Tag: 2010

The rumor is buzzing around Arkansas that Lt. Gov Halter will challenge Blanche Lincoln in the primary.

http://www.arktimes.com/blogs/…

Again, there is no confirmation on this as of yet.  But the Draft Halter facebook group (including yours truly) did a phone bomb this week on Halter’s office and got a rather enthusiastic response from the staff.  All of us that called from the Draft group got the impression that if Halter saw that the support was there he’d run, and if this is true our efforts may have pushed him over the edge.  Here’s to hoping!

If you’re on facebook, you can join the Draft group here:

http://www.facebook.com/group….

UPDATE:Halter spokesman Bud Jackson: “Nothing has changed.  The lieutenant governor continues to focus on his re-election while also considering the available options to best serve Arkansans.”

Sounds like a big non-denial to me.

Three paragraphs of original writing, well a picture’s worth a thousand words, right?

But in all seriousness, here are maps of the Democratic primary for both Governor and Senator.

For Governor (on left), green is for Hynes, Orange for Quinn. For Senator (on right), green is for Giannoulias, Orange for Hoffman. The color scale is slightly different for Senate, since it was a three-person race, Cheryle Jackson won exactly one county. (Too many colors is part of the reason I’m not attempting to do the Republican race at this point in the night.)

As you can see, Quinn won where it mattered: his slight margin in Cook County (especially 10% margin in the city of Chicago), is what’s pulling him across the finish line. Frankly, I think Hynes screwed up with his Harold Washington ad that enraged plenty of voters. (On the bright side, I had been considering voting GOP for governor, but now that the GOP nominee is Bill Brady, the Dem is getting my vote.)

Hynes won huge in Metro-East (Madison County by 27%, St. Clair by 5%), Springfield (Sangamon County by 24%) and Decatur (Macon County by 27%). Hynes also added to his margin in North Central Illinois, winning Peoria by 2%, Bloomington (McLean County by 3%), and LaSalle/Peru by 4%. Again, Quinn won where it matters – he didn’t get completely demolished in the collar surrounding Cook County, losing Will County by 10% but eking out wins in both Lake and DuPage. Quinn’s strongest county? Jo Daivess (and you say we’re not southern!) in the northwest corner of the state, Hynes’ was Fayette in the souther-center of the state.

For Senate, Giannoulias did extremely well downstate: that solid green represents Giannoulias at 60%+ in a 3-way race. Hoffman held his own in the population centers in Chicagoland, especially the more affluent ones, stomping out wins in Lake and DuPage. Giannoulias won the city of Chicago itself, while Hoffman squeezed out an edge in the Cook suburbs. Giannoulias’ solid margins downstate were probably too much to overcome without definitive wins in Chicago and bigger wins in the suburbs. Hoffman’s best county was Lake (49.4%), worst was Rock Island (only 18.2%). Giannoulias’ best was 63.3% in Monroe, worst was Clark, the exact reverse of Cheryle Jackson. Her 23.7% in Cook was pretty important to her strong showing though.

Lastly, of note, the collar counties’ voting powers were diluted today thanks to astronomic turnout (in comparison) in Cook County:

550,000 were cast in Cook for the Democratic primary compared to 905,000 votes for Blagojevich in 2002 (when he had a very generic Dem quality), a 60% turnout ratio compared to 2002 Democratic turnout.

34,000 votes were cast in Lake compared to 76,000 for Blago (a 44% ratio). The ratio in DuPage was 42%, 37% in Kane County, and 45% in Will County. I’m guessing the (relative) high turnout in Cook County is due to our willingness to vote out Todd Stroger (incidentally, whoo Toni Preckwinkle!).

Once we get precinct results and I make the requisite shapefiles, we can break down the city of Chicago and suburban Cook County to compare areas of strength. I’ll probably do maps for that for Governor, Senate, and Cook County Board President. Let me know what other maps you’d like…

http://www.publicpolicypolling…

Some of the others poll better but even Beebe loses to Boozman.

Lincoln 33

Boozman 56

Lincoln 35

Baker 50

Ross 37

Boozman 48

Ross 39

Baker 39

Halter 30

Boozman 53

Halter 34

Baker 45

Clark 36

Boozman 51

Clark 39

Baker 45

Beebe 43

Boozman 44

Beebe 46

Baker 38

For all you purists Lincoln’s problems are certainly not because she isn’t liberal enough. A majority of Arkansas voters say she is too liberal.

The only silver lining is that these other Dems all have high “don’t knows” in terms of favorability but then so do both Boozman and Baker. I think we have to face facts – the state wants a Republican senator.

Two potential candidates are out.

Little Rock mayor, Mike Stodola (who I honestly never expected to run anyway) has declared for reelection.

