I'd really like to know why Chris Matthews is considered a political pundit of some repute when he's almost invariably wrong. This morning he said Democrats were assured of losing at least five senate seats and perhaps as many as ten.

At the moment, with the retirements of Max Baucus in Montana, Tim Johnson in South Dakota, and Jay Rockefeller in West Virginia, those are the only seats considered likely to go over to the Republicans in 2014. (Alaska, Arkansas, Louisiana, and North Carolina are considered toss-ups or Lean Democratic).

So where is Matthews pulling his numbers from? Perhaps it's best not to answer that.

DAVID BROOKS: Yes. And it's all bad for the country. (CHUCKLE) So what are the things that are going to help the economy in the near term? Immigration would be a huge boost for the economy. A fast-track trade deal across the Atlantic, across the Pacific, huge boost. Chained CPI would save a trillion dollars in the second decade off the federal budget debt.

So these are all gigantic, very good policies, where there is majority support and where, in the old days in Washington, you'd cobble together a bipartisan coalition and get rid of the fringes. But right now, the fringes have veto power over everything else, and nobody's found a solution to that.

CHRIS MATTHEWS: So right. And by the way, it used to be that the parties would help each other to make up for each other's differences. Now they accentuate each other. To the Democrats, this election, a rosy scenario is to lose five Senate seats, not six.

DAVID GREGORY: That’s saying, right.

CHRIS MATTHEWS: They could lose ten. And so what they've said is, "If we're going to lose ten seats potentially," and they could well do that, a big sweep, they're going to the battle stations. Nothing on Social Security. All-out talk about minimum wage. Nothing on trade. David's dead right. Nothing's going to get done, because both parties have gone to their base.