Swing State Project

This is the second part in my two-part series having a little bit of fun with the Oregon Voters’ Pamphlet.  This part discusses the main arguments presented by each side in every contested ballot measure and then dissects them for pure comedic value.

Cross-Posted from Loaded Orygun: http://www.loadedorygun.net/sh…

The Oregon Voters’ Pamphlet is currently posted at: http://www.sos.state.or.us/elections/nov42008/military_vp.html

Please note that this is the “Military/Overseas” edition and as such is a bit rough (it is basically scanned in PDFs).

For a more serious look at these measures, see my diary from a few weeks back: The Final Oregon Ballot: Game On!

For each measure I present each side’s major arguments and list the number of arguments filed for and against.  I then analyze and make fun of these arguments.

Note: These are obviously gross exaggerations of some of these arguments so bear with me.  I focus on the main argument for each side, but multiple arguments do exist for/against most measures.

For the record, this is how I personally will vote on each measure:

54: Yes.

55: Yes.

56: Yes.

57: Yes.

58: No.

59: No.

60: No.

61: No.

62: No.

63: No.

64: No.

65: No.

Oregon’s Ballot Measures:

Measure Summary:

Measure Type:

C-Constitutional.

S-Statutory.

Legislative Referrals:

Measure 54 (C):

Summary: This corrects a bizarre flaw in the state constitution that prohibits citizens under 21 from voting in school board elections (a provision which is, of course, not in effect but should be removed anyways).

No arguments filed for or against.

Measure 55 (C):

Summary: Minor fixes to the state’s redistricting process.

Known Opposition: None.

No arguments filed for or against.

Measure 56 (S):

Summary: Partially repeals the Double Majority law requiring that 50% of registered voters cast ballots in an election for a bond measure to pass for May and November votes.

Arguments Filed For/Against: 23/7.

Yes Argument: The Double Majority Law basically means that measures that would otherwise pass fail because people don’t vote.

The Real Argument: We’re losing because people don’t vote.

No Argument: The Double Majority Law protects taxpayers from being abused by local governments who may repeatedly sneak ballot measures past them until they pass.

The Real Argument: We hate taxes and we know that the only people likely to vote in non-general elections are those that support taxes.

Measure 57 (S):

Summary: Proposes an alternative to Kevin Mannix’s (R-Of Course) property crime sentence minimum initiative.  Focuses state policy on treatment rather than prison for low level drug and property crimes.

Arguments Filed For/Against: 23/6.

Yes Argument: Kevin Mannix’s crime bill costs too much because it requires building of too many prisons and focuses on punishment and not treatment.

The Real Argument: Mannix’s measure will pass if we don’t propose this measure so that’s exactly what we’re doing.  We can’t really afford this one either but we are in less deep sh-t if we pass this one than Mannix’s.

No Argument: This measure is just a kiss-off designed by politicians to appear that they are doing something when they are in fact not to prevent crime.

The Real Argument: We want everyone who has ever committed any real crime at all locked away forever.  Rehabilitation, forget it.  If Jean Villejean of Les Miserables fame stole bread under this measure, he’d get hard time and we don’t want any excuses about why he did it.

Citizen Constitutional and Statutory Measures:

Measure 58 (S):

Chief Sponsor: Bill Sizemore.

Summary: This measure would require English immersion rather than ESL for children for whom English is not their primary language.

Arguments Filed For/Against: 8/29.

Yes Argument: Children of immigrants learn English best and integrate best into our society if they have English immersion, not ESL.

The Real Argument: Learn English you Mex-I-Cans!  This is A-Mer-ika and you dang well better speak it rather than that there Espan-Yol….

No Argument: It costs too much and is not effective to force English immersion on new immigrants and their children.

The Real Argument: The other side is a bunch of racist f-ers and we shouldn’t listen to them.

Measure 59 (S):

Chief Sponsor: Bill Sizemore

Summary: This is at least the third time that Sizemore and his gang have proposed this measure, which makes federal income taxes fully deductible on state returns.  This measure largely benefits high wage earners and would blow a huge hole in the state’s budget.

