SSP Daily Digest: 8/30 (Morning Edition)

  • FL-Sen: Charlie Crist is still refusing to say whether he’ll caucus with the Dems or the GOP if he wins, a position which looks increasingly untenable as we get down to crunchtime.
  • LA-Sen: It looks like TPM got tipped to an interesting story: David Vitter’s campaign has been sending letters to Louisiana newspaper editors pressuring them about their coverage of Brent Furer, the former Vitter aide responsible for women’s issues – who also attacked his girlfriend with a knife. TPM’s characterization is that Vitter is “trying to intimidate newspapers into giving Furer what he considers fair coverage.”
  • MO-Sen: The DSCC, which has reserved $4 million in ad time in Missouri, is out with its first ad of the race, attacking Roy Blunt.
  • NV-Sen: For a while it looked like Harry Reid might get the NRA’s endorsement, but it turns out that the group won’t be backing him this cycle (though they aren’t getting behind Sharron Angle, either).
  • CO-Gov: LOL – Tom Tancredo picked a running mate, a former state representative named Pat Miller who served a single term twenty years ago. She sounds just as batshit as he is. I’d love to know why her tenure in the state lege was so illustrious.
  • CT-Gov: A nice bump for Dan Malloy: He just collected $6 million in public financing for his gubernatorial run, the most anyone’s been awarded in Connecticut history. But Republican Tom Foley is ultra-rich – he’s already given his campaign $3 million, and as the CT Mirror puts it:

    • Foley, who owns a 100-foot yacht, an airplane and a waterfront Greenwich estate, laughed and stammered when asked how could much he afford to spend.

    “Well, I, …,” Foley began, then he paused and said, “Could I afford to match him? Yeah.”

  • NH-Gov: Dem Gov. John Lynch has reported raising $1.3 million to date (though that includes a half-million dollar personal loan), and has $750K on hand. His Republican opponent, John Stephen, has raised just under a million bucks and has $800K left.
  • OH-Gov: God, if John Kasich loses, it’ll be for two reasons: First, Ted Strickland has run a good campaign. Second, he has Chronic Acute Goofball Disease, an incurable condition which causes you to do shit like… propose a regulatory overhaul plan that is basically identical to one your opponent already enacted two years ago. Kasich even ganked the name, dubbing his plan “Common Sense Initiative Ohio” (CSI Ohio – does that even make sense?), while Teddy Ballgame’s was “Common Sense Business Regulation Executive Order.”
  • TX-Gov: Wow, what a horror: Nearly all of Harris County, TX’s voting machines were destroyed in a fire, and the cause is still unknown. Election officials are putting on a brave face, but this is obviously a major nightmare for this fall’s elections. What’s more (and this is why we’re filing it under “TX-Gov”), Harris County is home to Houston, the largest city in Texas and, of course, where Dem nominee Bill White served as mayor for eight years. Not good.
  • AR-03: I’m not sure whether to laugh or to cry. A Talk Business Research/Hendrix College poll has Republican Steve Womack up 55-31 against Dem David Whitaker in this ultra-red district, the most Republican (by far) in Arkansas. Why am I going schizo? Well, these numbers are very similar to Talk Business’s surveys of AR-01 and AR-02, districts where we’re supposed to have a much better chance this fall (or at least the 1st CD). So either AR-01 is as bad as AR-03, or one of these polls is wrong. I’m not betting on good news for us.
  • GA-12: Regina Thomas’s secret plan to run as a write-in, despite Georgia law pretty clearly barring that option, has been thwarted. She won’t be eligible this November in any way, shape, or form – and she’s also refusing to endorse the Dem primary winner, Rep. John Barrow.
  • MO-08: Dem Tommy Sowers is up with his first negative ad of the season, once again touting his “combat bible,” and attacking Rep. Jo Ann Emerson as a bailout supporter. (There’s also a gratuitous shot of him firing a gun at the end.) The campaign says it will spend “at least $100,000 to air the spot on broadcast and cable stations throughout” the district. More interestingly, though, is the fact that Emerson is also out with a negative spot – not something you’d expect would be necessary given the lopsided polling, the super-red nature of the district, and the fact that it’s 2010. NWOTSOTB. You can find links to both ads at the link.
  • NE-02: Dem Tom White unveiled his first ad, which is “set to air on broadcast and cable channels in the Omaha area” this week. (NWOTSOTB though.)
  • OH-01: Dem Rep. Steve Driehaus is up with his first ad, a spot which attempts to draw distinctions between his record and that of former Rep. Steve Chabot, who is making a comeback bid. Interestingly (and I think this is a wise move), Driehaus is making the argument that his vote for the stimulus was a vote for tax cuts – which in fact it was. The ad really strikes me as lacking any emotional punch, though. NWOTSOTB, though the ad (which you can view here) is reportedly airing on “Cincinnati’s four local affiliates and cable.”
  • VA-02: Maybe it sounds like rapprochement to you, but to me, it sounds like “Either your brains or your signature will be on this pledge.” Teabaggers in Virginia’s second CD, long hostile to Republican nominee Scott Rigell, have compelled him to sign a seven-part pledge endorsing several of their favorite platforms – but even so, they aren’t endorsing Rigell in return. Still, one teabag leader seems to finally be playing realpolitik, claiming she wants to isolate indie Kenny Golden, so maybe a right-wing split will be averted here (sadly).
  • DCCC: Not sure how much Politico (as is their wont) is over-reading Chris Van Hollen’s remarks, but they make it sound like CVH is threatening to cut off under-performing Democratic candidates if they don’t get their acts together. Nothing like some threats of triage to get the troops motivated, huh?

