WASHINGTON – Some angry and some anxious, American voters head into the final hours of a bitter campaign for control of the Congress poised to throw Democrats out of power in at least part of the Capitol and slam the brakes on President Obama’s agenda.

The wave building against the Democrats doesn’t automatically mean a mandate for Republicans. Coming just four years after voters threw the Republicans out of control of Congress, and two years after throwing them out of the White House, this year’s expected turn against the Democrats suggests a country looking for a government more responsive to its desires and anxieties and quick to punish any party that doesn’t deliver fast enough.

Additional Photos

President Obama stops for lunch at the Famous Fourth Street Deli in Philadelphia on Saturday after a rally at Temple University. Obama is making a final get-out-the-vote push for Democratic candidates. The Associated Press

Democrats are bracing to lose control of the House of Representatives. Top independent analysts last week issued their final forecasts, predicting the Democrats will lose between 45 and 60 House seats, well more than the 39 that would drive them from power.

SENATE UNCERTAINTY

They’re more confident Democrats will hold onto nominal control of the Senate. Top analysts said the Democrats likely would lose six to nine seats, short of the 10 seats that would end their majority.

The independent analysts cautioned, however, that the figure could go higher: Since 1930, every time voters have thrown one party out of control of the House, they’ve done the same thing in the Senate.

The rejection of Democrats likely will sweep through state capitals as well, where Democrats now control 26 governor’s offices and Republicans hold 24. The forecasts: Democrats will lose six to nine.

Voters will elect all 435 members of the House of Representatives, 37 senators and governors in 37 states.

Despite polls showing Democrats closing the gap in some states, the forces dominating public attitudes over the last two years have shown little change — primarily a frustratingly slow recovery from a deep recession.

“We’ve had $4 billion spent, half a million TV ads, hundreds of debates,” said Larry Sabato, director of the Center for Politics at the University of Virginia. “But the fundamentals of this election were in place by midsummer, and there was almost nothing the Democrats could do to change those fundamentals.”

Obama barnstormed the country, into this weekend, trying to save Democratic seats, hitting Virginia, Pennsylvania, Connecticut, Illinois and Ohio.

Money poured into the campaign as well, as much as $800 million in the final days alone, driving the total near $4 billion and financing an unprecedented torrent of TV ads.

Emotions ran high. In Kentucky, a supporter of Republican Senate candidate Rand Paul recently stomped on a liberal activist’s head. In Alaska, aides to Republican Senate candidate Joe Miller handcuffed a reporter who tried to ask the candidate a question.

“This election is kind of a therapeutic outburst,” said Ross Baker, a political science professor at Rutgers University.

IT’S ALL ABOUT THE BACKLASH

“People are dissatisfied with the direction of the country, and they’re taking it out on the people in power,” said Nathan Gonzales, the political editor of the Rothenberg Political Report.

There’s little doubt that there’s a backlash against the Democrats — conservatives angry at soaring federal spending and debt, and liberals disappointed the party didn’t go further on issues such as health care, regulation of Wall Street or climate change.

It isn’t, however, a clear mandate for any Republican agenda.

House Republicans laid out a platform calling for spending cuts but declined to endorse more aggressive specifics, such as overhauling entitlement spending, a touchstone for many tea party conservatives.

Moreover, Americans are more closely divided than pundits let on.

A McClatchy Newspapers-Marist poll last week, for example, showed 37 percent of likely voters said Obama has a better plan for the country, 31 percent said the Republicans do, and 27 percent said neither.

The survey also showed that likely voters, by a margin of 68 percent to 27 percent, want congressional Republicans to work with Obama.

HOW VULNERABLE ARE DEMOCRATS?

The final forecasts:

In the House, Rothenberg predicted Republican gains of 45 to 55 seats; Sabato predicted 55, and Charles Cook of the Cook Political Report predicted 48 to 60.

In the Senate, Rothenberg predicted GOP gains of six to eight, Sabato predicted eight, and Cook predicted six to eight.

Among governors, Sabato predicted Republican gains of eight to nine, and Cook predicted six to eight.

A key dynamic is the fact that Democrats gained House seats in the past two elections, many in conservative districts. While Democrats interpreted the gains as an embrace of the party and its ideas, they just as likely were a rejection of Republicans.

Now, many of those incumbent Democrats are vulnerable to charges that they’re out of step with their more conservative districts.

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