Arguments Filed For/Against: 6/28.

Yes Argument: Allowing a full federal deduction saves taxpayers money and thus stimulates the economy.

The Real Argument: Allowing a full federal deduction saves rich people money (the current deduction covers most middle class folks).

No Argument: This deduction is unnecessary and would blow a huge hole in the state budget.

The Real Argument: This deduction would cost a whole lot of state jobs, including teachers. cops and firefighters.  You like teachers, cops and firefighters don’t you?

Measure 60 (S):

Chief Sponsor: Bill Sizemore

Summary: This would require “merit-pay” for teachers in public schools.

Arguments Filed For/Against: 6/26.

Yes Argument: We should focus on retaining the best teachers, not simply those that have been there the longest.

The Real Argument: We want another excuse to cut teachers we don’t like.

No Argument: Merit pay doesn’t work because it is difficult to measure student performance.

The Real Argument: We’re used to the seniority system and we want to keep it.

Measure 61 (S):

Chief Sponsor: Kevin Mannix

Summary: This is Kevin Mannix’s draconian sentencing measure for property and low-level drug crimes.

Arguments Filed For/Against: 7/19.

Yes Argument: Those committing low level drug and property crimes get off too easy nowadays.

The Real Argument: Measure 11 (Mannix’s Mandatory Minimum Measure) worked so well at increasing the need for prisons, why not go for broke?

No Argument: This law is overly punitive, most of these folks need treatment, not jail.

The Real Argument: We can’t afford this measure, it’s as simple as that.

Measure 62 (C):

Chief Sponsor: Kevin Mannix.

Summary: Dedicates 15% of Oregon Lottery proceeds to crime fighting/prevention efforts.

Arguments Filed For/Against: 6/10.

Yes Argument: If we want real crime prevention, we need a stable funding source like the lottery.

The Real Argument: This also takes away money from those pesky public schools to boot, we don’t like public schools that much.

No Argument: This would decrease funding for other programs, parks and schools mainly, funded by the lottery.

The Real Argument: Gambling has been funding us for a long time and we can’t afford to lose any money from people who are foolish enough to play the lottery.

Measure 63 (S):

Chief Sponsor; Bill Sizemore

Summary: This measure would allow minor building changes without a permit.

Arguments Filed For/Against: 6/24.

Yes Argument: Right now, in order to make minor building changes to your home or business, you need to get a pesky permit.  This should not be so.

The Real Argument: This is a backhanded way of starving local governments that depend on permit revenue and thus decreasing the size of government.  Oh and we hate pesky permitting requirements for the most part too.

No Argument: Permit requirements are there for our own good and safety.

The Real Argument: Local governments rely so heavily on permit revenues that we can’t afford to lose them.

Measure 64 (S):

Chief Sponsor: Bill Sizemore

Summary: Sizemore brings back an old and twice-failed idea to ban public-employee unions from using dues for political purposes.

Arguments Filed For/Against: 7/30.

Yes Argument: Since public employee unions work for the public, they should not be involved in any way in politics.

The Real Argument: Public employee unions are the single biggest source of funding for the Oregon D’s and this way we can kill the Democrats $ source.

No Argument: People can already opt out of their dues being spent on political campaigns.  This is just a backhanded way to destroy our influence.

The Real Argument: We lose a lot of our power if this measure passes.

Measure 65 (S):

Chief Sponsor: Former SOS Phil Keisling (D)

Summary: Creates a Top-Two Open Primary in which all parties run their candidates on the same ballot and the top two, regardless of party affiliation, advance to the general election.

Arguments Filed For/Against: 20/15

Yes Argument: The top two primary makes sense because it allows the top two candidates regardless of party affiliation to advance to the general election, allowing for choice and encouraging turnout in the primary.

The Real Argument: We don’t like the control parties have our the primaries.

No Argument: The top two primary doesn’t increase turnout and actually decreases the chance a third-party candidate will make it to the general election.  If you want to vote in a primary, register as a member of a political party.

