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Wednesday, October 13, 2004
Bush Pulling Out of PA
Posted by DavidNYCWord on the street is that the Bush campaign is ditching Pennsylvania. If so, this would be interesting - they'd be the first campaign to abandon a major, top-tier battleground. (I don't consider Missouri to fall into this category.) Combined pro-Bush expenditures show only one PA city (Harrisburg) on the top-ten list, and the Bush campaign itself actually has zero PA media markets on its list.
So, the battle will now be fought in Ohio and Florida. Good. What about Wisconsin and Iowa, you ask? Well, they start to matter a lot less with PA no longer in play. If we win FL, we will win even if we lose both WI and IA. OH is a bit dicier - we lose with OH going to Kerry but WI and IA going to Bush. We'd need to pick up a couple of small states to make up the difference. Nonetheless, it goes without saying that the fewer states we have to defend - especially the fewer big states - the better.
Posted at 05:13 PM in Pennsylvania | Technorati
Comments
Ditching Pennsylvania? Wow all last month it felt like Bush never did any campaign stops anywhere BUT Pennsylvania. This would be epic.
Posted by: Inkan1969 at October 13, 2004 05:36 PM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment
if you reweight the wash post poll it's
kerry 50%
bush 47%
Posted by: ed at October 13, 2004 05:40 PM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment
Another plus from this. Bush was advertising in PHiladelphia suburbs, which meant in NJ as well. This reduces his indirect NJ presence.
Bush may have decided that he's best off defending Florida and Ohio since a successful defence of those 2 will likely win him the election.
Posted by: erg at October 13, 2004 05:54 PM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment
I was glad whenever I saw a Bush trip to PA...I knew he had no chance of winning it from the get-go. I laughed as Karl Rove poured wasted resources into the state.
Kerry has been focused on all the right places.
Posted by: Robert Marlye at October 13, 2004 06:04 PM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment
What's this about Missouri? Has Kerry given up on the show-me state?!
I believe this would be a big mistake. A la Gore and Ohio.
Posted by: anon at October 14, 2004 12:29 AM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment
I'm amazed that Bush would be pulling out of PA while remaining in MI. Surely we're further ahead here (I'm in Kalamazoo, SW MI), but Bush ads are still ubiquitous. Cheney is showing up here this week (in an, ahem, intimate format - only 500 tickets, designed just to jazz up the R leadership).
I've been thinking of a trip to work in OH, since MI seems relatively safe, and OH now appears to be the central state of the election.
Posted by: Mark Miller at October 14, 2004 01:12 AM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment
I think Bush can still carry Maine. Outside of the pocket of ultra liberals in Portland the state is more conservative than most think.
Posted by: Tom at October 14, 2004 10:38 AM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment
Is it time to encourage activists working in GOTV efforts in PA to spread their resources into New Jersey? I NPR reports that Bush and his wife will be campaigning in NJ soon. Cheney said publically that he thinks republicans have a chance there.
Posted by: Brandon Brown at October 14, 2004 11:38 AM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment
It does not make much sense for Bush to focus on NJ and ignore PA. This could be a head fake. Also, the media market is incredibly expensive in NJ.
The Dems can probably win NJ, but this is probably a low turnout election, with no Senator or Gubernatorial seats up. GOTV needs to be well organzied by the Dem machine. So far, I hear of petty feuds, like the Dem Governor refusing to release money to the Kerry camp in NJ. The best Kerry staff is probably in other states. I would urge the 2 Dem Senators to do some campaigning for Kerry, maybe another K or E visit.
The good news is, I feel my efforts in signing up some anti-Bush relatives to register were useful after all.
Posted by: erg at October 14, 2004 11:53 AM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment
The Note reports today that the Bush campaign claims they're not pulling out of PA, they still have an active ad program there etc.
Thats what you would expect them to say. But the fact that there aren't more ad buys in PA markets is a clear indication that they have put it on the back burner.
Posted by: erg at October 14, 2004 01:55 PM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment
ads are still running for now (alot of them still) and Cheney was in town yesterday. Bush may be pulling out (these things don't happen instantly) but there are no clear indications yet. Interestingly, Hoeffel is now campaigning against Bush. He is taking advantage of how Specter has associated himself with Bush in this year's election. Good move!
Posted by: seamus at October 14, 2004 03:52 PM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment
The ads are still running tonight in PA. I'm getting real sick of seeing Bush on the screen all the time. John Kerry and the liberals in Congress do this and that. How can the liberals be pushing an agenda?
Posted by: Brett at October 14, 2004 09:32 PM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment
I'd be surprised to see Bush pull out of PA so soon. He doesn't need it, but he probably wants to force Kerry to spend more time and money there. Kerry can't win without PA. Bush can. By forcing Kerry to maintain a strong presence in PA, he will have less time and money to spend in other Gore states, like IA, WI, and MN--all of which have a far better chance of swinging to the red column in November than does PA.
Posted by: pepe at October 14, 2004 10:01 PM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment
I was there the week before....There were ad after ad after ad with W and he approved this message. The yardsign poll in central PA was 50/50.
Posted by: Andrew C. Oliver at October 17, 2004 11:23 PM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment
Has Bush pulled out of any other swing states? ME? MI? MN? OR? WA? It seems that all of these are states he will be wasting his money trying to win, just like LA, NC, and AZ for Kerry.
Posted by: Nathaniel at October 18, 2004 11:42 AM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment