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Showing posts with label MA-Senate. Show all posts
Showing posts with label MA-Senate. Show all posts
Tuesday, January 19, 2010
The Daily Show clip as promised...
Here it is as I promised, its 10 minutes but its the best 10 minutes that Stewart has done in a LONG time.
Monday, January 18, 2010
Second to last MA-Senate post....
My final post will be Jon Stewart shredding the dems about how they handled this election. He did a great job at it. My favorite line from this, "It's not like the Democrats are playing checkers while Republicans are playing chess; its like the Republicans are playing chess while the Democrats are in the nurses office because once again they glued their balls to their thighs." This is from PPP yesterday...
Raleigh, N.C. – Scott Brown leads Martha Coakley 51-46 in Public Policy Polling’s final survey of the Massachusetts Senate special election, an advantage within the poll’s margin of error.
Brown’s lead comes thanks to an overwhelming advantage with independents and the
ability to pick off a decent number of Democrats. He’s getting the support of 19% of
voters in Coakley’s party, while she is winning just 8% of the Republican vote. The lead with independents is 64-32. Each candidate has seen a large decline in their favorability numbers as the campaign has taken on an increasingly negative tone. Brown’s +19 at 56/37, down 13 points from his +32 (57/25) standing a week ago. Coakley’s now in negative territory at 44/51 after being at a positive 50/42 previously, a 15 point net decline.
Republicans continue to show much more enthusiasm about the election than Democrats,
with 89% of them saying they’re ‘very excited’ to go vote compared to 63% of Dems
who express that sentiment. Brown has a 59-40 lead among voters in that category.
The likely electorate for Tuesday’s election continues to express skepticism about the Democratic health care plan with 48% saying they’re opposed to 40% who support it. President Obama’s approval stands at 44/43. “Brown has a small advantage right now but special elections are unusually volatile and Martha Coakley is certainly still in this,” said Dean Debnam, President of Public Policy Polling. “She just needs to get more Democrats out to the polls.”
PPP surveyed 1,231 likely Massachusetts voters from January 16th to 17th. The margin
of error is +/-2.8%. Other factors, such as refusal to be interviewed and weighting, may introduce additional error that is more difficult to quantify.
I was going to post the polls but here is a summary: Brown +9,+10,+5,+7, and tied. One of them was a Daily Kos poll, take a wild guess at which one... Now for my prediction. I believe Brown will win 57-41 (2% goes to the losertarian candidate). Polls almost always, and I mean always underclock the support of Republicans, Brown is averaged at 52% or so according to the last polls taken and Coakley around 43% so I just add 5% for Brown (due to increased turnout) and Coakley stays where she is. So there you have it 57-41 Brown. Brown wins by 16, 15 minimum.
Raleigh, N.C. – Scott Brown leads Martha Coakley 51-46 in Public Policy Polling’s final survey of the Massachusetts Senate special election, an advantage within the poll’s margin of error.
Brown’s lead comes thanks to an overwhelming advantage with independents and the
ability to pick off a decent number of Democrats. He’s getting the support of 19% of
voters in Coakley’s party, while she is winning just 8% of the Republican vote. The lead with independents is 64-32. Each candidate has seen a large decline in their favorability numbers as the campaign has taken on an increasingly negative tone. Brown’s +19 at 56/37, down 13 points from his +32 (57/25) standing a week ago. Coakley’s now in negative territory at 44/51 after being at a positive 50/42 previously, a 15 point net decline.
Republicans continue to show much more enthusiasm about the election than Democrats,
with 89% of them saying they’re ‘very excited’ to go vote compared to 63% of Dems
who express that sentiment. Brown has a 59-40 lead among voters in that category.
The likely electorate for Tuesday’s election continues to express skepticism about the Democratic health care plan with 48% saying they’re opposed to 40% who support it. President Obama’s approval stands at 44/43. “Brown has a small advantage right now but special elections are unusually volatile and Martha Coakley is certainly still in this,” said Dean Debnam, President of Public Policy Polling. “She just needs to get more Democrats out to the polls.”
PPP surveyed 1,231 likely Massachusetts voters from January 16th to 17th. The margin
of error is +/-2.8%. Other factors, such as refusal to be interviewed and weighting, may introduce additional error that is more difficult to quantify.
I was going to post the polls but here is a summary: Brown +9,+10,+5,+7, and tied. One of them was a Daily Kos poll, take a wild guess at which one... Now for my prediction. I believe Brown will win 57-41 (2% goes to the losertarian candidate). Polls almost always, and I mean always underclock the support of Republicans, Brown is averaged at 52% or so according to the last polls taken and Coakley around 43% so I just add 5% for Brown (due to increased turnout) and Coakley stays where she is. So there you have it 57-41 Brown. Brown wins by 16, 15 minimum.
Thursday, January 14, 2010
A full analysis of the MA Senate race...
One look from inside (Boston Herald) and another from the outside (Pollster.com).
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From the Boston Herald...
Rattled Dems fret over health of Senate seat
It’s all about health care.
The race to replace Ted Kennedy in the U.S. Senate has come down to one issue, and it’s not Sen. Ted Kennedy’s “legacy.” It’s the misshapen health-care bills that have scared the bejesus out of an ever-growing majority of American voters, even in this bluest of states. Asked his view of the bill, the Republican candidate, state Sen. Scott Brown, says succinctly: “It kinda stinks.”
A month ago, he was 30 points behind his Democratic opponent, the don’t-make-no-waves attorney general, Martha Coakley. She was cruising, playing the one card she never leaves home without - the gender card. Then the specifics of ObamaCare started leaking out. The cuts in Medicare - $500 billion, or as Brown prefers to say, “half a trillion dollars.” Then the state’s union members began to hear about the president’s insistence on a 40 percent tax on their “Cadillac” health care plans.
