Lee is feeling burned
NBC 10 is out with its own poll on Delaware’s gubernatorial race this morning, and its findings confirm the SurveyUSA and FDU/PM polls also released this week.
Markell 64%, Lee 29% (703 LV)
The above linked News Journal article makes the point that Lee has come back from being down in the polls before. In 2004, Lee was behind Minner by 18 points and he closed the gap to make it a relatively close race in the end. To that I say, Jack Markell is no Ruth Ann Minner. Challenging an incumbent is much easier than winning an election on your own merits in an open race. Bill Lee’s reaction to the numbers:
“I did not expect the numbers to show that wide a gap,” Lee said. “They’re inconsistent with the less sophisticated polling we’ve done. But it is what it is. I don’t see it as discouraging. I see it as challenging.”
[…] “I don’t know what effect it will have on fundraising,” he said. “I’ve been very focused on Republicans who I think feel some obligation for the way I got into the race and some sense that this is a climactic election and it’s one we have to win. Those kind of numbers can encourage people. But it’s certainly not a positive for fundraising.”
This response raises two issues. First, Lee thinks his fundraising may increase now, at least among Republicans. Ha! Being down more than 30 points does not increase fundraising. Being down 30 points means the Republican Governors Association and the RNC are at this very moment packing their bags and fleeing Delaware for more contested races, if they were ever here in the first place. Being down 30 points means that the GOP more wealthy contributors will not contribute to Lee, for that is a bad bet on a sure loser. What they will do now is attempt to help Copeland, or they will concentrate on helping McCain-Palin in Pennsylvania.
Don’t believe me? Then listen to Don Mell, a political strategist and consultant who worked on Lee’s gubernatorial campaigns in 2000 and 2004.
“It will effectively shut down Bill’s fundraising capabilities,” he said. “In this economy, I think people are going to be like they are on Wall Street — the herd is going to go where they think they’re going to win. There is that sort of mentality in politics.”
The second issue is the support Bill Lee is garnering among Republicans. Bill Lee, in his quote above, is laying a guilt trip on Republicans. He is basically saying that Republicans should feel an obligation to support him because it was they who drafted him. I wonder if he said that because he saw the breakdowns in the polls on party support. Markell was supposedly going to suffer from a divided party due to the close primary election. Wrong. More than 80% of Democrats are supporting Markell. Meanwhile, only 61% of Republicans are supporting Lee. Indeed, 25% of the remaining GOP vote is supporting Markell. I am sure that rubs Lee the wrong way, hence the guilt trip.
In the immortal words of Jan Ting, “When someone tells you that you’d make a great candiate, say ‘show me the money’.”
– OR –
Republican donors are not where Lee needs them to be right now.
My question –
Will the margin that Markell beats Lee be bigger than the margin that Lee beat Protack?
Lee and KHN should get together and commiserate.
Maybe it’s time to re-examine the story that the party “drafted” Lee on a groundswell of popular demand. What really happened?
Castle runs the DEGOP in exactly the way Tom Carper is a behind the scene shot caller for the Delaware Dems.
There is no mystery. Castle got Lee to run by lying his ass off about how much support he could muster. The point of the whole sorry pantomine is to prop up Copeland, because COpeland feared having to appear in any pictures standing next to Mike Protack.
The people who drafted him should support him. I still think that this exercise is about teeing up Copeland for bigger and better things down the line. This practice run gets him in front of all of the right people statewide plus some statewide voter visibility.
What I am surprised at, though, is that their own internal polling (if any is really being done) could be that out of line with the published polls.
Why didn’t Copeland just go ahead and run for governor?
Cassandra’s right. After Copeland loses, he’ll basically own the Delaware GOP for giving up his Senate seat and jumping on this stupid grenade. He can do whatever the hell he wants and the GOP won’t be able to complain.
i’m beginning to think that Charlie would rather have Protack on the top of the ticket cuz at least he would be talking about the issues and creating a positive buzz on the rest of the ticket instead of Lee just contridicting the “party line”. Chairman Ross holds a news conference and Lee says he’s gonna apologize to Markell for the attack. Wow…what a party. What a strategy…Charlie is a good candidate, good thing he has a printing company doing millions of dollars of business with the State of Delaware and a duPont trust fund to fall back on.
Mike Matthews, get in touch with me. You are very wrong about your postulation.
Well, if Protack says it, I guess it’s true.
Honestly, do I even need to say “snark”?
Copeland isn’t going to even come close. He’ll do better than Lee, but Denn will have some Markell coattails – and he’s run statewide before, which gives him name recognition.
If Copeland’s last name were duPont, he might pick up some more votes. But he’s not going anywhere this time.
I take Protack’s statement here as a sign that he will continue his quest to destroy the rich-guy wing of the GOP.
I take Protack’s statement here as a sign that he will continue his IMPOTENT quest to destroy the rich-guy wing of the GOP.