Rating the Parties: The sucessful and not-so state parties and their chairs

State parties - and their chairs - are back. It was not all that long ago when the role and strength of political parties - not merely the 'R' or 'D' next to a candidate's name, but the actual party organizations - was a source of debate among political scientists. Had the combined forces of mass communication and individual fund-raising apparatuses relegated the parties to the dust-bin of political history?

But new federal campaign finance laws after the 2002 election season renewed the importance of state party chairs and their organizations in recent elections.

"The job [of chairman] is getting more complicated," explained Jennifer Duffy of The Cook Political Report. …