Charlie Crist: He Wonders Why He's Losing?

From The Shark Tank:

http://shark-tank.net/2010/02/fl-senate-slugfest-spills-over-into-faith-forum/

Question: How many more days until the Governor decides to end his quest for the Senate in order to spend more time at the Green Iguana ...err, with his family/wife of convenience?

- AZDB

The Great RINO Hunt of 2010

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It looks like, from these amateur eyes, the most endangered Republican incumbent may be Bob Bennett (Big Gov't - Utah), who may struggle to even get renominated by the activists in his own party. The 3-term Senator, who's about as exciting as peanut butter on white bread, is even struggling to keep notable Republicans in his own state awake long enough to carry him over the finish line for re-nomination. per The Salt Lake Tribune (For those in Gila Bend, it's the largest newspaper in the state of Utah, AZ's neighbor to the north):

Washington » Rep. Rob Bishop is backing Senate colleague Bob Bennett's re-election campaign, but it's not the most winning endorsement. "I told him I'd do that and he can count on my endorsement until I look him in the face and told him he no longer has it," Bishop said of Bennett. "I haven't done that yet."

Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, won't even go that far. "I'm going to keep my powder dry on this one," Chaffetz said, noting that he thinks Bennett has an incredibly tough fight ahead of him. While Bennett and his GOP opponents -- Tim Bridgewater, Merrill Cook, Cherilyn Eagar and Mike Lee --- are lining up politicians and groups behind their campaigns, several high-profile Republicans are holding out, or at most, giving tepid endorsements in a race that splits the Utah Republican Party. Bennett, who is seeking his fourth term, so far is touting some big names as supporters: former presidential candidate and Utah's adopted son, Mitt Romney, as well as former House Speaker Newt Gingrich. Not to be outdone, former gubernatorial general counsel Mike Lee nabbed the endorsement of the FreedomWorks political action committee and its head, former House Majority Leader Dick Armey.

(Emphasis mine)

17 years in the U.S. Senate - and the leading lights of the Utah GOP flat-out don't give a damn about having you for another six years? Quite a reputation you've amassed over the years, Senator. At least they haven't (yet) said they hate your guts & to please go away.

- AZDB

Happy Anniversary, Mr. Future President

From Free Republic:

Thirty years ago tonight, Ronald Reagan shocked the political world with a tremendous victory over the moderate Establish-mentarian George H.W. Bush in the New Hampshire Primary, without which victory he would not have been nominated or elected, which would have changed the history of the entire 20th Century not only for the United States but for the world.

According to the 40th POTUS himself:

I continued to campaign for the remaining days until the election. When the polls closed, I learned I had won the seven-way New Hampshire primary with fifty-one percent of the vote. In retrospect, this was really the pivotal day of the whole primary campaign for me. Shortly after New Hampshire, all the candidates except George Bush dropped out, and then, near the end of May, he dropped out too.

(Courtesy of Simon and Schuster)

And the rest, as we say, is history.

- AZDB

Jackass of the Week

The path to the New York Governor’s mansion got that much easier apparently for Andrew “Remember My Daddy” Cuomo on Friday, as current selected-not-elected Governor David “Anyone Seen My Integrity?” Paterson abruptly announced he’d dropping his bid for a full term of office. He did say he plans to remain in office until his hand-me-down term expires in January 2011. NYC bookmakers are currently taking bets on whether he makes it that far. He made it official with an announcement from his Manhattan office on Friday afternoon. According to the Wall Street Journal:

"I have never abused my office—not now, not ever," Mr. Paterson said at a news conference in New York City. He cited an accumulation of distractions for his decision, and said he is "being realistic about politics."

The governor had faced intensifying pressure to abandon his campaign, as a senior aide quit his administration in outrage and the New York political world responded with disgust to allegations the state police and the Democratic governor interfered with a domestic-violence case involving a top aide.

