Is Mike Castle Feeling The Heat?
On Friday we wrote about a Chris Coons press release criticizing Castle for attending yet another stimulus event. Castle’s campaign had a rather bizarre response:
The fact is that the bike lane was funded by the Delaware Department of Transportation. It is true that Rep. Mike Castle is a strong supporter of recreation opportunities in this area, including the bike lane on the bridge, and has secured funding for the coordinated federal, state, and local effort to create the C&D Canal Recreation Trail.
“Congressman Castle has fought for and secured federal dollars for this area of Delaware over the years and continues to support the state’s needs for federal funds that have already been appropriated. Voters in Delaware know what the Coons campaign does not — The nation is in debt and the rate of spending that he supports has got to stop in order to get the economy back on track. Chris has spent $360,000 of New Castle County residents’ tax dollars in lobbying fees to his campaign donors and regularly raises our taxes, it is no wonder that he doesn’t realize that we are in a budget crisis.
I’m not even sure what he’s saying – is he blaming Chris Coons for the U.S. deficit? I guess Mike Castle wants you to ignore his 18 years in Washington.
I’m a bit surprised that Castle is feeling some heat from Christine O’Donnell’s campaign as well. This time, though, he relied on the Delaware GOP to have a response:
Back in Delaware, O’Donnell has been cited repeatedly lying to voters and manipulating her own political history. Recently, O’Donnell has claimed that she won two out of three counties in Delaware in her 2008 race against then-Senator Joe Biden. Election results show that Biden won overwhelmingly against O’Donnell and that she did not win any counties in the state of Delaware. In addition to this blatant spin on reality, O’Donnell yesterday told Politico that she had not sought the endorsement of the Constitution Party of Delaware. But last week, The News Journal reported that O’Donnell had pushed to be on the November ballot for the election, quoting Constitution Party Chairman Pell Sherman.
“O’Donnell is hoping that voters have a short-term memory and ignore her record in Delaware,” said Tom Ross, Delaware GOP Chairman. “Sadly, Christine continues to avoid the tough questions and will spin her own reality with the hope that the national press won’t catch on.” He went on to note how O’Donnell is seldom seen in Delaware and never misses an opportunity to seek endorsements and coverage outside the state.
Her campaign appears to be getting desperate as the Republican primary is only two weeks away. The most recent Rasmussen poll has shown her support drop by five points in only a month to 36 percent – robbing her of the talking point that she would beat Democrat Chris Coons in November.
O’Donnell’s campaign is no doubt desperate but why is Castle paying attention to her at all?
Tags: DE-Sen, Mike Castle
DeGOP response to O’Wackjob is insane. It is impossible to think that Castle is feeling the least bit of heat from that nut bag.
I’ve been telling you folks, there’s a chance that the teabaggers may pull one of those two races out. If not Christine, then Glen. They’re the ones who are going to be super-motivated to get to the polls in 15 days, not the mainline Repubs who pine for the good ol’ days of booming banks and DuPont dominance and Senator Roth. All that matters is getting people to the polls.
Oh hold the phone. Crazed GOP harpie, Michelle Malkin, just put up a post loving on O’WAckjob and pissing on Ole Cap & Tax Castle.
They’ve hit on a catchy, underdog slogan: Castle thinks he is too big to fail. Tbagz will eat that up.
Tbagz
You may see a bit of late national Tbagzy support for O’Wackadoodle. On the off chance that they pull off a shocker, they’ll all want to claim a peice of it.
O’Donnell thinks she has a big issue with stem cell research.
Great kos diary about Castle up right now. The stem cell bill could be the miracle that the O’Whackadoodles have been praying for.
On that news the tea part express has just said that it is going to be on the air bashing Castle with a huge media buy.
Here’s the Daily Kos story.
I agree with the thrust of the story, the stem cell bill could put Castle in somewhat of a bind. I’m sure O’Donnell is going to hammer hard at him until September 14. I’m still not sure I’d characterize Castle as being in a tough race but perhaps tougher than he’s had in the recent past?