The Real Argument: The Republican and Democratic parties don’t want to lose control of their nominating processes.

Let me know what you think.

It’s Sunday night, which means that it’s time for SSP round up all of the House race independent expenditures filed in the last seven days. Here’s the latest damage:

Most notably, the DCCC has entered AL-05, AZ-01, AZ-05, and PA-03 for the first time this year. It’s nice to see that Dave Schweikert is getting the warm general election welcome of a prompt bloody nose from the DCCC, and the committee’s targeting of the odious Phil English means that we can expect a hotly-contested race in PA-03.

The NRCC is still holding its fire, but Tom Cole has dipped into his kitty to fund a poll in OH-02. Will its findings ever see the light of day?

In case you missed it, last week’s round-up is available here.

For more specific details on these expenditures, please check out SSP’s daily Independent Expenditure Tracker.

Note From Diarist:  This diary is primarily about the Presidential campaign.  I wrote it for Daily Kos but didn’t feel it got the exposure I was hoping for.  It’s very much inside baseball politics so I thought it might have some fans around here, but it is about the Presidential campaign which I know is no longer the focus of the website.  If the moderator wishes to delete it, I’ll understand.

Anybody following the horse race at all has a pretty good idea where the key battlegrounds are expected to be. My personal opinion is that the three markets that are most likely to determine the 2008 election winner are, in this order, Denver (including Boulder and Fort Collins), Detroit, and Northern Virginia. Beyond those three, there are at least a dozen markets in key battleground states that will be sucking up the vast majority of campaign resources in the next 50-some days until the election. That’s the way the game is played and always will be for as long as the Electoral College is a reality. My thought process this morning was dedicated to isolating some geographic hotspots that are perhaps under-the-radar of conventional wisdom yet could nonetheless be very productive investments of time and resources for the Obama campaign. The top-10 I came up with are listed below in descending order.

10. Flagstaff, Arizona–Because it’s John McCain’s home state, nobody expects Arizona to be a swing state in 2008. It probably won’t be, but the most recent poll released from the state showed McCain leading by only six in Arizona, a smaller lead than he held in the expected battleground state of Nevada. The Obama campaign needs to do some internal polling in Arizona and see if their findings reflect the recent polling of a single-digit McCain lead. If it is, I think it would be entirely worthwhile to pour some campaign dollars in the less-expensive media market of Flagstaff, which is already favorable Democratic terrain, and also to set up a campaign stop there. It would be very embarrassing for the McCain campaign if Obama went to the university town of Flagstaff and filled the streets with tens of thousands of screaming fans in McCain’s backyard. Obviously this is not something we’re likely to see in the closing weeks of the campaign, but for headfake value alone, it’s something worth doing in September.

9. Aberdeen, South Dakota–I’ve seen only one poll coming out of South Dakota, and it showed McCain with a scant four-point lead. I don’t expect Obama to win there, but I’m puzzled why the prospect of a competitive South Dakota is not even being discussed even when the polls are similar to those of North Dakota, which is a battleground. Aberdeen is a worthwhile target for a September campaign stop and television ads for a number of reasons. This is the Democratic part of South Dakota. Tim Johnson and Stephanie Herseth pulled out statewide victories in 2002 and 2004 by running up the score in the counties in and around Aberdeen. Given that the Democrats have adopted a much more friendly platform to controversial-everywhere-but-the-Corn-Belt biofuels than Republicans in 2008, Obama could pick off alot of GOP-leaning farmers in eastern South Dakota who don’t trust McCain’s commitment to agriculture. Beyond that, Obama could do a rally with hometown boy Tom Daschle and really make some connections to voters who were out of reach for Gore and Kerry. I’m not certain about particulars of the Aberdeen media market, but I suspect it would be one of the cheapest in the country for advertising, and cuts into portions of North Dakota making it even more useful.