Mr. Paterson's administration was plunged into disarray late Wednesday after it was reported by the New York Times that the governor and a member of his security detail had conversations with a woman pursing a protection order against a top administration aide, David Johnson, 37 years old, a close friend and adviser to Mr. Paterson.

Gov, Don't let the door hit ya where the Good Lord split ya!

Video of the announcement here, complete with a "Now let me make this clear..." Skip to 3:45 to cut to the chase: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fq53_nrlRfQ

New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo wasn’t immediately available for comment, as unnamed, anonymous sources had him placed at a Bed, Bath & Beyond shopping for drapes, presumably to be used for the Governor’s mansion in Albany.

- AZDB

2010 IL-Sen: A True Toss-Up

2/24/10 Electionology Rolling Average

Mark Kirk (R) 41%
Alexi Giannoulias (D) 41%

Tossup

Race News:
The Illinois primaries are the first in the country, held in February. Kirk walked away in a landslide victory for the Republican nomination, despite initial worries about a challenge from the right. Giannoulias, on the Democratic side, was able to squeak out a 5-point victory, thanks to the early date of the primaries. (Challenger Hoffman was surging in the week before election, and theoretically, could have surpassed Giannoulias had the primary been held later)

Race Dynamics:
Alexi Giannoulias is surrounded by scandals from his time working for his father's bank. This is an instant disadvantage that is somewhat offset by the Democratic partisan makeup of the state and the city of Chicago's impact on statewide political races. However, in addition to the candidate's corruption issues, there may be a voter backlash against the Democrats as a whole. This seat, held formerly by President Obama, was being auctioned off to the highest bidder by disgraced former Governor Blagojevich. Current appointed Senator Burris was ultimately seated by said governor.

As a moderate, Republican Mark Kirk has already proven victorious in his own House district, which leans Democrat. A national wave benefiting the Republicans may ultimately pave the way for victory. Kirk will also need to depend on rural/suburban votes outside of Chicago (where most of the Republican base resides) to ultimately prevail, but internals show that he is performing well among Independents (winning 2 to 1).

-FSHS

2010 TX-Gov Primary: Perry Leads Comfortably

2/24/10 Electionology Rolling Average

Rick Perry 45%
Kay Bailey Hutchison 28%
Debra Medina 16%

Perry +17%

Race News:
The Texas Republican primary is probably one of the most highly anticipated primaries of 2010 as Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison takes on sitting Governor Rick Perry (who has kept the Governor's seat warm for the last 10 years).

Now that he is ahead, Rick Perry's goal is to garner over 50 percent of the vote to avoid a run-off. This is very likely, as Perry still has room to grow with the 11% Undecided voters. All he needs is 5% to get over the 50% hump. At this point, even if there is a runoff, we project Perry to win easily and comfortably.

Race Dynamics:
Several factors before next week's election are: (1) the potential collapse of Debra Medina's support, typical of many 3rd party candidates by election day and (2) whether those supporters go to Perry or Hutchison. We're already seeing this tightening as Perry picks up support in the latest Rasmussen poll, drawing 48% of primary support in today's poll, compared to 43% in last month's poll.

-FSHS

Harry Reid’s Re-Election Salvation: Emulate John Corzine?

Stop me if you’ve heard this one before: You are the biggest-name incumbent Democrat in the state, elected in the last race for the seat by a comfortable double-digit margin. You see your job-approval ratings fall to the floor in the wake of complete Democrat takeover of the federal government. You begin to trail in head-to-head polling more than 8 months before November by anywhere from 8-15 points when matched up against a potential candidate who has never been elected state-wide before. You are convinced that the millions of $$ you have banked, much of it to be used on negative advertising against the still-largely unknown Republican opponent, will make the difference in the fall. You continue to hitch your wagon to the young, Hope-and- Change new President who had handily won your state by a comfortable margin (which seems just like yesterday). You even warmly embrace the increasingly unpopular President at fund-raising and re-election events for your sputtering campaign. No help to the re-election chances. So what’s the hail-Mary pass you hope carries you over the finish line come November? If you answered a 3rd party challenger that’s really a front for the Democrat Party, nice work.

