Daily Archives: September 15, 2010

PPP: Coons 50, O’Whackado 34

Public Policy Polling has released their new general election poll following Christine O’Donnell’s suprise victory last night. Chris Coons holds a solid double digit lead over Christine, 50% to 34%. If Castle had won last night, he would be leading Coons right now, 45% to 35%, a result that showed Castle damaged from the nasty primary fight but still leading.

The worst news of the poll for O’Donnell’s cult followers is her favorability rating. It is 29%. Her unfavorability rating is a devastating and unelectable 50%!

Moderate Republicans will be voting for Coons by a margin of 54 to 31. Indeed, Coons takes a Castle like 25% of the total Republican vote. The shoe is on the other foot. O’Donnell is now their Karen Hartley Nagle.

And it gets worse:

Only 31% of voters in the state think O’Donnell’s fit to hold public office while 49% think that she is not. Even with Republicans in the state less than half at 48% believe that she is. […] Only 33% of independents and 16% of Democrats believe O’Donnell’s fit.

You know what I like about that? 3% of Christine’s voters in this poll think she is unqualifed but are voting for her anyway.

Last Night I Was Shocked, Today It Makes Sense

Last night I couldn’t believe Christine O’Donnell beat Mike Castle. I walked around stunned. How could this happen? And then I realized what happened. Why wouldn’t she win? For far too many years the entire Republican Party has fed their supporters a steady diet of issue-less tripe. They’ve run on liberty, freedom, real America, family values, Christian nation, etc. Even their claim of “less government” rings hollow due to lack of specifics. But today’s GOP doesn’t do specifics – they simply call their opponent names (commie lib, socialist, etc), question their Americanism, and wrap themselves in their god and the flag.

So why wouldn’t O’Donnell win? Ideology trump issues. That has been the GOP message for years. Last night establishment Republicans lost to their own strategy.

A Word Of Warning

Delaware Liberal is about to get deluged. A Christine O’Donnell win means her crazed supporters are feeling powerful and now that Chris Coons is the one standing in the way of her annointment their eyes will turn to us. I don’t know how much you followed what happened on the Delaware Tomorrow blog but they practically had to shut down for a while because of harassment of O’Donnell supporters and one blogger was even driven off of the blog.

If you’re posting here under your name, I strongly suggest you use a pseudonym. Of course, this decision is up to you. Also, we will lower any tolerance for “outing” behavior. No more “you sound like X” or “I know where you live” type of statements. People need to come here to discuss things without worrying that political feuds are going to spill over into real life. Just be careful about revealing information about posters who you may know.

Castle will not endorse O’Donnell, and will not run write in campaign

Good for him. I would have lost what respect I had left for him if he had done that. Indeed, if Ross and the rest of the state GOP endorse her, they will confirm themselves to be without principles (which will ironically prove O’Donnell right, at least about that one thing). Ross should make the rumors true and resign. So should the rest of the state GOP. There is no coming back from this election result for the state GOP. From what was said to the shocking result, there can be no healing between the two camps.

A Rep. Mike Castle (R-Del.) campaign source confirmed to The Hill late Tuesday that the longtime congressman will not be endorsing Christine O’Donnell. […] As to whether the national party would back O’Donnell, a Castle campaign source said the campaign has no knowledge of their thinking but said “they should save their money.”

Well, as we noted earlier, the NRSC has packed its bags and left town, refusing to help O’Donnell with money or manpower. The RNC has no money. So if O’Donnell wants help, it will have to come from Palin and the Teabaggers Express. Side question, are the Teabaggers Express like regular teabaggers, just quicker?

After the stunning primary loss, Castle’s campaign also said the longtime congressman is not interested in waging a write in bid this November.

And my respect for Mike grows a little bit.

Winners & Losers

I don’t know about you but I’m still a bit shell-shocked by the election results last night. I think we knew it was possible that Christine O’Donnell could win, but didn’t think it was probable. Let’s assess besides O’Donnell & Castle who are the winners and losers from last night’s primary?