8. Wheeling, West Virginia–I have a good friend who lives deep into the hollers of Logan County, WV, and still insists from her interactions that she believes Obama will win West Virginia. I suspect that puts her in a minority small enough to count on one hand, but I still think some outreach effort into West Virginia would be valuable, particularly in the Wheeling area. Obama essentially ceded West Virginia to Hillary in the primary, making only one campaign stop in Charleston on the eve of the primary. Voters there don’t know him, but I suspect that if more do, the margin for McCain in the state could potentially be far less lopsided than if he doesn’t set foot there. More importantly though, I think Wheeling is important for the same reason it was important for Kerry four years ago. The market cuts into Ohio and Pennsylvania, specifically the very blue-collar regions of Ohio and Pennsylvania where Obama has the most work to do to win over skeptics. I suspect campaigning in this area is something of a defensive move, meaning his best hope is probably to cut losses rather than win over Bush voters, but in the context of controlling losses within statewide races in OH and PA, the old adage that the best offense is a good defense certainly seems to apply.

7. Council Bluffs, Iowa–Each new round of poll numbers indicate that Iowa appears less likely to ultimately be a battleground state, with Obama managing double-digit leads in the state. Again, I surmise that the untold story accounting for Obama’s strong performance throughout the Corn Belt (even Indiana!) is ethanol, specifically McCain’s previous hard-line opposition to it. The reason Council Bluffs is a secret weapon is twofold. It’s location in the heavily Republican southwest side of Iowa means the Obama campaign is on offense there, competing for traditionally Republican votes in western Iowa, but also competing for votes in Omaha, Nebraska, just across the Missouri River from Council Bluffs. We don’t hear much anymore about the prospect of Obama winning one (or even two) of the electoral votes in eastern Nebraska, and it remains a longshot. Nonetheless, raising Obama’s presence in western Iowa will have spillover effect in Omaha and the corn farmers surrounding it in Nebraska, leaving the prospect of robbing McCain of a Nebraska electoral vote on the table while simultaneously running up the score in Iowa.

6. Durango, Colorado–Chances are, the suburban doughnut surrounding Denver will decide who wins Colorado’s nine electoral votes, but if the race is as close there as most suspect it will end up being, smaller Colorado markets loom large. The fast-changing demography of Colorado was abundantly clear in the 2004 election, and perhaps no place was the change more obvious than Durango, formerly a Republican stronghold in Colorado’s southwest corner, where population growth is apparently fronted by left-leaning young people drawn to the area’s ski culture. I believe there were only five counties in America that Bill Clinton never won in 1992 or 1996, but where John Kerry won in 2004. La Plata County, Colorado, home of Durango, was one of them. If we assume that the trendlines that had clearly transformed Durango in 2004 have continued, Obama should be able to grow upon Kerry’s margin rather significantly in the area in 2008. The fact that neighboring battleground state New Mexico is a few miles south of Durango is an an additional bullet point for its utility.

5. South Bend, Indiana–Congressman Joe Donnelly showed us the potential northern Indiana holds for Democrats if we simply try there. The lesson appears to be learned as Indiana is deemed a battleground state in 2008. South Bend strikes me as the most consequential market in Indiana. Notre Dame University gives Obama a youthful base of operation while simultaneously providing Obama an outreach to Catholic voters, a demographic long cited as one of his most difficult to reach. The South Bend market also reaches into southwestern Michigan, and despite fairly encouraging polls of late, I think Obama will ultimately need all the help in can get in Michigan. Probably outside of the South Bend market but still worthy of mention is another Indiana town in Joe Donnelly’s Congressional district, Kokomo. This is a blue-collar factory town that Democrats should be winning, but rarely do. Voters in Kokomo may be some of the most likely to swing if the Obama campaign reaches out to them in a serious way.

