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The survey found plentiful evidence that Election Day will draw an electorate that thinks the nation is on the wrong track and dislikes the direction in which President Barack Obama has led the country. With eight or more Senate races considered close, even a slight advantage for Republicans could produce enough victories to give the party the six seats it needs to gain control of the chamber. (O'Connor, 11/2)

ObamaCare has fizzled as a midterm election issue, with views on the law hardening into a partisan split that leaves little opportunity to win over new voters. While Democrats predicted that the public would come to love ObamaCare, the law’s unpopularity remains high as it enters its second enrollment year. And while GOP candidates have attacked the law in their campaigns, it has not been the silver bullet that many expected when HealthCare.gov was melting down last year. The result could be a wash for both sides (Viebeck and Ferris, 11/1)

In interviews, GOP senators talked at times of an ambitious conservative push for fewer regulations, lower taxes and other long-held priorities. But they also outlined more pragmatic, modest agendas that might avoid Obama's veto .... There was virtually no talk of balancing the budget, repealing Obama's health care law or achieving similar GOP campaign pledges that prove politically impossible in Washington.... Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., says leaders of both parties must be willing to defy key supporters, and even risk their political careers, to end government gridlock. With his re-election virtually assured, Graham has told business leaders he wants Congress to improve roads and bridges and to shore up entitlement programs such as Social Security and Medicare, among other things. That will require ending some tax breaks and finding new sources of revenue, which is anathema to many Republicans, he said. (Babington, 11/2)

A GOP Congress would almost certainly pick a quick fight with the White House over Obamacare, immigration and what Republicans see as the administration's anti-coal policies. Problem is, even if Republicans take the Senate, their majority would likely fall short of the 60 votes needed to break a Democratic filibuster, or the 67 votes needed to overcome a presidential veto. ... Party officials, including Kentucky's Sen. Mitch McConnell, who would become Senate majority leader, are already trying to temper expectations. Last week McConnell warned that repealing Obamacare in its entirety may be unrealistic. "Remember who's in the White House for two more years," he cautioned. But tea party activists immediately forced him to backtrack, and he vowed to do his best for full repeal, perhaps by using the upcoming budget process. ... Critics note that despite GOP demands to repeal the Affordable Care Act, they have yet to offer a viable alternative. (Memoli and Mascaro, 10/31)

Four days before Election Day, conservatives are attacking Mitch McConnell, potentially the next Senate majority leader and in a tight race himself, as insufficiently committed to repealing Obamacare. (Everett and Palmer, 10/31)

Republican attacks on the health care law dominated the early months of the campaign, but now have largely receded from view. The focus instead has been more on tethering Democratic candidates to Mr. Obama with a broad-brush condemnation of his policies. And even though some Republican candidates still vow to repeal the law, almost none have offered an alternative. Mr. Gillespie and Mike McFadden, the Republican challenger to Senator Al Franken in Minnesota, stand as exceptions, to little effect. Like Mr. Gillespie in his race against Senator Mark Warner, Mr. McFadden holds little chance of defeating the incumbent on Tuesday. (Weisman, 10/31)

Rate filings indicate some of the 85,000 people who bought private health insurance through Kentucky's exchange could have to pay more for those plans in 2015. The exchange, established under President Barack Obama's federal health law, has been a key piece of Kentucky's heated campaign for the U.S. Senate. Republican Sen. Mitch McConnell says the law must be repealed and blames it for rising health care costs. Democrat Alison Lundergan Grimes says she would fix it, not wanting to take away people's coverage. However, she's refused to say how she would have voted for the law if she were in office. (Beam, 10/31)

There’s an element of nostalgia in campaign ads targeted at seniors. Both parties are talking about Medicare like it’s 2012. The ads are new, but the arguments are old: Republicans accuse Democratic incumbents of cutting $716 billion from Medicare as part of the health reform law in 2010. Democrats say the GOP lawmakers have been trying to “end Medicare as we know it” since 2011 by turning it into a voucher program as part of Rep Paul Ryan’s House budget plan. Neither attack is strictly true, but the vintage 2012 attacks just keep coming. (Wheaton, 11/2)

Democratic Rep. Ami Bera of Elk Grove, in another television ad, depicts Republican challenger Doug Ose as opposing access to birth control and being against abortion rights, showing the former congressman backpedaling in black-and-white footage. (Cadelago, 11/2)