More surprisingly, veteran and former AG candidate, Paul Suskie, who was apparently laying the groundwork for the campaign, has opted out, citing family obligations and his current work.

http://bluearkansasblog.com/?p…

It’s a real shame about Suskie.  I’ve met the guy and, while we don’t agree on much, he’d have been a strong candidate and I genuinely like him on a personal level.

Right now the race is looking like a three person affair in the primary-

State House Speaker Robbie Wills is running.  So is Snyder’s chief of staff, David Boling.  And then there’s state senate majority leader Joyce Elliott, the only woman and African American in the feild, so far at least.

Now that the dust has settled on the Massachusetts Senate Special (ugh) it is time to turn our minds back to candidate filing.

Below the fold for all the details and hey go check out the 2010 Race Tracker Wiki over at Open Congress for all your House, Senate and Gubernatorial needs.

Candidate filing has closed in Kentucky and West Virginia with a full slate for both parties (boring but true)!

For the Democrats:

KY-01 (Whitfield) – R+15,

KY-02 (Guthrie) – R+15,

KY-04 (Davis) – R+14,

KY-05 (Rogers) – R+15,

WV-02 (Capito) – R+8,

And for the GOP:

KY-03 (Yarmuth) – D+2,

KY-06 (Chandler) – R+9,

WV-01 (Mollohan) – R+9,

WV-03 (Rahall) – R+6,

So for those of us that take notice of these things the progressive totals in states where candidate filing has closed is 6 Unopposed GOP House Reps and 2 unopposed Democratic House Reps.

And finally candidate filing season is open in Indiana. If you assume that all House incumbents recontest then as of the posting of this diary we have candidates in every district except the 3rd & 6th and the GOP every district but the 7th.

The next two states up after that are New Mexico and Ohio.

At last some good news! PPP finds State Treasurer and Democratic frontrunner Alexi Giannoulias leading GOP Congressman Mark Kirk 42-34.

http://publicpolicypolling.blo…

Interestingly, though Kirk edges indies 33-27, Alexi leads among moderates by 45-25. He also has slightly better favorables. I wonder if the airing of all the dirty laundry in the primary is helping get it out of the way.

Jackson and Hoffman trail but it is basically a statistical tie. Since Giannoulias has a clear lead in the recent primary polls this is probably academic.

Been out of the loop the last few days and I’m just now getting around to talking about this.  First, let me assure everyone, Marion Berry did not leave because he was in danger of losing-his health, long something that’s been discussed among Democrats in the district, was the stated reason.  And trust me, the last time I saw the guy at an event (in 2008) he looked like a mummy.  It was time for him to retire long ago.  Still, despite some his conservative leanings, he was a great congressman and everyone in the district, except the Republicans (who could never come up with a coherent reason to run against him), likes him personally and has good things to say about him-he will be missed here.

That said, I know this district looks competitive on the surface, but from where I’m standing on the ground I don’t think it’s going to end up that way.  Republicans had one chance to make this race competitive, and that was to get state rep. Davey Carter in.  Carter has said that he absolutely will not be running, so we can rejoice that this one is off the table-the other potentials all being third tier candidates.

Now there are a ton of names being thrown around on the Dem side-basically every state rep. and state sen. that’s ever been in the district.  None of them really thrill me, but by now it’s no secret that I’m a lefty to lefties.  Anyway, here are the names I know for sure-

Former state party chair Jason Willett has long wanted this seat.  I don’t know where he stands issue wise but I do know that he was a good party chair, though an asshole by reputation.  He’d have the money to fund the race, but he came in a distant third when he ran for mayor of Jonesboro, the district’s largest town and my base of operations.

Former state senator Tim Wooldridge, a very conservative fence post who ran against Bill Halter in the ’06 primary.  He did well in the district during the initial primary, but he was hurt big among African Americans when it came out that he had jokingly proposed a bill to bring back public hangings.

Chad Causey, Berry’s cheif of staff, looks to run, apparently with Berry’s endorsement, which will help big time, though I can’t say I know much else about Causey.

Chris Thyer, the former state rep. of Jonesboro (long before I moved here), is definitely in.  Don’t know anything about him but I’m asking around.

And there are plenty of other names-I’ve heard every state legislator in the district mentioned and several former ones.  I’ll keep you guys posted as things develop.  The only name that really interests me is our State Treasurer, Martha Shoffner (one of my absolute favorite politicians due to her competence and accessibility).  She managed to win big in her race for Treasurer despite being underfunded because she excels at retail politics.  However, with the state budget and the economy being in the straits they are, she’ll probably run for reelection (if Berry had held out and retired next cycle I think she’d have been a shoe in though).

Two more things I want to say.

First, Dustin McDaniel was NEVER going to run for the House seat and everyone here new it.  His name entering this was just a case of name recognition and nothing more.  He wants to be Governor come ’14, and he may well be the favorite for that race.