4. Elko, Nevada–In 2004, it seemed like John Kerry was spending more time in Republican-leaning Reno than in Democratic-leaning Las Vegas. I didn’t really understand it at the time, until I saw the election returns and noticed Kerry had significantly cut into the GOP’s advantage in Reno and surrounding areas. The reason Kerry lost Nevada was that he got absolutely destroyed in rural Nevada. Obama, by contrast, beat Hillary in most rural Nevada counties, meaning there’s at least a basis for thinking he could overperform Kerry in places like Elko. Campaigning and advertising in Elko would really be taking Kerry’s 2004 effort to go on offense in Reno to the next level. Considering Kerry got less than 20% of the vote in Nevada’s fourth most populous county, worse than both Mondale and Dukakis did back in the day, there’s easily room for improvement in the area, and even a little improvement upstate Nevada could be the difference in the state.

3. Cincinnati, Ohio–Now considering Cincinnati is the third-largest media market in what is considered perhaps the most critical battleground state, calling for an Obama campaign presence there is on the surface a no-brainer, but most importantly, I see metropolitan Cincinnati as the region of Ohio where Obama is best-positioned to make gains over John Kerry. Kerry narrowly lost Hamilton County (home of the city of Cincinnati and the core of its suburbs), but with a high African-American turnout in 2008, I strongly expect the county to turn blue. Just as important are the three crimson red exurban counties surrounding Cincinnati, which accounted for Bush’s entire margin of victory in Ohio in 2004. In every election since 2004, the needle has moved dramatically against Republicans in all of these counties (Butler, Clermont, and Warren), with Jean Schmidt, Ken Blackwell, and Mike DeWine, all badly underperforming traditional GOP margins in the area. If Obama can keep this trendline going and trim his losses by a few percentage points in suburban Cincinnati, it will go a long way towards offsetting his likely underperformance in the rural portions of Ohio. And to whatever extent the Cincinnati market is an outreach into Indiana is also a feather in our cap.

2. Michigan’s Upper Peninsula–With the racial polarization of metropolitan Detroit, enflamed by the Kwame Kilpatrick scandal, and Obama’s call for tougher CAFE standards fiercely opposed by Detroit automakers, the McCain campaign has some serious ammunition against Obama to take into Michigan. I fully expect Obama will underperform Gore and Kerry in metropolitan Detroit. With that in mind, the thought process should become where we can pick up additional votes in Michigan to offset the possible hemorrhaging in the population centers. To that end, it seems like a no-brainer for Obama to take his campaign up north…way up north. The blue-collar Upper Peninsula of Michigan is sparsely populated, but its demographics seem to align with other Midwestern areas that are Obama-friendly. More to the point, the Upper Peninsula of Michigan looks like Wisconsin, thinks like Wisconsin, and votes like Wisconsin. When you look at Obama’s healthy standing in Wisconsin polls compared to Kerry four years ago or Gore’s eight years ago, my thinking is that every Obama campaign rally that begins in Green Bay should make the quick drive to Marquette, Michigan, from there.

1. Fargo-Moorhead (North Dakota/Minnesota)–I suspect there is no other media market in the country where the needle will move more significantly in Obama’s favor compared to 2000 and 2004 than Fargo-Moorhead. To the extent that North Dakota has already been identified as a battleground state, Obama’s campaign already has a presence in the area, but may nonetheless not appreciate just how many things are working to their candidate’s favor here. First of all, the cities of Fargo and Moorhead are islands of youth in a region otherwise dominated by gray hair. That cuts to Obama’s advantage demographically. Furthermore, in addition to Obama’s more farmer-friendly stand on biofuels, the Democrats have an additional ace-in-the-hole here because the region is one of the nation’s top sugar-growing areas. The sugar industry has enjoyed its relative “cartel” status and has become decidedly protectionist since the passage of CAFTA in 2005, a vote which helped every Democrat on the ticket in Minnesota in 2006 score landslide margins in the Red River Valley. Particularly on the Minnesota side, this area is historically Democratic, even though both Gore and Kerry were destroyed here. This advantage on both sides of the river extends further to the Grand Forks area, a region of North Dakota where every Democrat needs to win big in a competitive statewide race. It’s expected that Minnesota is leaning heavily Obama, but don’t underestimate the pseudo-maverick image of John McCain fooling alot of moderate suburbanites in Minneapolis-St. Paul. That raises the stakes for Obama’s need to win in places like the Red River Valley, which early indications suggest he is poised to do.