Winners

Sarah Palin & Tea Party Express

When O’Donnell began her surge about 2 weeks ago she had the backing of some obscure rightwing groups like Concerned Women for America. After Murkowski’s loss, Castle & the Delaware GOP opened up on O’Donnell with everything and at least from our perspective, looked to have stalled her momentum. Sarah Palin stuck out her neck to endorse O’Donnell. The DeMint, NRA & Bachmann endorsements all came after Palin. Despite Palin’s spotty record she now will have the (deserved) reputation as kingmaker.

PPP Polls

PPP Polls also stuck out their neck on this race. They were the only pollster willing to come in the final week before the race and they captured the O’Donnell surge. Not only did they catch the O’Donnell surge but they were willing to say O’Donnell could win by even more (from a post on Monday):

There’s a pretty wide range of outcomes that would not surprise me tomorrow given the difficulties of polling a Republican electorate in a small blue state. It would be no shock if Castle hangs on to win but when you look at the internal numbers and compare them to Murkowski I also wouldn’t be all that surprised if O’Donnell ends up winning by 10.

Chris Coons

This one is obvious. Overnight the U.S. Senate seat in Delaware switched from “likely Republican” to “likely Democrat.” PPP tweeted some of their general election numbers – O’Donnell favorability is 29/50 and only 31% of Delawareans think she’s fit to hold office. Democrats can’t afford to get complacent here but O’Donnell is pretty well defined already while Coons is more of an unknown.

Losers

GOP Establishment

There’s a lot of blame to pass around here. The Delaware GOP is no doubt reeling right now. The whole organization was organized to support Mike Castle and spent the last month attacking Christine O’Donnell. I don’t see how the Delaware GOP survives. O’Donnell is now the top Republican in the state. I think she is justified to ask for the resignations of Tom Ross and other officials. The NRSC and John Cornyn are also losers here. Mike Castle is one of their top recruits and seeing him fail is a blow. In fact, the NRSC has already announced they’re pulling out of the state. Not to worry though, I’m sure Christine will have plenty of Tea Party money. I think it’s obvious now that the GOP is run by Sarah Palin, the Tea Party and Rush Limbaugh. Even Karl Rove is on the outs. Check out Karl Rove arguing with Sean Hannity over O’Donnell:

Delaware

I know we’ve spent a lot of time bashing Mike Castle, who deserves criticism for not standing up to the forces of his own party. However, it is quite sad to see a long career of service to Delaware end in the fashion it did last night. O’Donnell won by distorting Castle’s record, turning his 90% record of voting with the GOP into a “liberal” voting record. Delaware’s reputation for clean politics has taken a beating as well.

Pragmatism

The Republican Party’s hard right turn has given a blow to moderate Republicans and concept of bipartisanship. I think it’s always been a bit of a pipe dream but the new configuration of the GOP is absolutely committed to not doing anything with Democrats. I fear for our country – gridlock means we won’t be able to address important issues (like unemployment). The defeat of Castle sends a clear signal to GOP lawmakers – we don’t want you to work with Democrats. Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe have to be quaking in their boots right now.

Beau Biden

I know he had his reasons for not running and hopefully he’s still happy with his decision. If one of Biden’s main concerns was taking on popular Mike Castle, how dumb do you think he’s feeling right now?

The Other Results

Everyone was focused on the Senate & House primaries last night but there were other offices being contested. Here are the results:

