2006

Oops

ArchPundit November 3, 2006 No Comments

VFW endorsed Roskam. A while ago.

Roskam tried to bill the endorsement as a major boost to his campaign in the final days, but found himself admitting he sat on the endorsement until the end for maximum attention. The VFW representative was unable to give much of a reason for the endorsement or explain how it happened, and Roskam looked stunned at the harsh questioning from reporters.

H/T Rich

Wow. Cubed.

ArchPundit November 2, 2006 No Comments

Final Rothenburg Predictions:

he latest Rothenberg Political Report ratings are out. Here are exclusive excerpts provided to Political Wire:

The Senate: “While Senate control is in doubt, with Democrats most likely to win from 5 to 7 seats, we do not think the two sides have an equal chance of winning a majority in the Senate. Instead, we believe that state and national dynamics favor Democrats netting six seats and winning control of the United States Senate.”

The House: “Going into the final days before the 2006 midterm elections, we believe the most likely outcome in the House of Representatives is a Democratic gain of 34 to 40 seats, with slightly larger gains not impossible. This would put Democrats at between 237 and 243 seats, if not a handful more, giving them a majority in the next House that is slightly larger than the one the Republicans currently hold. If these numbers are generally correct, we would expect a period of GOP finger-pointing and self-flagellation after the elections, followed by a considerable number of Republican House retirements over the next two years.”

Governors: “With Republican seats like Idaho, Alaska, and Nevada in play for state-specific reasons, and Minnesota vulnerable to a Democratic wave, the ceiling for possible Democratic gains is high. We have narrowed our earlier projection from Democratic gains of 6-10 to 7-9.”

45-37-14

ArchPundit November 2, 2006 No Comments

New Survey USA for Illinois Governor. A little bit closer to previous polls with her up 3 and him up 1. Whitney stable at 14. This would be consistent with late race tightening, but no fundamental shift in the race. We’ll need another poll to give us an idea if Copley or SUSA is more on target. Both are pretty close to each other even then.

Wow.

ArchPundit November 2, 2006 No Comments

Democracy Corps has a new poll out:

It is very hard to look at the most recent Democracy Corps survey in the 50 most competitive Republican-held districts finished last night and not conclude that we are headed toward a 1994 election – with the Democratic majority approaching that of the ‘Gingrich Congress’. The named Democratic vote for Congress has moved up from a 3-point lead to 7-point margin since Sunday, with the named Democrat for the first time moving over 50 percent (51 to 44 percent). For the first time, the Democratic candidate is ahead on average in the bottom tier of least competitive races. The generic congressional ballot has moved up to 11 points – up 3 points from Sunday and another 3 points from the week before.

The gap in interest in the election (those ranking their interest as “10” on 1-to-10 point scale) between Democratic and Republican voters has grown from 7 to 14 this week.

The trend in the final week on most factors, as we will elaborate below, favors the Democrats, including independents’ support, enthusiasm, and handling key issues, including taxes, and above all, the Iraq war. The 2006 election is rapidly moving toward being a referendum on Iraq.

We do want to underscore in this last survey conducted by Greenberg Quinlan Rosner for Democracy Corps some reasons why you should believe this is real:

This survey, unlike any other public survey, asks the congressional vote using the actual names of each candidate, meaning this survey fully reflects any advantages for incumbency. We also ask the generic ballot for a read of overall partisan sentiment, but named vote is more likely to tell us what happens.

This survey is based on a 1,200 sample of likely voters conducted over three nights in the real battleground districts and will likely provide a more reliable read on the state of the race in the battleground.

This survey was not conducted on Halloween, which is a notoriously inaccurate night for polling.

The survey asks job approval and the thermometer rating for the incumbent by name, which produces a very disturbing result for the Republicans. Both measures are net negative, despite the power of incumbency. Incumbent approval is only 43 percent, with more disapproving, and indeed only at 44 percent in the tier 3 races.

While the survey shows a shift to the Democrats in the congressional ballot (named and generic) this week, the respondents have not shifted a point on party affiliation or recall of their 2004 vote. That should emphasize that this is a real, rather than a too-Democratic, sample.

These voters identify with the Republicans by 2 points, but in the generic, want to vote Democratic for Congress by 11 points.

We conducted 400 interviews last night after two news cycles of Kerry stories. While the story clearly broke through – over 20 percent of respondents in an open-ended question on what is happening in the campaign mentioned him – the story has not helped Republicans, and the calling on the last night was no different than the results from the first two nights. It is the highest recall for the partisans, those identifying as Democrats or Republicans, yet independents show no interest in it.

The shifts in this final week are almost entirely among independents who are giving the Democratic candidates landslide margins.

Do You Hate Being in the Minority

ArchPundit November 2, 2006 No Comments

Luis:

House members of both parties pay dues based on their committee assignments. Rep. Luis Gutierrez, whose district is next to Emanuels’, did not want to pay his $250,000 invoice. “What Rahm does is he keeps billing you. I hate it,” Gutierrez said. After a nudge from Pelosi, he started sending checks, with another $10,000 dispatched Tuesday.