Just down the road from Paducah, Kentucky sits St. John’s Catholic Church. Every year, they have an annual picnic with games and political speaking. While not as famous, and a lot tamer than the Fancy Farm Picnic, it is a really good idea for candidates to stop in and work for votes in Western Kentucky.

As with a lot of events in Kentucky Politics today, Heather Ryan stole the show. Unfortunately, at the last minute our camera had some technical difficulties, but I want to share a transcript of Heather’s speech, that once again fired up Democrats in attendence, and offended Republicans deeply with the hard truth of their records:

Well, we were going to bring our tractor-trailer to St. John’s Picnic like Exxon Eddie, but we simply couldn’t afford it.

After the Republican National Convention ended this week, analysts said the Republicans didn’t mention their achievements because they didn’t have any. Unfortunately, I disagree.

Republicans achieved everything they set out to achieve. They’ve made the rich richer, and the middle-class poor. You may think it is unfair for me to say, but when my opponent votes against Healthcare for poor children, he is representing Insurance companies, not you.

When Exxon Eddie votes against funding Alternative Energy, he is representing Big Oil, and his own stock options, not you. When he votes to give himself and the richest 1% of Americans a huge tax break while cutting veteran’s benefits he is representing his own wallet, not yours.

(Republican heckles from side) That is unless you are sitting over there with that bunch, who obviously aren’t hurting.

Because that is what we have had in office for 14 yrs, a cookie-cutter Republican who votes over 90% of the time with President Bush. If you are proud of what George W. Bush has done to our country, then by all means vote for Exxon Ed Whitfield.

But if you are embarrassed that we are the only industrialized nation in the world that doesn’t provide healthcare for it’s citizens, and if you are angry that Big Oil holds our economy hostage, and if your furious that the richest among us own the politicians that are supposed to represent us, then vote for me, Heather Ryan and support the Democratic ticket.

I am Heather Ryan and I am just an ordinary person during an extra-ordinary time. I am a wife, and mother, previous labor union member, and a veteran, which means that even I have more experience than Sarah Palin.

You have heard a lot of talk about change in this election. Its something we desperately need in Kentucky’s First Congressional District, and in fact in America. Friends, if you always do what you did, then you will always get what you have gotten. So please, vote Democrat on Nov. 4th. Change isn’t a campaign slogan, it is a neccesity.

Thank you.

Now for some pics of St. John’s!! Here is Heather, and her daughter Heaven, everyone’s favorite Mitch McConnell antagonist arriving at the picnic. (McConnell was a no-show):

Here is Bruce Lunsford, McConnell’s opponent who did show to meet with the voters of Western Kentucky:

Here is our opponent, Exxon Eddie, looking worried as he arrived in an empty tractor-trailer with his face and name on the side, burning $4.10 a gallon diesel while Paducah Trucking Companies are closing their doors. Of course, with his Exxon and Chevron Stock he will get it back. The taxpayers of Western Kentucky won’t:

Here is Exxon Eddie on the stage, trying to explain away $4.00 a gallon gas, and voting against Healthcare for Children:

Here is the reaction of Democrats as Exxon Eddie states how he has worked for Energy Independence. From left to right, Former Congressman and State Senate candidate Carroll Hubbard, Bruce Lunsford, Heather Ryan, and Lt. Gov. Dan Mongiardo:

Here is Heather, doing what she does like no other, calling the Republicans out on their sorry records of representing us:

Here is Carroll Hubbard, showing he still has what it takes to deliver a knockout speech:

Here is the leader of the Kentucky Democratic Party, Jennifer Moore, who is doing an awesome job and as Carroll Hubbard reminded us at Breakfast is the prettiest leader of the KDP ever:

It was a long, and great day for Democrats. Heather fired everyone up as usual, and better yet got under some Republican skin. As is the case every time people hear Heather for the first time, we signed up many new volunteers and recieved several contributions.

