February 2012
36 posts
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Early Voting in Michigan
February 26, 2012:
In the Arizona survey, ARG asked for voter preference by early vote. Among those surveyed, 48 percent had already voted, and among those early voters, Romney lead Santorum 50 to 29 percent. If that can be generalized statewide, then I think early voting may once again have helped Romney, and we will find out on Tuesday.
That was the news from the American Research...
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The GOP Race: AZ & MI - Updated
February 20, 2012:
Two new polls are out from Public Policy Polling: one for Arizona and one for Michigan.
Both show the race narrowing in those two states, but in opposite directions. In Arizona, Romney’s lead is 3 points over Santorum (Source). In Michigan, Santorum’s lead is now only 4 points over Romney (Source
Reblogging this old post on the Public Policy Polling surveys from last week...
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Super PACs Out Raised by Party Committees
The six party committees - DNC, DSCC, DCCC, RNC, RSCC and RCCC - raised a combined $404 million in 2011 compared to $86 million combined by Democrat and Republican affiliated Super PACs (Source). The study was conducted by the Campaign Finance Institute, and you can view the tables showing the historical rates of fundraising here.
The Democratic National Committee has raised more than the...
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The GOP Race: AZ & MI
Two new polls are out from Public Policy Polling: one for Arizona and one for Michigan.
Both show the race narrowing in those two states, but in opposite directions. In Arizona, Romney’s lead is 3 points over Santorum (Source). In Michigan, Santorum’s lead is now only 4 points over Romney (Source).
The polling after the Arizona debate on Wednesday should give us a better idea of...
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Sizing Up the Texas Primary
So, we know the Texas primary won’t be before May 29th, and if the parties can’t come to an agreement on the maps soon, it may be pushed back to June. This is having an effect on the convention process; Texas precinct conventions will be optional, and if the county parties decide to have them, they will be the same day as the district conventions (Source). Ultimately, the delegates...
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Presidential Popularity Poll →
I thought about posting this yesterday evening, but I’m glad I chose to read A Storm of Swords instead (got to decompress a little after a stressful week); however, since President’s Day is right around the corner, here are the results of Public Policy Polling’s poll of Presidential popularity. It’s a fairly interesting poll, particularly if you look at the breakdown of...
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Texas Primary: May 29th?
If you’ve been following the redistricting hearings in Texas, you may have heard that the primary will not be before May 29th. So, the answer to the question asked on Sunday - Is the Texas primary relevant to the GOP race? - is not so much.
So, we’re looking at May 29th depending on if everyone can agree on interim maps.
You can follow the redistricting saga here.
Further reading:
...
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Santorum's Lead and Early Voting
Earlier this week, I posted about Santorum’s lead both nationally and in Michigan. Now he leading in Ohio [3/6] and in 2nd in Arizona [2/28].
As I noted before the Florida primary, early voting is something to keep in mind before we get all giddy about Romney going down in flames. If I’m reading the statute right, Michigan voters could begin requesting absentee ballots 75 days before...
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Santorum Takes the Lead
I can only imagine that Rick Santorum and his supporters are having a good laugh at Newt Gingrich’s expense now that Santorum is leading both nationally and in Michigan.
Santorum leads Romney by 2 points in the most recent Pew survey.
Not only that, but doubts about Mitt Romney are growing among Republican voters. Moving forward that’s not a good sign for Romney, but he has the...
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The Death of Football? →
Tyler Cowen and Kevin Grier discuss the possible ways in which the NFL, and perhaps football in general, may come to an end through liability suits: players begin to win judgments and insurance companies no longer insure colleges and high schools against football related suits. They argue that this could take years, but could happen nonetheless. They then go on to discuss what an United States...
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GOP Primary: Is TX Relevant? →
Maybe. Maybe not. No one knows, because we don’t know when the primary will be held. We also don’t know what the race will look like coming out of Super Tuesday. The April 3rd date is now no longer a viable option, so we’re looking at April 17th, May 29th or June 26th. If the parties aren’t able to come to an agreement soon, the April 17th date might also be in doubt.
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Romney Wins CPAC Straw Poll →
Romney won the straw poll with 38 percent of the vote; Santorum came in 2nd (31%), and last year’s winner - Ron Paul - came in 4th (12%).