Overnight, the old dichotomies, Democrat-Republican, red-blue, lost their resonance. This has become a struggle for self-preservation - medical and fiscal. As the old folk song goes, Which side are you on? “This race affects everyone - everyone,” Brown says over and over again. “Forget about the letter after my name. If I win, this broken health-care bill goes back to the drawing board.” Which is why the city was buzzing yesterday with unconfirmed reports that Barack Obama may have changed his mind about staying out of the race. The rumor was that he may fly into Boston this weekend on behalf of the flailing Coakley, whose lead in the latest poll has shrunk to two points. Coakley is still favored to win, but what Brown calls “the machine” is stunned. In the most recent Rasmussen poll, Brown leads Coakley among independents 71-23.
“They are in an absolute panic mode,” one prominent Bay State Democrat was saying yesterday. “They don’t care if bringing in Barack energizes the Republicans and independents - how much more energized can they get? Obama’s people have to get the minority vote out, and Coakley sure can’t do it herself. It’s risky, but it may be the only way now to save her.” The national Democrats are pumping hundreds of thousands of dollars into the race in the final days. On TV and radio here, Scott Brown’s first name is now “Republican,” as in “Republican Scott Brown.” The SEIU, moveon.org, NARAL - all the usual suspects are on board. The “A” word - abortion - is heard once more in the land. But Coakley’s first 30-second hit piece fell a bit flat when, at the end, the campaign misspelled the name of her state as “Massachusettes.” “Maybe Martha should talk to some people who actually live here,” Brown said yesterday. The deluge of attack ads began a couple of hours after the final debate Monday night, just after Coakley left the spin room. She’d turned in yet another lackluster performance, informing the audience that there were no terrorists left in Afghanistan, two days after one of the slain CIA operatives was buried in nearby Bolton, and on the same day that three U.S. servicemen were killed in the war that she seems to think is over.
But Brown won the debate when he fielded a question from the hyper-liberal moderator, David Gergen, who asked him how he could possibly vote to kill health care while sitting in Ted Kennedy’s seat. “With all due respect,” Brown told the Sunday chat-show fixture, “this is not Ted Kennedy’s seat, it’s not the Democrats’ seat, it’s the people’s seat.”
Brown was in the midst of an Internet “money bomb” fund-raiser, and after slapping down Gergen, by the end of the night he had raised $1.3 million - $800,000 above the campaign’s goal. In the state’s suburban town halls, voters are lining up to get absentee ballots, just in case the weather takes a turn for the worse Tuesday. For example, in Yarmouth, on the Cape, during the primary last month, 183 residents voted absentee. By Monday, the number of absentee ballots given out in Yarmouth was 543. It’s the same in all of the more conservative cities and towns.
Despite the bitter January cold, the Brown campaign has been swamped with volunteers. On the weekends, there are Brown “standouts” at every major intersection. Representing a gerrymandered, heavily Democrat district in the state Senate, Brown is used to having his yard signs disappear, but this time there’s a difference. “My own supporters are stealing them from each other,” he said. “They say, I need it more than you. I live on a busier street.”
The Democratic establishment is relying on yesterday’s tactics. On Tuesday night, a reporter for the Weekly Standard was assaulted outside a Coakley fundraiser in D.C. by a Democrat operative. The video was quickly posted on the Internet, but the Boston Globe, the Kennedy family house organ, pretended it was still 1973. Their headline: “Reporter takes stumble.” Just like Martha Coakley. She may yet hang on to win, but even she does, one thing is certain. As Scott Brown said, it’s not Ted Kennedy’s seat anymore.
Now from pollster.com
We have two new polls out in Massachusetts on the January 19 special election to fill Ted Kennedy's Senate seat, and their results could not be more different. The new survey conducted Saturday through Wednesday last week by the University of New Hampshire Survey Center on behalf of the Boston Globe shows Democrat Martha Coakley leading by 17 percentage points (53% to 36%), while a new automated poll conducted on Thursday and Friday by Public Policy Polling (PPP) shows a dead heat, with Brown one point ahead (48% to 47%). A third survey conducted on Monday by Rasmussen Reports has Coakley ahead by nine (50% to 41%).
The disparity of the results is likely to provoke the usual angst about inconsistent polls, debates about past pollster accuracy and the customary conspiracy theories about intentional bias. Forgive me if I don't join in, because as different as these results seem to be, I think the discrepancies actually add up to a consistent and important finding on the state of voter preferences this past week.
Here are three things to keep in mind about polls on the special election:
Turnout Will Matter -- The big spread in results among the polls, and differences apparent within two of them, are all consistent in supporting one finding: The lower the turnout, the better the odds for Scott Brown. These differences indicate that the voters most interested and most likely to vote are Republican, while Democrats are more blase.
Consider the differences in the table below from within Globe/UNH and Rasmussen surveys. Both show a dead even race among the most interested and certain voters, while Coakley leads by huge double-digit margins among all other voters.
Those differences mean the overall results reported by any poll are going to be very sensitive to the "tightness" of the screen or likely voter model used. The more restrictive the screen, the closer the result. My assumption is that the "if you do not intend to vote...please hang up" automated methodology employed by PPP produced an effectively tighter screen and, thus, a likely voter sample closer to the "certain" or "extremely interested" subgroups of the Boston Globe and Rasmussen polls.
Pollsters can't predict turnout - I have yet to see any poll or statistical model that can predict voter turnout with precision, especially in an oddly timed special election like the one in Massachusetts. What pollsters try to do is monitor self reported enthusiasm and interest as compared to previous, comparable contests and try to calibrate their screens and models appropriately (although there is much debate among pollsters about the accuracy of those calibrations and their necessity).
The bigger challenge in predicting turnout, however, has to do with something more fundamental: The size and makeup of the electorate will depend on decisions not yet made by those who may or may not vote on January 19. How many will become more interested and decide to vote over the next 9 days? I'm not sure any poll or methodology can predict that with confidence.
Keep in mind that as of this past week, most Massachusetts voters assumed that Coakley would win in a walk. According to Globe/UNH poll, nearly three quarters (74%) of Massachusetts voters believe Coakley will win, while only 11% say the same about Brown. In that sense, news of a narrowing race could work to Coakley's advantage if it convinces Democrats that their votes are needed and that Ted Kennedy's seat could be lost to the Republicans without their help.