Please, help us in this race. This seat is ripe for the picking if we get the funds, and Heather would be an awesome Democrat with a spine in the Congress. Just ask Russ Feingold!! We are fighting hard here, and Exxon Eddie knows he is vulnerable. Go here to expand our Congressional majority!!:

We need your support!!

 

This is a pretty big deal. Billionaire industrialist (and all-around racist nutjob) Jack Davis is hell-bent on using his considerable personal resources in order to buy the seat of retiring GOP Rep. Tom Reynolds. Since Davis is currently embroiled in a contentious primary with Iraq vet Jon Powers, he has gone to great lengths in order to guarantee a spot on the November ballot no matter the outcome of the Democratic primary next Tuesday. Davis formed a new party (the “Save Jobs and Farms Party”) for exactly this purpose.

After paying field workers to gather 7,000 signatures from around the district, the move looked to be a slam dunk. The only problem? Davis forgot to officially accept the nomination:

The state Board of Elections on Friday threw Davis’ new party off the November ballot because he failed to file a document accepting the party’s nomination for Congress in the 26th District, commission spokesman Robert A. Brehm said.

“The state board commissioners voted today to determine that the . . . petitions of Mr. Davis are invalid,” Brehm said. “The reason was the failure to timely file an acceptance by the candidate, which is required by state Election Law.”

Davis has until Wednesday to appeal the decision, but the commissioners agree that it was a slam-dunk move that stands no chance of being reversed. If Jon Powers can win Tuesday’s primary — and folks close to the action in the district tell me that the primary is a true tossup — getting Davis weeded from the November ballot is crucial to Democratic chances here.

(H/T: The Albany Project)

As another month begins, it’s time for us to pause and take note of the constantly shifting picture of 2008’s Senate races. You know what to do: Rank the senate races (as far down the list as you wish to go) in order of their likelihood of flipping.

Yesterday, we looked at the dramatic voter registration shift in Nevada, where Democrats have added far more voters to the rolls than Republicans in all three of the state’s congressional districts over the past two years. It occurred to me that we might want to expand this analysis to as many “swing states” as we could.

SEK over at The Edge of the American West has done yeoman’s work on this score, keeping tabs on the Democratic gains since the beginning of the year in all states with available data on party registration. Let’s take that approach a step further and compare the voter registration changes between today and 2006.

Nearly five years ago, DavidNYC defined a swing state as any state where the vote margin between both sides was ±10%. Let’s take David’s 2004 list of swing states (and add North Carolina and Arizona, for good measure) and see just how much movement there has been in voter registration in these states since November 2006. Unfortunately, not all of these states have voter registration, or publicly available data covering the last two years, so our list is much shorter than I’d like. But you blog with the stats you have, not the stats you want.

Just as we did yesterday, let’s present the data in terms of the margin of each party’s voter registration advantage in their respective states, with blue indicating a Democratic registration advantage and red indicating a GOP advantage.

No doubt a super-charged presidential primary was a big factor in the hard blue turn in many of these states, but that contest only fanned the flames of an already present (and continuing) trend. These are definitely some numbers worth chewing on — and definitely ones causing heartburn for GOP strategists.

I’ve included links to my sources below the fold.

Update: I’ve revised the chart above to include inactive voters in the tallies for Arizona and Nevada, as well as update the Iowa numbers with the new September stats (Dems posted another net gain of 2,500 voters here).

AZ: 2006 | 2008

CA: 2006 | 2008

CO: 2006 | 2008

DE: 2006 | 2008

FL: 2006 | 2008

IA: 2006 | 2008

NV: 2006 | 2008

NJ: 2006 | 2008

NC: 2006 | 2008

OR: 2006 | 2008

PA: 2006 | 2008

The Alaska Division of Elections has just updated the primary results for the state’s at-large House race:

Don Young: 48,006 (45.45%)

Sean Parnell: 47,767 (45.22%)

Gabrielle LeDoux: 9,856 (9.33%)

That looks to be just about it, although the state is still accepting oversees absentee ballots until Wednesday, when the count will be made final.