Not sure this is the best thing for Romney; he won the CPAC straw poll in 2007, 2008 and 2009 and lost the GOP nomination. Perhaps the campaign hopes it’ll help with movement conservatives in the upcoming primary states, but more likely the vast...
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Twenty Percent of Rs might vote D? →
I saw this poll posted a forum the other day, and I scratched my head a little when I saw it. I pretty much take any thing from World Net Daily with large doses of salt, because - well, I don’t think I really have to explain that do I?
The poll was conducted by Wenzel Strategies, who did not post any information about the poll on their website unfortunately.
The last head-to-head poll...
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Romney Campaigning in Maine →
Maine began caucusing last month and the last caucus won’t be held until March; however, today is the day when Maine’s Republican Party will release results of the caucus straw polls that have been conducted. The race in Maine is between Romney and Paul - other candidates have not spent much time in the state, probably because it is next door to Massachusetts and Romney did well there...
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Virginia Ballot: Write-Ins Available →
Virginia’s Presidential ballot for the March 6th primary had only 2 candidates: Mitt Romney and Ron Paul. However, the Virginia legislature recently passed a bill that would allow for write-in candidates. This holds out hope for Gingrich and Santorum, but a successful write-in campaign requires a level of organization not seen out of the Gingrich campaign at any point during this election...
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Tuesday Night Slaughter
So, what exactly happened last night and does it matter?
Surprisingly Santorum won all three states: Colorado, Minnesota, and Missouri.
Let’s look at these in reverse order:
1) Missouri was not that surprising given Romney’s past performance in the state and limited effort his campaign put into it.
2) Minnesota is much more surprising, especially the margin of victory, given that Romney won the...
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Race, Politics, and Christianity in the American... →
So what caused the US political map to flip-flop in a mere eight years? What happened to cause the Southern states, proudly Blue and Democrat since the Civil War, to flip to Republican Red?
Why are the Red States Red?
What happened between 1956 and 1964?
Answer: The American Civil Rights Movement.
Actually, income growth and increases in wealth happened:
The Myth of the Southern Strategy
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Book Review: Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy
I finished reading John Le Carre’s novel last night, and it was a great read. Definitely helped take my mind off politics and work on some much needed occasions. In the Penguin edition I read, there is a brief introduction where Le Carre describes the background for his book in the treachery of Kim Philby and George Blake. There are at least two other Le Carre novels involving George Smiley...
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A Texas Redistricting Deal?
Supposedly? Maybe? Hopefully?
That’s the news at any rate (Sources: Austin American-Statesman, Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Texas Tribune). Today was the deadline for the parties to reach an agreement to save the April 3rd primary date, and according to the Attorney General, they have reached an agreement with 7 of the 9 plaintiffs in the redistricting suit. As some of the plaintiffs have not...
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Gingrich's Survival Plan →
We don’t know yet how many delegates each candidates will receive coming out of the NV caucuses, and frankly all that matters is how many did Romney receive, but on the heels of another 20 point blowout, Gingrich is talking about how he’ll stay in the race.
According to Gingrich, his goal is to get to Super Tuesday. Between now and then, the following states will be caucusing or...
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Motorcyclist hogties hit-and-run suspect →
Fuck yes. I love this town.
Excerpts from the article:
“That guy ran that light, and just ran them over. He didn’t even stop. I don’t think there’s skid marks out there,” Perez said.
That’s when the 47-year-old private contractor and father of four chased after the driver on his motorcycle.
“I couldn’t just sit there and watch him hit those...
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Illegal Voters In Florida? →
This investigative report purports to have found at least 100 hundred illegal voters - some of whom have voted in recent elections. The report did not reveal in which elections they voted. However, some of these people claim they did not know how they became registered votes.
Part of this problem could be solved by regularly checking and cleaning up the voting rolls. If you remember the story...
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TX Primary & Redistricting
If you were planning on voting in Texas on April 3rd, you might have to adjust your plans. A DC court, which is also hearing arguments on Texas redistricting (yeah, it’s a mess, we’ve got two courts dealing with this), says it will not have a decision for at least a month (Source). The court in San Antonio, who is redrawing the interim maps after the Supreme Court ordered that the maps...
