DOUBLEHEADER -- November 2, 2012 at 7:25 PM EDT

Shields and Brooks: Watching Indiana's Senate Race, Bobblehead Forecasts

By: Christina Bellantoni


Mark Shields and David Brooks met up Friday in the NewsHour newsroom for a final pre-election Doubleheader. I filled in for Hari Sreenivasan, who is hosting the PBS election special, "What's at Stake," which airs at 9 p.m. ET.

We started off with the guys sharing which Senate contests they will be watching Tuesday night. David picked Indiana, and Mark agreed, with both saying a win by Rep. Joe Donnelly looks more likely. The Washington Post on Friday moved the race to "lean Democratic," one indication that Republican state treasurer Richard Mourdock's rape comments have made a difference on the ground. David noted that if Mourdock loses, it's another Republican seat that would have fallen thanks to the tea party.

For our "politics of sport" section, we talked about the traditions of big sports games predicting presidential winners.

And don't forget the "study" showing college games can actually give candidates a 1.6 percentage point boost come Election Day. Call us skeptical.

Joshua Barajas shot and edited this video. Special thanks to Reporter-Producer Tiffany Mullon and Desk Assistant Jeremy Blackman for sports research.

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