Turnout differences complicate trend tracking - The big spread in these poll results complicates our ability to spot trends. For example, PPP's Tom Jensen last night noted that they fielded their poll on Thursday and Friday, while the Globe/UNH poll was fielded in the first part of last week (Saturday through Wednesday). The earlier start to the Globe poll, he wrote yesterday, "could make a diff[erence] when things are moving fast." That's true in theory but difficult to evaluate in this case because we have to assume we are comparing an apple (the Globe/UNH results) to an orange (PPP) in terms of their likely voter samples.
Now that we have more than five polls released for this race, we should have our tracking chart posted (along with the tracking table, probably later tonight), but be forewarned: The small number of polls and the big "house effects" among them mean that we will really need to limit ourselves to same-pollster comparisons to evaluate trends over the last week. Coakley lead by an average of 29 percentage points on three surveys conducted before the primary last year, but leads by an average of 8 point on the three surveys conducted this past week. So we will see narrowing of the margin between the trend lines on our chart. Has Brown continued to gain over the last week? To answer that questions, we will need o watch tracking polls conducted next week by the same pollsters in the field this week.
Do we have a clear picture today of who will win on January 19 and by how much? Probably not, but we do have a sense of the dynamics that will ultimately determine the outcome.
And one last thought for those covering and commenting on this race: please spare us the cliche about the outcome depending on which campaign's "troops" do the best job turning out their supporters. Field organizations can make a difference, especially when contests are close, but the discrepancies in enthusiasm we are seeing are unrelated to canvassing and phone banking. Conservative Republicans are angry and ready to walk on hot coals if necessary to register their discontent with the direction of government. If he enthusiasm gap narrows, it will be because Democrats come to believe that Martha Coakley shares their priorities, Scott Brown threatens those priorities and the outcome of the election is in doubt.
Update: Via Twitter, Alex Lundry notes that the Globe Poll tests independent Joseph L. Kennedy (no relation to the famous family), while the PPP poll does not. What's interesting about that is that the presence of a "Kennedy" on the ballot appears to cos Republican Brown more support than Democrat Coakley . Also, for what it's worth, roughly 90% of those who support "Kennedy" (4 of his 5 percentage points) have not yet "definitely decided on a candidate, and about the same number (90%) are voters that are less than "extremely interested" in the Senate race.
">
From the Boston Herald...
Rattled Dems fret over health of Senate seat
It’s all about health care.
The race to replace Ted Kennedy in the U.S. Senate has come down to one issue, and it’s not Sen. Ted Kennedy’s “legacy.” It’s the misshapen health-care bills that have scared the bejesus out of an ever-growing majority of American voters, even in this bluest of states. Asked his view of the bill, the Republican candidate, state Sen. Scott Brown, says succinctly: “It kinda stinks.”
A month ago, he was 30 points behind his Democratic opponent, the don’t-make-no-waves attorney general, Martha Coakley. She was cruising, playing the one card she never leaves home without - the gender card. Then the specifics of ObamaCare started leaking out. The cuts in Medicare - $500 billion, or as Brown prefers to say, “half a trillion dollars.” Then the state’s union members began to hear about the president’s insistence on a 40 percent tax on their “Cadillac” health care plans.
Overnight, the old dichotomies, Democrat-Republican, red-blue, lost their resonance. This has become a struggle for self-preservation - medical and fiscal. As the old folk song goes, Which side are you on? “This race affects everyone - everyone,” Brown says over and over again. “Forget about the letter after my name. If I win, this broken health-care bill goes back to the drawing board.” Which is why the city was buzzing yesterday with unconfirmed reports that Barack Obama may have changed his mind about staying out of the race. The rumor was that he may fly into Boston this weekend on behalf of the flailing Coakley, whose lead in the latest poll has shrunk to two points. Coakley is still favored to win, but what Brown calls “the machine” is stunned. In the most recent Rasmussen poll, Brown leads Coakley among independents 71-23.
“They are in an absolute panic mode,” one prominent Bay State Democrat was saying yesterday. “They don’t care if bringing in Barack energizes the Republicans and independents - how much more energized can they get? Obama’s people have to get the minority vote out, and Coakley sure can’t do it herself. It’s risky, but it may be the only way now to save her.” The national Democrats are pumping hundreds of thousands of dollars into the race in the final days. On TV and radio here, Scott Brown’s first name is now “Republican,” as in “Republican Scott Brown.” The SEIU, moveon.org, NARAL - all the usual suspects are on board. The “A” word - abortion - is heard once more in the land. But Coakley’s first 30-second hit piece fell a bit flat when, at the end, the campaign misspelled the name of her state as “Massachusettes.” “Maybe Martha should talk to some people who actually live here,” Brown said yesterday. The deluge of attack ads began a couple of hours after the final debate Monday night, just after Coakley left the spin room. She’d turned in yet another lackluster performance, informing the audience that there were no terrorists left in Afghanistan, two days after one of the slain CIA operatives was buried in nearby Bolton, and on the same day that three U.S. servicemen were killed in the war that she seems to think is over.
But Brown won the debate when he fielded a question from the hyper-liberal moderator, David Gergen, who asked him how he could possibly vote to kill health care while sitting in Ted Kennedy’s seat. “With all due respect,” Brown told the Sunday chat-show fixture, “this is not Ted Kennedy’s seat, it’s not the Democrats’ seat, it’s the people’s seat.”
Brown was in the midst of an Internet “money bomb” fund-raiser, and after slapping down Gergen, by the end of the night he had raised $1.3 million - $800,000 above the campaign’s goal. In the state’s suburban town halls, voters are lining up to get absentee ballots, just in case the weather takes a turn for the worse Tuesday. For example, in Yarmouth, on the Cape, during the primary last month, 183 residents voted absentee. By Monday, the number of absentee ballots given out in Yarmouth was 543. It’s the same in all of the more conservative cities and towns.
Despite the bitter January cold, the Brown campaign has been swamped with volunteers. On the weekends, there are Brown “standouts” at every major intersection. Representing a gerrymandered, heavily Democrat district in the state Senate, Brown is used to having his yard signs disappear, but this time there’s a difference. “My own supporters are stealing them from each other,” he said. “They say, I need it more than you. I live on a busier street.”
