting, and figures the two proposed changes would help make it easier for “working Americans to vote and finally put America in the company of other nations that place a priority on participation.” MATT contends Americans need to discuss many ways to increase voter turnout, and wants to start stirring the pot with their proposal. A link to the weekend voting proposal can be found at www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=s109-144

A new Zogby Poll looked at a “generic ballot” and weighed how possible voters look at Democrats and Republicans for the U.S. House. The outcome was that if a person saw a generic ballot with a candidate having a Democratic Party affiliation, 44 percent would vote for the candidate, while if the name was of a Republican, 33 percent would support the candidate.

We’ve seen such generic ballot polls going for Dems in 2006 as the country sours on Republicans, in part because of an unpopular Iraq war. But I don’t put much stock in the generic ballot recaps, because no one ever sees a generic ballot. When they go in the booth, it says Mike Smith or Mary Langdon, with either an ‘R’ or a ‘D’ tied to their name. And the name of the candidates will conjure up impressions in the minds of educated voters — they’ll know candidate Jones did this that they support or candidate Burns did that that they don’t back. But certainly the Zogby Poll should give pause to Republicans seeking to hold the House majority.

Elsewhere in the Oct. 26 poll, Zogby found respondents felt Democrats lead Republicans in doing a better job in a host of issues: health care (57-26 percent Dems over Repubs), the environment (61-23 percent), government ethics (38-30), foreign policy in general (44-38), immigration reform (41-33), gas and energy prices (51-26), jobs and the economy (45-39) and traditional values like hard work (41-38 percent). Additionally, 57 percent said the Iraq war has not been worth the loss of 2,800 American lives.

Lots of ink has been devoted to whether Republicans will take a fall two weeks from today in the midterm elections. The thought is that with an unpopular Iraq war and the handling of the Mark Foley scandal, some Republicans will turn on their own party, putting control by the GOP of the U.S. Senate and House in peril.

So when I was interviewing Denise O’Brien, Democrat candidate for the Iowa Secretary of State position, over the lunch hour today, I threw a question at her on whether that sort of dismay with Republicans would even impact downticket state races like secretary of ag or secretary of state. O’Brien thought it might, and threw out meeting a group I’d never heard of — Crunchy Cons(ervatives).

O’Brien said “I’ve been in the homes of many Republicans that are really dissatisfied with their party and with the way their party has gone.” She said Crunch Cons “are granola eating Republicans” who described themselves as “Republicans who are interested in organics, interested in the environment, interested in family values and community, and they are the ones that are upset with the way their party has gone. I think the Republicans have an uphill climb.”

Here’s a confession. I just voted yesterday, exactly four Tuesdays before the Nov. 7 general election. As political reporter, I expect to be VERY busy that day, so I wanted to make sure that I voted, and the absentee ballot method totally works for me.

Absentee balloting spiked in 2002 after Iowa Democrats pushed that method. They were so successful that Republicans took notice, and their leaders in the 2003-04 Iowa Legislature touted means to ensure that absentee voting wasn’t used for voter fraud (and Democrats said the Republicans were just overreacting after getting outworked).

All that aside, absentee voting is a good method to cast a ballot for a host of people. I got my packet within days of requesting it, and the explanatory information easily lays out the process. You fill in ovals for desired candidates on the ballot, put it in a manilla envelope and sign that envelope, confirming who you are, then place that in a larger manilla envelope, and mail it back to the auditor, postage paid. Easy.