Secondly, and this is just an interesting side note, one of the most talked about Republicans, who’s still third tier mind you, is Princella Smith, a self described moderate, African American, Republican active in the state party.  Now her bio in and of itself is interesting enough, but the funny thing is that I actually went to high school with her and my dad and her dad were close friends when they played on the Wynne football team back in the day.  How wild is all that?

Some are beginning to talk up the possibility of the GOP not only taking the House but also the Senate this November. To do that they would have to win ten Democratic seats. In my view they currently lead in North Dakota, Nevada, Arkansas, Colorado and Delaware. Illinois and Pennsylvania are too close to call. Despite the loss of Massachusetts this week I still don’t think they will win all of these. But say for the sake of argument they did. They would then need three more from somewhere. Unless they can get fresh challengers in Washington, Wisconsin and more likely Indiana then they would have to win Connecticut, New York AND California to get control. To cut a long story short the gold standard of polling in the Golden State suggests the latter is very unlikely to happen.

Field Poll (1/5-17) MoE 3.3%

General Election

Barbara Boxer (D) 48%

Tom Campbell (R) 38%

Boxer (D) 50%

Carly Fiorina (R) 35%

Boxer (D) 51%

Chuck DeVore (R) 34%

The incumbent has a positive favorability rating of 48-39. The Republicans have far less name ID and only Campbell is in positive territory.

GOP Primary

Campbell 30%

Fiorina 25%

DeVore 6%

Undecided 39%

http://www.field.com/fieldpoll…

I’m as freaked out over Massachusetts as anyone – and I might be plenty angry/despondent/confused/hungover tomorrow morning.

But in the meantime, I’ve been working on a crude projection model using, in part, the “baseline” idea that Crisitunity and DavidNYC have made a part of SSP Election Night Tradition.

The model, as inputs, takes partial results from towns that have reported, and outputs a whole slew of numbers comparing the current situation to the “baseline” numbers.

Explanations below the flip.

So here’s the front end of the model:

http://spreadsheets.google.com…

You’ll see a few things:

• How Coakley and Brown are currently doing.
  

• How Obama was doing in 2008 with the same towns and parts of towns reporting.
  

• How a 2008 “baseline” Democrat on target to win by 1 vote would be doing.
  

• How Kerry was doing in 1996 against Bill Weld with the same towns and parts of towns reporting.
  

• How a 1996 “baseline” Democrat would be doing.
  

You’ll also see comparisons between Coakley’s performance and those of Obama, Kerry, and the two “baseline” Democrats.

Perhaps most significantly, you’ll see the “2010 Projection using 2008” line.

The model compares relative turnout between 2010 and 2008, and the relative performances of Coakley and Obama to project results from towns that have not yet reported.

The “2010 Projection using 1996” line does the same, except with 1996 data.

I’m not claiming this model is perfect. In fact, it’s pretty damn bad. I can think of a few glaring weaknesses:

• The fundamental problem of the ‘baseline’ idea: it assumes that every town will swing uniformly.
  

• Disparate turnout: this model compares turnout in aggregate, instead of at the town level. This may lead to an overestimation of turnout in areas with relatively low turnout (compared to 2008 and 1996) and the reverse in areas with relatively high turnout. This may potentially bias the projections in Coakley’s favor.
  

• Assumption of town uniformity: the model assumes that each town votes uniformly the same way, but…Jamaica Plain and Southie are not going to vote the same way, very simply. If a relatively Brown-friendly area of a town reports first, this will bias the projection in his favor. The reverse is true if a Coakley-friendly area reports first.
  

Incidentally, here are the blood and guts of the model: http://spreadsheets.google.com…

Update: In columns AS, AT, BB, and BC, you can see baselines for every town for both 2008 and 1996.

I threw in some junk results to test it, and so far I didn’t detect any coding errors. I don’t pretend that I’m better than the Associated Press – but I just want to have an idea of where we are at each point of the results phase.

Hopefully I’ll get a chance to keep this updated as results stream in tonight.

Lastly, if you live in Massachusetts, are reading this, and you haven’t voted (assuming you’re a citizen, not a convicted felon, etc..), what the hell’s wrong with you?!

Here’s hoping Coakley pulls this off.

500 LV, MoE +-4%, 12-13/1

Martha Coakley (D) 49%

Scott Brown (R) 41%

Joseph Kennedy (L) 5%

The electorate is 40% Democratic, 18% Republican and 42% unenrolled/independent. Brown leads the latter by 49-36.

http://www.bluemassgroup.com/u…

And breathe. Hopefully this means the ads are sinking in and making Democrats get off their behinds for next Tuesday. President Clinton is up there tomorrow and First Read reports a Vicki Kennedy ad is in the can and ready to go up before the weekend.