The Democratic establishment is relying on yesterday’s tactics. On Tuesday night, a reporter for the Weekly Standard was assaulted outside a Coakley fundraiser in D.C. by a Democrat operative. The video was quickly posted on the Internet, but the Boston Globe, the Kennedy family house organ, pretended it was still 1973. Their headline: “Reporter takes stumble.” Just like Martha Coakley. She may yet hang on to win, but even she does, one thing is certain. As Scott Brown said, it’s not Ted Kennedy’s seat anymore.
Now from pollster.com
We have two new polls out in Massachusetts on the January 19 special election to fill Ted Kennedy's Senate seat, and their results could not be more different. The new survey conducted Saturday through Wednesday last week by the University of New Hampshire Survey Center on behalf of the Boston Globe shows Democrat Martha Coakley leading by 17 percentage points (53% to 36%), while a new automated poll conducted on Thursday and Friday by Public Policy Polling (PPP) shows a dead heat, with Brown one point ahead (48% to 47%). A third survey conducted on Monday by Rasmussen Reports has Coakley ahead by nine (50% to 41%).
The disparity of the results is likely to provoke the usual angst about inconsistent polls, debates about past pollster accuracy and the customary conspiracy theories about intentional bias. Forgive me if I don't join in, because as different as these results seem to be, I think the discrepancies actually add up to a consistent and important finding on the state of voter preferences this past week.
Here are three things to keep in mind about polls on the special election:
Turnout Will Matter -- The big spread in results among the polls, and differences apparent within two of them, are all consistent in supporting one finding: The lower the turnout, the better the odds for Scott Brown. These differences indicate that the voters most interested and most likely to vote are Republican, while Democrats are more blase.
Consider the differences in the table below from within Globe/UNH and Rasmussen surveys. Both show a dead even race among the most interested and certain voters, while Coakley leads by huge double-digit margins among all other voters.
Those differences mean the overall results reported by any poll are going to be very sensitive to the "tightness" of the screen or likely voter model used. The more restrictive the screen, the closer the result. My assumption is that the "if you do not intend to vote...please hang up" automated methodology employed by PPP produced an effectively tighter screen and, thus, a likely voter sample closer to the "certain" or "extremely interested" subgroups of the Boston Globe and Rasmussen polls.
Pollsters can't predict turnout - I have yet to see any poll or statistical model that can predict voter turnout with precision, especially in an oddly timed special election like the one in Massachusetts. What pollsters try to do is monitor self reported enthusiasm and interest as compared to previous, comparable contests and try to calibrate their screens and models appropriately (although there is much debate among pollsters about the accuracy of those calibrations and their necessity).
The bigger challenge in predicting turnout, however, has to do with something more fundamental: The size and makeup of the electorate will depend on decisions not yet made by those who may or may not vote on January 19. How many will become more interested and decide to vote over the next 9 days? I'm not sure any poll or methodology can predict that with confidence.
Keep in mind that as of this past week, most Massachusetts voters assumed that Coakley would win in a walk. According to Globe/UNH poll, nearly three quarters (74%) of Massachusetts voters believe Coakley will win, while only 11% say the same about Brown. In that sense, news of a narrowing race could work to Coakley's advantage if it convinces Democrats that their votes are needed and that Ted Kennedy's seat could be lost to the Republicans without their help.
Turnout differences complicate trend tracking - The big spread in these poll results complicates our ability to spot trends. For example, PPP's Tom Jensen last night noted that they fielded their poll on Thursday and Friday, while the Globe/UNH poll was fielded in the first part of last week (Saturday through Wednesday). The earlier start to the Globe poll, he wrote yesterday, "could make a diff[erence] when things are moving fast." That's true in theory but difficult to evaluate in this case because we have to assume we are comparing an apple (the Globe/UNH results) to an orange (PPP) in terms of their likely voter samples.
Now that we have more than five polls released for this race, we should have our tracking chart posted (along with the tracking table, probably later tonight), but be forewarned: The small number of polls and the big "house effects" among them mean that we will really need to limit ourselves to same-pollster comparisons to evaluate trends over the last week. Coakley lead by an average of 29 percentage points on three surveys conducted before the primary last year, but leads by an average of 8 point on the three surveys conducted this past week. So we will see narrowing of the margin between the trend lines on our chart. Has Brown continued to gain over the last week? To answer that questions, we will need o watch tracking polls conducted next week by the same pollsters in the field this week.
Do we have a clear picture today of who will win on January 19 and by how much? Probably not, but we do have a sense of the dynamics that will ultimately determine the outcome.
And one last thought for those covering and commenting on this race: please spare us the cliche about the outcome depending on which campaign's "troops" do the best job turning out their supporters. Field organizations can make a difference, especially when contests are close, but the discrepancies in enthusiasm we are seeing are unrelated to canvassing and phone banking. Conservative Republicans are angry and ready to walk on hot coals if necessary to register their discontent with the direction of government. If he enthusiasm gap narrows, it will be because Democrats come to believe that Martha Coakley shares their priorities, Scott Brown threatens those priorities and the outcome of the election is in doubt.
Update: Via Twitter, Alex Lundry notes that the Globe Poll tests independent Joseph L. Kennedy (no relation to the famous family), while the PPP poll does not. What's interesting about that is that the presence of a "Kennedy" on the ballot appears to cos Republican Brown more support than Democrat Coakley . Also, for what it's worth, roughly 90% of those who support "Kennedy" (4 of his 5 percentage points) have not yet "definitely decided on a candidate, and about the same number (90%) are voters that are less than "extremely interested" in the Senate race.
Tuesday, January 12, 2010
Martha Coakley Do'h
Put this into the category of shit you really can't make up. From Gateway Pundit
There’s only one “e” in “Massachusetts,” Martha.
A New Martha Coakley ad attacking Scott Brown misspells Massachusetts:
Oh dear... you royally fucked this one up honey, I need to get over to DK (DailyKos) to see their reaction
The video in question (still found it on YouTube, for now...), pause it at 27 seconds to see what they are talking about
What a horrid ad. Does she really want people to start thinking about what they can’t afford after democrats just tripled the national deficit in one year?
