June 22, 2006
HAD ENOUGH?:
Cantwell's lead over McGavick nearly gone: Latest poll shows senator losing ground to challenger (NEIL MODIE, 6/22/06, Seattle Post-Intelligencer)
Dwindling voter support for U.S. Sen. Maria Cantwell's re-election bid has put her in a statistical toss-up with her Republican opponent, according to a new poll announced Wednesday. [...]While some political experts are skeptical of Rasmussen's automated telephone-polling methodology, the firm claims to have been the nation's most accurate pollster during the 2004 presidential election. And other surveys have shown a similar narrowing of Cantwell's lead.
Rasmussen said Cantwell was viewed favorably by 53 percent of likely voters and unfavorably by 42 percent, including 20 percent who viewed her "very unfavorably." McGavick, who has never run for elective office before, was viewed favorably by 46 percent and unfavorably by 35 percent.
Hovering 6 percentage points below 50 percent in a head-to-head matchup is a big danger sign for an incumbent. In a news release, Rasmussen attributed Cantwell's eroding support largely to her past backing of the Iraq war and her vote against an attempt to block the nomination of Samuel Alito to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Both positions have angered voters on Cantwell's left. She now has two anti-war opponents in the Democratic primary as well as an anti-war Green Party opponent.
The revolting eat their own. Posted by Orrin Judd at June 22, 2006 12:50 PM
"Statistical dead heat" won't get the job done in WA. McGavick has to win by several points in order to not get robbed like Rossi.
Posted by: b at June 22, 2006 1:37 PMb,
...and with King County being converted to mandatory vote-by-mail the corruption will get worse.
Kudos, Tim! Last I heard, Brother Timothy Goddard was hired to head up the Web campaign for McGavick. He must be doing SOMETHING right.
Meanwhile, his wife is stand-in blogging for him over at Flag of the World
[if we could only be so lucky here....]
Posted by: John Resnick at June 22, 2006 3:16 PMThanks, John. We're pretty pleased with how things stand over here (a Zogby poll released today also shows us close and gaining). And trust me, we're aiming for "several points," but we'll see how things go.
While we're being inappropriately self-referential, I should note I recieved Redefining Sovereignty as a gift last week, and it's even better than I expected.
Posted by: Timothy at June 22, 2006 3:58 PMI say again that ... to my surprise ... there has been no evidence of voter fraud in Oregon's vote-by-mail system. The Bushies scoured the state for such evidence in 2000 and found none.
Posted by: ghostcat at June 22, 2006 5:46 PMghostcat: That could certainly be true. The system most succeptible to fraud seems to be punch cards...
Posted by: b at June 22, 2006 6:04 PMghostcat,
Oregon must not be as corrupt as King County, WA. There is plenty of proof of vote-by-mail fraud in the last election when it was voluntary.
Remind me again how it is that the Dems are going to take back the Senate in the Fall?
They'll be lucky to hold what they have.
Posted by: Jim in Chicago at June 22, 2006 10:01 PM