All told, Young has made a net gain of 21 votes since election night. However, given that either Parnell or ten petitioning voters can request a state-paid recount if the margin is tighter than 0.5% (as is the case here), a recount seems likely.

So far, so good for Ethan Berkowitz.

Update: The Anchorage Daily News writes that “an uncertain number of absentees and questioned ballots remain to be counted”.

Later Update: With another cluster of votes counted, Young’s lead has expanded from 172 to 239 votes.

Buried deep in the crosstabs of last week’s PPP poll of the Hagan-Dole seate race, there is this little gem:

One thing the Democracy Corps poll asked was who people would support for Congress in each district of the state. The sample sizes on these are pretty small (51-86 respondents per CD) so should be taken with a bit of a grain of salt but they still tell an interesting story:

– Folks who have leads over 15 points include G.K. Butterfield, Bob Etheridge, Walter Jones, David Price, Howard Coble, Mike McIntyre, Sue Myrick, and Heath Shuler. Shuler has a remarkable 66-27 advantage. It’s amazing how quickly a district can become ‘safe,’ but that’s sort of the choice the Republicans made by nominating Carl Mumpower. Unless I’m missing something it doesn’t look like the 12th and 13th district crosstabs are on the report but I am pretty comfortable saying that Mel Watt and Brad Miller will be reelected this fall.

–The closest Congressional district in the state is the 5th, where Virginia Foxx leads Roy Carter 48-46. I really hope the DCCC and other folks take the pick up opportunity in this district seriously. There are races on the Red to Blue list that based on the data I’ve seen are less winnable than this one. Carter is a uniquely appealing candidate and has the opportunity to pull off the same kind of shocker Larry Kissell almost did in 2006 if he gets the resources he needs to run the strongest campaign possible.

– In the 8th District they show Robin Hayes up 50-42 on Larry Kissell- I think it’s a little closer than that right now but that’s simply a sample size issue. Same thing in the 10th District where Daniel Johnson trails Patrick McHenry 54-39 based on 65 interviews.

Admittedly, the sample sizes are small since these are just subsets of the statewide polls. But if NC-5 is 48-46, what a golden opportunity we have there.

http://publicpolicypolling.blo…

Great news.  After the Alaska Division of Elections counted the remaining 25,000 absentee and questioned votes, Don Young’s lead is at 129 votes, down from 151.  

With the lead shrinking a bit, it looks like we’re headed to recount territory, but Young is holding on.  This is solid news for Ethan Berkowitz, as Palin and Young’s bitter relationship likely won’t bring the longtime incumbent many coattails.  

http://www.ktuu.com/Global/sto…

Young’s lead over Parnell down to 129 votes

Posted: Sep 5, 2008 09:22 PM EDT

by Jason Lamb

Friday, Sept. 5, 2008

ANCHORAGE, Alaska — After counting absentee and questioned ballots Friday the Alaska Division of Elections released new numbers in the airtight Republican primary race between incumbent Congressman Don young and Lt. Gov. Sean Parnell for Alaska’s U.S. House seat.

Young now leads Parnell by a mere 129 votes.

There were 85,000 votes cast in the race leading up to today’s adjusted tallies.

Elections workers began counting the questioned and absentee ballots Friday morning at the Anchorage office of the Division of Elections.

The most recently counted ballots were checked to ensure they were postmarked correctly. Absentee ballots had to be postmarked by the Aug. 26 primary election day.

Elections officials also made sure that ballots were cast by registered Alaska voters.    

Parnell released a statement earlier Friday, saying, “We understand that over 25,000 ballots were to be counted today. Given that the current difference in votes is so small, anything can happen and we remain cautiously optimistic about the results.”

Despite Friday’s updated results, though, the race is still not over.

Elections officials still must count a few areas that ran out of ballots on primary election day, totaling about 250 votes.    

Absentee ballots cast overseas will not be counted until next week.