Mass Live reported:
On the heels of last night’s final debate between Martha Coakley, Scott Brown and Joseph L. Kennedy, Coakley released a new ad attacking Scott Brown — an aggressive turn that many observers have thought was long overdue.
However the ad’s message might get lost by a spelling gaffe that appears in the ad’s closing seconds. In the fine print appearing at the bottom of the screen, the ad reads:
Paid for by Massachusettes Democratic Party and Authorized by Martha Coakley for Senate. Approved by Martha Coakley.
Close observers will notice that there is an extra ‘E’ tacked onto the end of ‘Massachusetts. It’s a trivial oversight, for sure, but you can bet that the jokes and jabs the typo will inspire will blunt at least some of the impact of the ad.
Here's the Brown response, good but need more substance dude...
And even HuffPo can't believe the shitty strategy of the Coakley campaign, from Jammie Wearing Fool(old refrence)
Meanwhile, an analysis of the debate last night says Brown won. From those hardcore teabaggers at the Huffington Post...
At a time when jobs are scarce, terror is back at orange, and heating oil is expensive, not to mention the rent, guess what: after one year, Coakley and the Democrats can give up talking about Bush-Cheney-McCain. They need to develop and focus on a clear consistent message that comes from the leadership and transparency voters mandated a year ago. Change can mean anything. But voters did not mean more of the same.
Wow... thanks for the gift Coakley campaign. This is getting funny...
There’s only one “e” in “Massachusetts,” Martha.
A New Martha Coakley ad attacking Scott Brown misspells Massachusetts:
Oh dear... you royally fucked this one up honey, I need to get over to DK (DailyKos) to see their reaction
The video in question (still found it on YouTube, for now...), pause it at 27 seconds to see what they are talking about
What a horrid ad. Does she really want people to start thinking about what they can’t afford after democrats just tripled the national deficit in one year?
Mass Live reported:
On the heels of last night’s final debate between Martha Coakley, Scott Brown and Joseph L. Kennedy, Coakley released a new ad attacking Scott Brown — an aggressive turn that many observers have thought was long overdue.
However the ad’s message might get lost by a spelling gaffe that appears in the ad’s closing seconds. In the fine print appearing at the bottom of the screen, the ad reads:
Paid for by Massachusettes Democratic Party and Authorized by Martha Coakley for Senate. Approved by Martha Coakley.
Close observers will notice that there is an extra ‘E’ tacked onto the end of ‘Massachusetts. It’s a trivial oversight, for sure, but you can bet that the jokes and jabs the typo will inspire will blunt at least some of the impact of the ad.
Here's the Brown response, good but need more substance dude...
And even HuffPo can't believe the shitty strategy of the Coakley campaign, from Jammie Wearing Fool(old refrence)
Meanwhile, an analysis of the debate last night says Brown won. From those hardcore teabaggers at the Huffington Post...
At a time when jobs are scarce, terror is back at orange, and heating oil is expensive, not to mention the rent, guess what: after one year, Coakley and the Democrats can give up talking about Bush-Cheney-McCain. They need to develop and focus on a clear consistent message that comes from the leadership and transparency voters mandated a year ago. Change can mean anything. But voters did not mean more of the same.
Wow... thanks for the gift Coakley campaign. This is getting funny...
Saturday, January 09, 2010
Brown ahead in latest PPP poll!!!!!
I so fucking called this one. Remember what I said yesterday?
So lets say for the sake of argument that the trend continued over the next 3 days here and I'll be generous and only slash 2 points from Coakley because I know 2 polls does not a trend make but it's all the data I have available at the current moment. I predict that the next major poll will have the race 48-47% Coakley. Which means its within the margin of error and its basically tied. Will I be right?
Yep, turns out I am, score for me! :)
Senate Race Competitive
Raleigh, N.C. – The race to replace Ted Kennedy in the US Senate is looking like a toss up, with Republican Scott Brown up 48-47 on Martha Coakley.
Brown is benefiting from depressed Democratic interest in the election and a huge lead among independents for his surprisingly strong standing. Those planning to vote in the special election only report having voted for Barack Obama in 2008 by a 16 point margin, in contrast to his actual 26 point victory in the state. That decline in turnout from Obama voters plagued Democratic candidates for Governor in Virginia and New Jersey last fall. Beyond that 66% of Republicans say they’re ‘very excited’ about turning out while only 48% of Democrats express that sentiment. Brown leads 63-31 with independents and is winning 17% of the Democratic vote while Coakley receives only 6% support from GOP voters. Both candidates are relatively popular, with 57% viewing Brown favorably to only 25% unfavorable and 50% with a positive opinion of Coakley to 42% negative. Those folks planning to vote in the special election are actually opposed to Obama’s health care plan by a 47/41 margin and only narrowly express approval of the President’s overall job performance 44/43. “The Massachusetts Senate race is shaping up as a potential disaster for Democrats,” said Dean Debnam, President of Public Policy Polling. “Martha Coakley’s complacent campaign has put Scott Brown in a surprisingly strong position and she will need to step it up in the final week to win a victory once thought inevitable.” PPP surveyed 744 likely Massachusetts voters from January 7th to 9th. The margin of error is +/-3.6%. Other factors, such as refusal to be interviewed and weighting, may introduce additional error that is more difficult to quantify.
HOLY SHIT HOLY SHIT HOLY SHIT! Not only did I get the numbers right (48-47) I actually underestimated Browns move from 39-50 and 41-50 for Coakley and then a 48-47 Brown lead! WOW, talk about tanking, they say the margin of error is +/-3.6% which means Browns numbers are in the range of 44.4%-51.6% (not bad for a Republican in Massachusetts) and Coakley's range is 43.4%-50.6%. That is huge because that means absolute best case for Coakley is 0.6% over the magical 50%. What might be more telling is this from realclearpolitics.com
Poll Coakley (D) Brown (R) Spread
PPP (D) 47 48 Brown +1
Rasmussen 50 41 Coakley +9
Suffolk 58 27 Coakley +31
Western NE College 58 32 Coakley +26
Suffolk 54 24 Coakley +30
Her numbers were never that far above 50% and I rememeber reading one blogger saying that she wasn't the strongest candidate in the democratic field and got the nomination by default and apathy. Since September Brown has literally doubled his numbers while Coakley has lost 7% of her vote and it stands at a 31 point swing. This is amazing and shaping up to be an upset. Heck at this point I'd say the upset is if the democrats hold on to this seat. Every freaking thing is trending towards Brown, the left is in full meltdown mode. Proof of that in tomorrows post. I need to start being a poll lackey or something, I have been nearly dead on going back to the November elections. I'm not bragging (ok maybe just a little) go back and look at my posts and predictions for the NJ/VA governors race.