Talking Points Memo also picked up the story but cited that silly 9/12 Patriots poll.
Check out this from Swing State posted about an hour ago. http://www.swingstateproject.com/diary/7484/desen-tea-party-express-will-take-on-castle
Here is the thing. Even in a low turnout, off year, primary which gives added weight to the TBAGZ vote, they are still REALLY outnumbered in Delaware. This is a numbers game. Castle just has to go mute for the next 14 days and he wins in a walk.
HuffPost has chimed in on the O’Donnell campaign as well: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/08/30/christine-odonnell-delewa_n_699509.html
Even if logic dictates that Castle will win, he’s gotta be worried after seeing Joe Miller win the Alaska Senate nomination away from sitting Senator Lisa Murkowski. Polls showed she would win handily.
Some of that TBagz brigade is now heading to Delaware.
Wouldn’t YOU be scared? Especially since pollsters in Alaska clearly missed a lot of people who ordinarily don’t vote, but who did this time. Yes, Christine O’Donnell’s a joke. But the party has been taken over by the right-wingers to which it tailored its message of hate, division, and covert racism. If those elements (the Glenn Beck crowd) come out in big numbers, she could win.
It would serve the billionaires who have bankrolled the typical Rethug lies for all these years right.
Some of that TBagz brigade is heading to Delaware.
Oh yeah, because Delaware just loves us some carpetbaggers. Hell, we can’t even stand people from the other side of the canal.
What are the odds these out of staters will miscalculate Delaware, come on too strong and alienate everyone they come in contact with. Maybe like putting stickers on kids whose parents they want to deport?
Perhaps the out-of-staters should harass people on Twitter. That works really well.
It could happen, anon. But in a low turnout primary, if you can get the evangelical whackos out (which is who they’re reportedly targeting), you never know.
The general election is quite another thing, however.
Oh, and if O’Donnell even comes close, the apparently more-competitive Glen Urquhart will likely defeat Ms. Moneybags.
Sit back and enjoy the spectacle.
Hopefully she’ll decide to get on the ballot for the general election and pull 10,000 votes away from Castle, opening the door for Chris….
The reduced lanes of travel over St. George’s are perfect for abortion bikes. You can rent them for $13.00 a day. Go knock up some broads, boys!
We take a lot more out of staters than we used to.
Poetic justice if Castle is brought down by his ability to be on every side of any issue at all times. And yet there are two items that are keeping my excitement in check. 1) Wingnutism is a virus that is hard to contain. Rooting for O”Whackaddodle is like rooting for more Delawareans to become zombified. I don’t want even one percent of my fellow citizens to buy into her utter horse shit. 2) The Tbagz Express ads are going to be talking about how “liberal” Castle is. That could help Castle in the general.
I guess the question is, is there a reservoir of fundamentalist energy in Delaware that isn’t currently politically active. My guess is, there might be. I base this on a change I’ve seen, in about 15 years homeschooling in The First State as that branch of the movement (by no means the largest) gets louder bout their ‘rights’. 10 years ago people could agree not to discuss religion at a park day or nature walk. Now if you ask that there’s an uproar of how “Christians are persecuted”. It’s quite different, and somewhat alarming.
If they can get those folks motivated and out, our previous eval of turnout and balance might be off.
I commented on the HUFFPOST piece about Christine never having a job.Here it is:
I would gladly put her to work.The “job” wouldn’t be long term.Only twenty minutes or so.But the pay is OUTSTANDING!
It’s pretty clear that the Tbagz are targeting smaller population states where you can get more bang for your buck. Nevada, Alaska, and now Delaware.
And they are indeed trying to attract the people who Brooke referenced–off the pollsters’ radar b/c of their (lack of) voting history.
While I still don’t think O’Donnell will win, I now hereby predict that Glen Urquhart defeats Michele Rollins. Man, her commercials suck.