    • 31 thoughts on “SSP Daily Digest: 8/30 (Morning Edition)”

    1. Lets just say this could be true, though unlikely, CVH cutting off funding; Who would you let go and let them fend for themselves?

      My picks woulds be Bright, Minnick, and Taylor.

    2. Ugh…isn’t this the woman who played the secretary in Ferris Bueler’s Day Off? 😆

      And in response to that comment:

      I’m waiting for her to say something like: “Oh, Tancredo’s very popular. The sportos, motorheads, geeks, sluts, bloods, wasteoids, dweebies, they all adore him. They think he’s a righteous doood.” 😆

      ^_^

    4. While I personally believe that the TARP vote was the right thing to do it remains wildly unpopular. I do think that the way lots of GOPers have tried to get away from that vote and pin it on the Dems has been totally disingenuous and I like that Roy Blunt is being called out for this. This is a guy who was responsible for rounding up votes related to this for crying out loud! This is also the same guy who had revotes several times and told the cameras to stop during the Medicare Part D fiasco. Yet nobody talks about it. People forget this and I think Blunt’s record needs to be what people become familiar with. That said, given this climate Carnahan is likely not going to prevail but I do like the investment by the DSCC. I think that an investment in Ohio where voters are reminded of Portman’s record is coming soon as well.  

    5. Harris County is home to Houston, the largest city in Texas and, of course, where Dem nominee Bill White served as mayor for eight years. Not good.

      Houston is not just the largest city in Texas – it’s the 4th largest city in the US. What a mess – I hope Texas Democrats are out in front of whatever solution is developed.  

      I would hate to see shenanigans like unequal distribution of voting machines to Democratic areas of Houston end up determining the Governor’s race. After all, denying brown people the chance to vote is part of Republican Electoral Strategy 101.  

    9. Emerson seems like she’s learned from Murkowski. Despite her district’s PVI and the cycle, she’s not taking anything for granted because she knows her opponent has the ability to make things interesting with his cash (and her $808K CoH are no good if she doesn’t use them!) Plus, ending this race before it can get interesting would probably help Blunt, as a competitive house race would bring more Dems to the polls.

    12. Think you might be interested in this:

      “Dear Graduate Students,

      Keith Poole is organizing a conference to assess the outcome of this year’s midterm elections. It will be an all day conference at the Georgia Center on Friday, November 12. Please save the date. Faculty, students, and the public are encouraged to attend. Among the scheduled panel participants are:

      John Petrocik ( University of Missouri)

      Gary Jacobson (UCSD)

      Nolan McCarty (Princeton)

      Gary Miller (Washington University)

      Brian Schaffner (UMass, Amherst)

      Daron Shaw (University of Texas)(tentative)

      Brian Gaines (University of Illinois)

      Ben Bishin (UC-Riverside)

      David Bradford (University of Georgia)

      Jamie Monogan (University of Georgia)

      Andy Whitford (University of Georgia)

      In addition, Chuck Bullock will moderate a roundtable public forum consisting of Georgia politicians. The tentative schedule is as follows:

                 Panel 1. 9:00 – 10:15 a.m. Public Opinion and the Elections.

                 Panel 2. 10:30 – 11:15 a.m. Analyzing the Issues.

                 Panel 3. 1:30 – 3:00 p.m. Public Forum: Roundtable discussion with politicians.

                 Panel 4. 3:30 – 5:00. Election 2010 and the Future.”

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