So lets say for the sake of argument that the trend continued over the next 3 days here and I'll be generous and only slash 2 points from Coakley because I know 2 polls does not a trend make but it's all the data I have available at the current moment. I predict that the next major poll will have the race 48-47% Coakley. Which means its within the margin of error and its basically tied. Will I be right?
Yep, turns out I am, score for me! :)
Senate Race Competitive
Raleigh, N.C. – The race to replace Ted Kennedy in the US Senate is looking like a toss up, with Republican Scott Brown up 48-47 on Martha Coakley.
Brown is benefiting from depressed Democratic interest in the election and a huge lead among independents for his surprisingly strong standing. Those planning to vote in the special election only report having voted for Barack Obama in 2008 by a 16 point margin, in contrast to his actual 26 point victory in the state. That decline in turnout from Obama voters plagued Democratic candidates for Governor in Virginia and New Jersey last fall. Beyond that 66% of Republicans say they’re ‘very excited’ about turning out while only 48% of Democrats express that sentiment. Brown leads 63-31 with independents and is winning 17% of the Democratic vote while Coakley receives only 6% support from GOP voters. Both candidates are relatively popular, with 57% viewing Brown favorably to only 25% unfavorable and 50% with a positive opinion of Coakley to 42% negative. Those folks planning to vote in the special election are actually opposed to Obama’s health care plan by a 47/41 margin and only narrowly express approval of the President’s overall job performance 44/43. “The Massachusetts Senate race is shaping up as a potential disaster for Democrats,” said Dean Debnam, President of Public Policy Polling. “Martha Coakley’s complacent campaign has put Scott Brown in a surprisingly strong position and she will need to step it up in the final week to win a victory once thought inevitable.” PPP surveyed 744 likely Massachusetts voters from January 7th to 9th. The margin of error is +/-3.6%. Other factors, such as refusal to be interviewed and weighting, may introduce additional error that is more difficult to quantify.
HOLY SHIT HOLY SHIT HOLY SHIT! Not only did I get the numbers right (48-47) I actually underestimated Browns move from 39-50 and 41-50 for Coakley and then a 48-47 Brown lead! WOW, talk about tanking, they say the margin of error is +/-3.6% which means Browns numbers are in the range of 44.4%-51.6% (not bad for a Republican in Massachusetts) and Coakley's range is 43.4%-50.6%. That is huge because that means absolute best case for Coakley is 0.6% over the magical 50%. What might be more telling is this from realclearpolitics.com
Poll Coakley (D) Brown (R) Spread
PPP (D) 47 48 Brown +1
Rasmussen 50 41 Coakley +9
Suffolk 58 27 Coakley +31
Western NE College 58 32 Coakley +26
Suffolk 54 24 Coakley +30
Her numbers were never that far above 50% and I rememeber reading one blogger saying that she wasn't the strongest candidate in the democratic field and got the nomination by default and apathy. Since September Brown has literally doubled his numbers while Coakley has lost 7% of her vote and it stands at a 31 point swing. This is amazing and shaping up to be an upset. Heck at this point I'd say the upset is if the democrats hold on to this seat. Every freaking thing is trending towards Brown, the left is in full meltdown mode. Proof of that in tomorrows post. I need to start being a poll lackey or something, I have been nearly dead on going back to the November elections. I'm not bragging (ok maybe just a little) go back and look at my posts and predictions for the NJ/VA governors race.
Friday, January 08, 2010
MA-Senate seat is in play...
Wow, PPP (Public Policy Polling) has its own blog (on blogspot too) and they are showing some amazing numbers for the MA Senate race... from their blog
Because of the heavy interest we'll try to get our Massachusetts numbers out over the weekend. But because we've already conducted most of the interviews for it here are some of the major storylines we're seeing:
-At this point a plurality of those planning to turn out oppose the health care bill. The massive enthusiasm gap we saw in Virginia is playing itself out in Massachusetts as well. Republican voters are fired up and they're going to turn out. Martha Coakley needs to have a coherent message up on the air over the last ten days that her election is critical to health care passing and Ted Kennedy's legacy- right now Democrats in the state are not feeling a sense of urgency.
-Scott Brown's favorables are up around 60%, a product of his having had the airwaves to himself for the last week. By comparison Bob McDonnell's were at 55% right before his election and Chris Christie's were only at 43%. Coakley's campaign or outside groups need to tie Brown's image to national Republicans and knock him down a notch over the final week of the campaign.\
This has become a losable race for Democrats- but it could also be easily winnable if Coakley gets her act together for the last week of the campaign. Complacency is the Democrats' biggest enemy at this point and something that needs to be overcome to avoid a potential disaster.
This shows a trend...
On January 4th Hot Air reported this...
THE WEEKLY STANDARD has obtained the results of a private poll conducted last week by a reputable non-partisan firm. In that survey, Democratic Attorney General Martha Coakley led Republican state senator Scott Brown in the ballot test by 50% to 39%–not bad for Brown in a state Obama carried by 23 points. More interesting, perhaps, is that while Coakley’s favorable/unfavorable rating was 61% to 32%, Brown’s was 56% to 26%–in other words, they were virtually identical at +29/30. That suggests a potentially very competitive race: If Brown can make his case against another Democratic vote in the U.S. Senate, or against rewarding a member of unpopular governor Deval Patrick’s administration, some voters who currently prefer Coakley might be open to voting for Brown, since they view him favorably as well. THE WEEKLY STANDARD has also learned that an earlier poll, done in mid-December by another firm for another client, had similar results in the ballot test–but that the poll also found that the race tightened significantly, down to a low single digits margin for Coakley, among those judged most likely to vote. Furthermore, a careful analysis by Sean Trende shows, that if one assumes a swing against the Democrats like that in New Jersey and Virginia two months ago, the race could become very close.
