How Serious is Meeks?

Pretty damn serious.

The problem with getting true believers involved in the politics, they are actually true believers. Meeks believes the current system of public school finance is wrong and he’s going to try and do something about it.

What’s fascinating is the impact of him if he enters the race.

The Meeks poll has some more bad news for Gov. Rod Blagojevich, but also a rare spot of good news. The survey was taken April 25-30 by Washington, D.C.-based pollster Lester & Associates and has a margin of error of 3.9 percent.

According to the survey, Gov. Blagojevich’s “generic” re-election numbers are not that great. When asked whether he deserves re-election, just 36 percent agree, compared to 55 percent who want someone else. Nine percent didn’t know. Blagojevich’s job approval is 35 percent, with 45 percent disapproving and 20 percent not knowing. But even with those lousy numbers, for the first time since the primary Blagojevich is leading Judy Baar Topinka, 47-40.

When Meeks is tossed into the equation, Blagojevich leads with 41, Topinka has 34, Meeks has 12, and 13 percent are undecided. After several “push questions,” which were designed to test Meeks’ message of his religious affiliation, his opposition to gay marriage and abortion and his support of billions more in school funding, Blagojevich drops to 37 percent while Meeks and Topinka are tied at 25 percent each. Undecideds remain at 13 percent.

Wow.

More from Rich:

Meanwhile, Topinka’s own polling shows that Gov. Blagojevich has moved ahead of her. After four straight independent polls with Topinka leading, her latest poll reportedly shows Blagojevich with a 5-point advantage. The governor’s polling also reportedly shows him ahead.

The Blagojevich surge is undoubtedly the result of the governor’s television advertising campaign. The gov is spending over $500,000 a week, mostly on negative ads that attack Topinka for everything from not showing up for state investment board meetings to tying her to George Ryan’s budget deficits.

Many have questioned the spending, but I’ll defend it. Incumbents spend at different rates than challengers–especially in open seats. Both candidates are practically incumbents.

But why not now? Spending money in May makes a lot of sense. People actually watch television in May versus when previous early commercials appeared in June. By June most people are doing their summer routine and reaching them with political advertising is very hard.

Hitting Judy now makes sense as well. If she can be tied to the Georges (Ryan and Bush) the earlier the better. Voters aren’t paying close attention, but tying a candidate in a Blue State to a President who is floundering everywhere and a recently convicted former Governor gives voters a way to update their beliefs about the candidates without thinking hard. If, as many mass political psychylogy work suggests, people tend to add a mental tick to their mind as they gain new information, tying Judy to them right now can be done to get a head start of the fall campaign–and with enough money, it’s easy to do and still maintain a money advantage.

If the ads hadn’t worked now, they wouldn’t have worked in the fall either, but most evidence looks like it worked.

I’m still not sure what to make of Meeks taking as much if not more from Topinka, but it seems to suggest from the numbers, Blagojevich has a hard floor of around 37 with Topinka’s floor being far lower–a surprise to me.

If Topinka is losing a significant portion of her base in the form of religious conservatives and Meeks does get in, then running against Bush is not out of the question and the hard fight for suburban women will only intensify between her and Blagojevich.

For those who wonder why I think Blagojevich is so likely to be reelected in a two-way race (a three way is too complicated to sort out with the above information)–think Gray Davis. Davis makes Blagojevich look endearing and yet he won reelection. The Grand Jury’s are a big deal and I don’t dismiss them, but a high level indictment would have to come down by election day. The state grand jury could produce it, but the federal investigations are slow and will take time.

For all of the complaints about pay for play, if you are a statewide officeholder in Illinois, you’ve been involved in at least instances that look like it and to a cyncical public, that comes out as a wash.