Eight Days Out From The Dec. 6 GOP Leadership Votes, The Crypt Handicaps The Races

The scramble for Senate Republican leadership positions in wake of Sen. Trent Lott's surprising retirement announcement may be shaking out without as much of a fight as expected.

Sen. Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.), clearly has the No. 2 spot vacated by Lott wrapped up without any opposition.

And even the Senate Republican Conference chairmanship may be less of a free-for-all than originally expected. The No. 4 and No. 5 positions within Republican leadership may also be determined without much of an internal struggle.

Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-Texas) is being touted by several Republican offices contacted by Politico as the front-runner for the conference chairmanship, despite the entry of Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.). Alexander's office begs to differ, saying they're getting positive response from many Senate offices.

Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.), a conservative upstart, has yet to officially enter the conference chairmanship race and may not place his name on the ballot if he doesn't have a clear shot at winning, according to several GOP aides.

If Hutchison wins, Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) will move up one spot in leadership and become the chairman of the GOP Policy Committee, and Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) would take Cornyn's current post as vice chairman.

Overall, such maneuvering would keep the GOP leadership largely intact and prevent a divisive internal debate within a minority party facing a bruising 2008 election cycle.

"I'd say right now the smart money is with an easy [Hutchison] rise to SRC," said one GOP aide who works for a conservative Republican senator.

Alexander Chief of Staff Tom Ingram, however, contends that "we have been reaching out to members aggressively since Sunday night and feel good about next Thursday's elections."

When it comes to these internal leadership races, virtually nobody talks on the record and several aides insisted on anonymity so they could handicap the races. On top of that, these secret ballot races are notoriously difficult to predict — last year Alexander had public endorsements from a majority of Republican senators but still lost to Lott in his run for minority whip.