The next day Rassmussen Reports showed the gap narrowing
Massachusetts Senate: Coakley 50%, Brown 41%
Note this is important because the poll on the 4th had Coakley up 50-39, this shows to me as a amatuer political scientist that Coakley's numbers have topped out and the independents are breaking to Brown. The 50% could be decivingly high though because even though RR polls likely voters that doesn't mean that democrats who might decide to normally show up just say, "fuck it" and stay home or even go radical and vote for Brown out of pure protest. Yes I think the climate is that bad for Democrats right now.
So lets say for the sake of argument that the trend continued over the next 3 days here and I'll be generous and only slash 2 points from Coakley because I know 2 polls does not a trend make but it's all the data I have available at the current moment. I predict that the next major poll will have the race 48-47% Coakley. Which means its within the margin of error and its basically tied. Will I be right? I hope to find out this weekend. Failblog/FML Friday post coming tonight.
Because of the heavy interest we'll try to get our Massachusetts numbers out over the weekend. But because we've already conducted most of the interviews for it here are some of the major storylines we're seeing:
-At this point a plurality of those planning to turn out oppose the health care bill. The massive enthusiasm gap we saw in Virginia is playing itself out in Massachusetts as well. Republican voters are fired up and they're going to turn out. Martha Coakley needs to have a coherent message up on the air over the last ten days that her election is critical to health care passing and Ted Kennedy's legacy- right now Democrats in the state are not feeling a sense of urgency.
-Scott Brown's favorables are up around 60%, a product of his having had the airwaves to himself for the last week. By comparison Bob McDonnell's were at 55% right before his election and Chris Christie's were only at 43%. Coakley's campaign or outside groups need to tie Brown's image to national Republicans and knock him down a notch over the final week of the campaign.\
This has become a losable race for Democrats- but it could also be easily winnable if Coakley gets her act together for the last week of the campaign. Complacency is the Democrats' biggest enemy at this point and something that needs to be overcome to avoid a potential disaster.
This shows a trend...
On January 4th Hot Air reported this...
THE WEEKLY STANDARD has obtained the results of a private poll conducted last week by a reputable non-partisan firm. In that survey, Democratic Attorney General Martha Coakley led Republican state senator Scott Brown in the ballot test by 50% to 39%–not bad for Brown in a state Obama carried by 23 points. More interesting, perhaps, is that while Coakley’s favorable/unfavorable rating was 61% to 32%, Brown’s was 56% to 26%–in other words, they were virtually identical at +29/30. That suggests a potentially very competitive race: If Brown can make his case against another Democratic vote in the U.S. Senate, or against rewarding a member of unpopular governor Deval Patrick’s administration, some voters who currently prefer Coakley might be open to voting for Brown, since they view him favorably as well. THE WEEKLY STANDARD has also learned that an earlier poll, done in mid-December by another firm for another client, had similar results in the ballot test–but that the poll also found that the race tightened significantly, down to a low single digits margin for Coakley, among those judged most likely to vote. Furthermore, a careful analysis by Sean Trende shows, that if one assumes a swing against the Democrats like that in New Jersey and Virginia two months ago, the race could become very close.
The next day Rassmussen Reports showed the gap narrowing
Massachusetts Senate: Coakley 50%, Brown 41%
Note this is important because the poll on the 4th had Coakley up 50-39, this shows to me as a amatuer political scientist that Coakley's numbers have topped out and the independents are breaking to Brown. The 50% could be decivingly high though because even though RR polls likely voters that doesn't mean that democrats who might decide to normally show up just say, "fuck it" and stay home or even go radical and vote for Brown out of pure protest. Yes I think the climate is that bad for Democrats right now.
So lets say for the sake of argument that the trend continued over the next 3 days here and I'll be generous and only slash 2 points from Coakley because I know 2 polls does not a trend make but it's all the data I have available at the current moment. I predict that the next major poll will have the race 48-47% Coakley. Which means its within the margin of error and its basically tied. Will I be right? I hope to find out this weekend. Failblog/FML Friday post coming tonight.
Thursday, January 07, 2010
Could a Republican win Ted Kennedy's Senate Seat?
For those of you who don't know, there is a BIG special election in MA on I believe the 19th this month to decide who is Ted Kennedy's replacement for the rest of his term. Normally in a neutral environment Republicans would seriously be lucky to get 35% of the vote in an election like this. I mean I've read that the official party registration in the state is D-41%, R-17%, and I think I-35%. I'd have to look it up but I believe that MA hasn't had a Republican Senator since 1972, or earlier. This is from the Boston Herald (link in title)
“I haven’t been to the U.S. Senate, so. . . I’m learning about how it works.” - Martha Coakley on WTKK-FM yesterday.
Massachusetts, haven’t we made enough “history?”
In 2006 we cast an “historic” vote for Deval Patrick. What did we get? The highest unemployment in 20 years, $1.5 billion a year in new taxes and taxpayer-subsidized green jobs outsourced to China.
In 2008 we cast an “historic” vote for Barack Obama. What did we get? A trillion-dollar “stimulus” that left us with 2.5 million fewer jobs; a health-care fiasco that will cost $2 trillion more and a would-be Undie-bomber consulting with his attorney in Detroit.
Now it’s 2010, and Martha “as the only woman in the race” Coakley wants us to trust her with on-the-job training. Do we really need that deja vu all over again?
Perhaps not. The Rasmussen poll giving Coakley a narrow 9-point lead shows that even uber-liberal Massachusetts can only take so much.
The poll also shows that Scott Brown supporters are far more motivated than Coakley’s - and that was before yesterday’s debate.
On question after question, Coakley offered every possible response save one: an answer.
Does she support the billion-dollar bribery offered to senators for their votes on ObamaCare? Her answer: “There’s been horse trading.”
OK, but does she think that’s good or bad? “I agree people are questioning the process.”
Yes, Martha, people are. But what about you? No answer.
