Vote 2010 Election: Democrats Playing Blame Game Before Elections

LOS ANGELES, Oct. 22, 2010 — -- President Obama was on the campus of the University of South California today, stumping in a deep-blue state for Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., who six years ago won with almost 60 percent of the vote. Now, however, she is locked in a dead heat with former Hewlett Packard CEO Carly Fiorina.

Tonight in Nevada, he will try to raise money and excitement for embattled Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, who may lose to Republican Tea Party favorite Sharron Angle.

But one thing the president seems to not be raising is expectations.

"Let me be clear. This is going to be a difficult election because we have been through an incredibly difficult time as a country," he told the crowd.

Being the incumbent party at a time of nearly 10 percent unemployment is, of course, perilous in itself, but even many Democratic officials are surprised at how difficult it has been for the president and Democratic lawmakers to reach voters,

Vice President Joe Biden, the most publicly optimistic prognosticator in the Obama administration, for the first time allowed for the possibility that Democrats would lose the House. He blamed outside spending by third-party groups.

"I've been out now on a lot of races," he told Bloomberg News. "I was amazed at the amount of money. I've never seen this before. So the only caveat I'd put in terms of the House is how much impact this $200 billion are going to mean."

Though that number is closer to $200 million, it appears that even before the election returns have come in, Democrats are eager to explain why things have gone so wrong for their party.

"We had to move so fast," Obama said Thursday in Seattle, explaining the many crises his administration faced. "We were in such emergency mode that it was very difficult for us to spend a lot of time doing victory laps and advertising exactly what we were doing, because we had to move on to the next thing."