Though the strategy wasn’t ultimately successful in victory, New Jersey Governor John Corzine cut a once insurmountable deficit in polling down to a true tossup by Election Day with the help of an “independent” to siphon votes from the Republican candidate, or more like, siphon from the “Anybody but Corzine” candidate.

Using his campaign’s website as a basis, the Independent candidate, Chris Daggett, is a liberal on energy & environmental issues. His running mate admittedly voted for Barrack Obama. And according to National Review Online, Democrats were funding robocalls on Daggett’s behalf.

A similar situation is developing in Nevada, where embattled incumbent Senate Majority leader Harry Reid is mired in the 30s job approval. He trails head-to-head against either Sue Lowden or Danny Tarkanian by between high single-digits to mid-teens. He has a $20M war chest to define his yet-to-be-decided GOP challenger coming out of a June primary. He not only hasn’t abandoned carrying water for the increasingly unpopular Democratic administration, but he welcomed his help at a campaign event in Las Vegas last week. And now a 3rd party candidate, for the recently formed Tea Party, has qualified for the Nevada ballot.

According to the Las Vegas Review-Journal:

“He's a Las Vegas businessman who owns an asphalt company and has real estate holdings. And he's a political newcomer.

Other than that, Scott Ashjian, the rumored U.S. Senate candidate for the newly formed Tea Party of Nevada, remains something of a mystery. Ashjian is expected to file March 1 to run against U.S. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and his Republican challenger in the November general election. But Ashjian has remained quiet about his campaign, giving cryptic e-mail interviews and hardly returning phone calls.

Barry Levinson, a lawyer, registered Democrat and secretary of the Tea Party of Nevada, said he "represents the candidate" and wants to help his longtime friend get elected…

National tea party organizations are distancing themselves from the local U.S. Senate campaign using the 'tea party' banner.”

(Emphasis mine)

Even a blind man can see he’s hoping Nevada voters will confuse the Tea Party with the assembled masses of conservative & libertarian-leaning “mad as hell” events that formed by groups of hundreds and thousands in 2009 and now have undeniable political momentum.

Could this be, in the words of Yogi Berra, “déjà vu all over again?”

Harry Reid is hoping the situation, like the one in New Jersey, can give the embattled incumbent a puncher’s chance, and hopefully for him a different ending outcome, by November.

- Arizona Diamondback

Introduction To Electionology's Polling Metric

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By clicking on the "Polling" tag, you will be able to filter polling-relevant material based on our in-house professional metric for race predictions.

PROCEDURE:

Our metric takes into account many factors to predict races: date of poll, sample size, nature of voters (Registered or Likely voters), reputation of the polling outfit and long-term race trends. Unlike other poll analysis metrics, we do not tweak data based on subjective reads of the race.

RESULTS:

Our metric predicted with full accuracy, the results of the MA special election and came very close in the NJ and VA Governor races:

Outside parentheses were our predictions (Inside parentheses are the actual results)

MA-Sen:
Brown (R) 50% (52%)
Coakley (D) 45% (47%)

FINAL: Brown +5 (Brown +5)

NJ-Gov:
Christie (R) 43% (48%)
Corzine (D) 41% (44%)

FINAL: Christie +2 (Christie +4)

VA-Gov:
McDonnell (R) 55% (59%)
Deeds (D) 41% (41%)

FINAL: McDonnell +14 (McDonnell +18)


We will begin our election season with the Texas governor race, scheduled on March 2, 2010.

- FSHS

So Ronald Reagan Is Unelectable to the Presidency. Now What?

Creepy similarities to the situation Sarah Palin finds herself in regarding her standing with the electorate and matched up against the sitting president in head-to-head-polls. Oh, by the way, she is at an election stage more than two years earlier than Reagan was at the point this Time article was published.

ttp://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,921912-1,00.html

Just sayin'.

- Arizona Diamondback