Does she support profiling airline passengers in the wake of the Jock-Strap Jihadist case? “We’ve increased profiling to everyone who flies an airplane.”
But a profile that includes everyone is - obviously - not a profile. It’s just a passenger list. Does she favor real profiling that would include a Nigerian Muslim with no luggage and a cash ticket?
Again, no answer.
Does she support trying Osama bin Laden as an unlawful combatant instead of treating him like the Undie-bomber and lawyering him up? “He will be tried in the military tribunal system,” Coakley said on WTKK.
Finally, a straight answer . . . but wait!
“I assume he won’t be landing on a plane in Detroit,” Coakley said. “If he is captured as an enemy combatant, then he will tried” by a tribunal.
Get that - if.
Coakley’s anti-terrorism strategy comes from the real estate industry: location, location, location. Terrorists who are cooperative enough to get caught in Afghanistan may (or may not) be handled by the military. But if the Islamist’s lingerie doesn’t explode until he gets over sovereign U.S. soil, he gets a lawyer and the right to remain silent on future attacks.
Osama bin Laden, book your flight now!
Listening to Coakley play debate dodgeball, one could hear Nixonian echoes: What does she not know, and how long has she not known it?
When asked about the burden of the $2 trillion Obama cap-and-trade plan she supports, she claimed she didn’t know where that figure came from. (Answer: the White House, as reported in many media outlets.)
When asked about ObamaCare’s costs, again she demurred. We don’t really know what it’s going to cost, she admitted, but we ought to do it anyway.
If you’ve had enough of Washington liberals’ “do it anyway” agenda, a defeat for Martha - or even a narrow victory - in deep-blue Massachusetts would be felt in every Democratic swing district across Obama’s 57 states.
Yep thats the Boston Herald people. This article is as surprising as if the Red Star did a hit piece on a major DFL contender. This just doesn't happen. I think what's most striking is the first paragraph.
“I haven’t been to the U.S. Senate, so. . . I’m learning about how it works.” Oh joy. The Rasmussen numbers are surprising, despite what DailyKos tries to bitch about Rasmussen is the MOST reliable polling, with the possible exception of fivethirtyeight.com. Tomorrow (well later today) I will analyze the polls that are out there. Of course the most important one will be right before the election. Oh and in case you forget if Scott Brown (please donate, shameless plug I know, link to his campaign site embedded in his name) wins, he's vote #41, bye-bye fillerbuster proof majority :)
“I haven’t been to the U.S. Senate, so. . . I’m learning about how it works.” - Martha Coakley on WTKK-FM yesterday.
Massachusetts, haven’t we made enough “history?”
In 2006 we cast an “historic” vote for Deval Patrick. What did we get? The highest unemployment in 20 years, $1.5 billion a year in new taxes and taxpayer-subsidized green jobs outsourced to China.
In 2008 we cast an “historic” vote for Barack Obama. What did we get? A trillion-dollar “stimulus” that left us with 2.5 million fewer jobs; a health-care fiasco that will cost $2 trillion more and a would-be Undie-bomber consulting with his attorney in Detroit.
Now it’s 2010, and Martha “as the only woman in the race” Coakley wants us to trust her with on-the-job training. Do we really need that deja vu all over again?
Perhaps not. The Rasmussen poll giving Coakley a narrow 9-point lead shows that even uber-liberal Massachusetts can only take so much.
The poll also shows that Scott Brown supporters are far more motivated than Coakley’s - and that was before yesterday’s debate.
On question after question, Coakley offered every possible response save one: an answer.
Does she support the billion-dollar bribery offered to senators for their votes on ObamaCare? Her answer: “There’s been horse trading.”
OK, but does she think that’s good or bad? “I agree people are questioning the process.”
Yes, Martha, people are. But what about you? No answer.
Does she support profiling airline passengers in the wake of the Jock-Strap Jihadist case? “We’ve increased profiling to everyone who flies an airplane.”
But a profile that includes everyone is - obviously - not a profile. It’s just a passenger list. Does she favor real profiling that would include a Nigerian Muslim with no luggage and a cash ticket?
Again, no answer.
Does she support trying Osama bin Laden as an unlawful combatant instead of treating him like the Undie-bomber and lawyering him up? “He will be tried in the military tribunal system,” Coakley said on WTKK.
Finally, a straight answer . . . but wait!
“I assume he won’t be landing on a plane in Detroit,” Coakley said. “If he is captured as an enemy combatant, then he will tried” by a tribunal.
Get that - if.
Coakley’s anti-terrorism strategy comes from the real estate industry: location, location, location. Terrorists who are cooperative enough to get caught in Afghanistan may (or may not) be handled by the military. But if the Islamist’s lingerie doesn’t explode until he gets over sovereign U.S. soil, he gets a lawyer and the right to remain silent on future attacks.
Osama bin Laden, book your flight now!
Listening to Coakley play debate dodgeball, one could hear Nixonian echoes: What does she not know, and how long has she not known it?
When asked about the burden of the $2 trillion Obama cap-and-trade plan she supports, she claimed she didn’t know where that figure came from. (Answer: the White House, as reported in many media outlets.)
When asked about ObamaCare’s costs, again she demurred. We don’t really know what it’s going to cost, she admitted, but we ought to do it anyway.
If you’ve had enough of Washington liberals’ “do it anyway” agenda, a defeat for Martha - or even a narrow victory - in deep-blue Massachusetts would be felt in every Democratic swing district across Obama’s 57 states.
Yep thats the Boston Herald people. This article is as surprising as if the Red Star did a hit piece on a major DFL contender. This just doesn't happen. I think what's most striking is the first paragraph.
“I haven’t been to the U.S. Senate, so. . . I’m learning about how it works.” Oh joy. The Rasmussen numbers are surprising, despite what DailyKos tries to bitch about Rasmussen is the MOST reliable polling, with the possible exception of fivethirtyeight.com. Tomorrow (well later today) I will analyze the polls that are out there. Of course the most important one will be right before the election. Oh and in case you forget if Scott Brown (please donate, shameless plug I know, link to his campaign site embedded in his name) wins, he's vote #41, bye-bye fillerbuster proof majority :)
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