From a Tarrance Group (R) poll for Jean Schmidt, conducted 3/11-12 (likely voters, no trendlines):
Vic Wulsin (D): 33%
Jean Schmidt (R-inc.): 51%
MoE: ±4.9%
So, how would you rate this race on the SSP scale?
14 thoughts on “OH-02: New (Internal) Poll Gives Schmidt an 18-Point Lead”
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if schmidt doesn’t say a thing from now until the election she’ll run away with it. otherwise it’s still one of the most likely to switch.
That isn’t a good poll. But if she’s already polling over 50%, that’s pretty bad for us.
Don’t they all have to be taken with a grain of salt? I still bet this will be at worst a 46-54 race for the Dem, with victory a real possibility.
Vc Wulsin, our candidate in a rematch, held Schmidt to 50.45% of the vote last time, while getting better than 49.39% herself. To believe this poll, we’d have to believe that Jean Schmidt will run ahead of her numbers from 2006.
Well, maybe the Ohio voters aren’t as mad at the corrupt Repubs anymore, forget and forgive. Maybe they think we are winning the War of Occupation in Iraq and don’t mind holding on another 100 years. Maybe these voters aren’t the ones looking for change. Maybe the Cincinnati area won’t be hit hard by this Recession. Maybe pigs will fly.
But how many other Repub House members have the same expectation? Not the 30 or so who’ve retired. But seriously, are there ANY others we expect to outperform their last showing?
If Ms Schmidt likes being told what she wants to hear, then she sure got her money’s worth out of this poll. But if she wants to know where she really stands, not so much.
Regardless of accuracy, it still at the least vaguely shows how the electorate feels.
What do you guys think the chances of Vic Wulsin, if she were to win, to holding onto this seat in 2010? If they aren’t that likely, should we even bother with this race? Sure, Schmidt is a nut job and I would love to beat her, but if there are other races we could win and hold onto for quite some time, we should go for them.
If this is a Republican polling outfit, I tend to factor in a small or slight partisan bias. I would do the same if the polling organization were Democratic one too. (I’ve done phone interviews for polling agencies. Not every interviewer adheres to conducting interviews in a nonbiased way though others do. And even in the best situation, bias may seep in.) Taking possible partisan bias into consideration, 51% is the best that MJ can do?! Two percentage points lower, most of us would be pronouncing her doomed because she’s under the magic 50% re-elect mark. Keep in mind that she should have the incumbency effect going for her and polling stronger than that.
In the meantime, Wulsin is recovering from a contested primary. She also has the strong support of the state Democratic Party. And she has a strong fundraising base and will probably have the support of EMILY’s List. I think that she will perform much more strongly than this poll reveals and that she can win!
i’m digging in my memory for a poll they did in kentucky related to fletcher and beshear. my recollection is that it showed fletcher and beshear tied when nearly every other poll showed beshear cleaning his clock (which he proceeded to do).
does anyone remember this?
I’d like to point out, that the people who do vote for Schmidt are probably holding their breath and looking away as they touch the screen. Republicans hate her, they just hate liberals more.
Its a really tough district though. Southern Ohio is really strange dynamically, lots of evangelicals and libertarians both of which side with the GOP.