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A Correction re: GOP Delegates
I believe I have previously stated that AZ and MI are the only states coming up that are awarding pledged delegates. That is incorrect. Nevada is also awarding pledged delegates, which will be awarded proportionately.
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Moving on to Nevada
Now that Florida is out of the way, the Nevada caucuses are next. Romney dominated the Nevada caucuses in 2008 (Source), and is expected to do so once again (Source).
Paul has also been spending a lot of time in the state, but Gingrich is not doing very well coming off his recent loss in the Sunshine State (Source):
The former House speaker abruptly canceled a meeting with Nevada Gov. Brian...
January 2012
30 posts
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Thidwick Goes to Washington →
Sen. Joe Lieberman cited Dr. Seuss today in the Senate, specifcally, Thidwick The Big Hearted Moore.
Sen. Lieberman did not want his bill to become like Thidwick’s antlers.
I wholeheartedly support more Dr. Seuss references in politics.
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Republican Primary: Early Voting
Over 600,000 people have voted early in person and by absentee ballot in the Florida primary (Source). An American Research Group survey showed Romney leading among those who have already voted (51 to 33 percent). That’s a huge deficit for Gingrich to attempt to overcome in an election where somewhere around 2 million people are expected to vote.
More and more people are voting early,...
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Looking Ahead: Arizona & Michigan
The Arizona and Michigan primaries will occur on February 28th. These will be the next Republican contests which award pledged delegates (the delegates from the caucus states are unpledged).
Arizona would normally award 58 delegates, but because they kept their primary in February against RNC rules, they will only award 29 in a winner-take-all selection (Source). In 2008, Mitt Romney came in 2nd...
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Dead Voters in South Carolina
You may remember this reply to a post claiming 953 dead people voted in S. Carolina’s GOP primary.
Luckily, the Executive Director of the S. Carolina Election Commission testified on this issue.
According to her testimony, 37,000 people in the state have been identified as deceased. Of those 37,000, only 953 ballots have been cast in the names of those deceased. Based on this finding, they...
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Maine Caucusing Saturday →
Florida is obviously the big fish and the focus of everyone’s attention, and for good reason, but Maine begins their caucus on Saturday. Maine’s caucus process is pretty interesting. The first of the caucuses will take place this Saturday and the last will take place on March 3rd. Maine has 24 unpledged delegates. According to The Green Papers, Maine has a closed caucus, meaning that...
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A Delegate Situation
The delegate allocation rules (Rule 15) set up by the GOP this year kinda make a mess of things: some states are proportional and some are not. And some that were going to be proportional are now winner-take-all. Take Florida for example.
Florida was not supposed to hold it’s primary before February, and not before Iowa, New Hampshire, S. Carolina and Nevada. However, they ignored the rules...
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The Super PAC Campaign
Looking at the poll numbers (Florida) and Gingrich’s recent fundraising haul ($2m), if he wins Florida, it seems to contradict everything I know and have ever been taught about campaigning, because Newt has run one of the most dysfunctional campaigns I have ever seen.
For example, Gingrich got in late on chasing absentee voting, and Romney now has an 11 point lead among early voters...
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Texas Elections: Split Primary?
The U.S. Supreme Court rejected the maps drawn by the 3 judge panel in San Antonio and ordered them to create a map closer to the map drawn by the Legislature (Sources: Austin American-Statesman, CNN, Texas Tribune, Washington Post). You can read the court’s full opinion here [pdf]; there were no dissents. There are differences of opinion about the legal consequences of the court’s...
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953 dead people voted in the South Carolina GOP... →
Actually, these ballots were not cast in the GOP primary on Saturday, so the headline is just wrong. The S. Carolina AG informed the Justice Department about these votes in a letter sent to the Justice Department on Thursday (Source). The letter also does not specify which elections, but it would not likely have been this year’s primary since the discovery came about as a result of extensive...
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Book Review: Reagan's Comeback
Gilbert Garcia’s Reagan’s Comeback: Four Weeks in Texas that Changed American Politics Forever is a highly enjoyable read that captures essence of the Republican Presidential primary in Texas in 1976 between Gerald Ford and Ronald Reagan. Having read John Knaggs Two Party Texas and Sean Cunningham’s Cowboy Conservatism, which both talk about Reagan’s entry into the world of...