STATE TREASURER
323 of 323 Districts Reported

DEMOCRATIC PARTY
CHIP FLOWERS JR. 18406 435 18841 54 . 3 %
VELDA JONES-POTTER 15393 487 15880 45 . 7 %

AUDITOR OF ACCOUNTS
323 of 323 Districts Reported

DEMOCRATIC PARTY
RICHARD KORN 17167 472 17639 53 . 9 %
KENNETH A. MATLUSKY 14692 405 15097 46 . 1 %

STATE SENATOR DISTRICT 19
16 of 16 Districts Reported

REPUBLICAN PARTY
ERIC R. BODENWEISER 1957 80 2037 48 . 6 %
* JOSEPH W. BOOTH 2062 95 2157 51 . 4 %

STATE SENATOR DISTRICT 20
16 of 16 Districts Reported

DEMOCRATIC PARTY
* GEORGE H. BUNTING JR. 1815 43 1858 78 . 8 %
PERRY J. MITCHELL 484 15 499 21 . 2 %

STATE REPRESENTATIVE DISTRICT 2
10 of 10 Districts Reported

DEMOCRATIC PARTY
STEPHANIE T. BOLDEN 652 24 676 51 . 2 %
HAZEL D. PLANT 630 15 645 48 . 8 %

STATE REPRESENTATIVE DISTRICT 3
7 of 7 Districts Reported

DEMOCRATIC PARTY
ROBERT BOVELL 583 7 590 44 . 5 %
HELENE M. KEELEY 707 29 736 55 . 5 %

STATE REPRESENTATIVE DISTRICT 8
9 of 9 Districts Reported

DEMOCRATIC PARTY
S. QUINTON JOHNSON 778 13 791 68 . 7 %
VALERIE V. JONES-RABB 358 3 361 31 . 3 %

STATE REPRESENTATIVE DISTRICT 9
10 of 10 Districts Reported

DEMOCRATIC PARTY
RICHARD H. GRIFFITHS 255 3 258 21 . 0 %
REBECCA WALKER 961 9 970 79 . 0 %
REPUBLICAN PARTY
JOHN MARINO 1514 8 1522 75 . 5 %
ANTHONY MIRTO 486 7 493 24 . 5 %

STATE REPRESENTATIVE DISTRICT 10
9 of 9 Districts Reported

DEMOCRATIC PARTY
KENNETH DARGIS 274 6 280 27 . 8 %
DENNIS E. WILLIAMS 718 9 727 72 . 2 %

STATE REPRESENTATIVE DISTRICT 24
6 of 6 Districts Reported

DEMOCRATIC PARTY
KAY WILDE GALLOGLY 235 4 239 29 . 1 %
EDWARD S. OSIENSKI 579 2 581 70 . 9 %

STATE REPRESENTATIVE DISTRICT 27
6 of 6 Districts Reported

DEMOCRATIC PARTY
EARL G. JAQUES JR. 769 12 781 64 . 3 %
JAMES MARAVELIAS 429 5 434 35 . 7 %

STATE REPRESENTATIVE DISTRICT 29
7 of 7 Districts Reported

REPUBLICAN PARTY
GEORGE A. PHILLIPS 427 23 450 28 . 0 %
LINCOLN D. WILLIS 1114 42 1156 72 . 0 %

STATE REPRESENTATIVE DISTRICT 31
7 of 7 Districts Reported

REPUBLICAN PARTY
RONALD POLIQUIN 497 38 535 49 . 4 %
RONALD SMITH 504 45 549 50 . 6 %

STATE REPRESENTATIVE DISTRICT 33
8 of 8 Districts Reported

REPUBLICAN PARTY
HAROLD J. PETERMAN 1069 33 1102 56 . 3 %
STEVEN RUST 829 26 855 43 . 7 %

COUNTY COUNCIL DISTRICT 3
20 of 20 Districts Reported

REPUBLICAN PARTY
JANET KILPATRICK 2641 51 2692 51 . 7 %
MICHAEL D. PROTACK 2470 49 2519 48 . 3 %

SHERIFF
212 of 212 Districts Reported

DEMOCRATIC PARTY
TRINIDAD NAVARRO 14732 300 15032 63 . 3 %
MICHAEL P. WALSH 8504 206 8710 36 . 7 %
REPUBLICAN PARTY
WILLIAM HART 14134 243 14377 56 . 4 %
JOSEPH O’LEARY 10905 200 11105 43 . 6 %

RECORDER OF DEEDS
63 of 63 Districts Reported

DEMOCRATIC PARTY
JOHN F. BRADY 3674 111 3785 56 . 0 %
ALMA C. ROACH 2852 127 2979 44 . 0 %

What surprises do you see? I see a few mild upsets – Flowers over Jones-Potter (surprisingly high margin), Navarro over Walsh (a blowout) and Bolden over Plant. There were a few close calls as well – Korn-Matlusky, Booth-Bodenweiser & Kilpatrick-Protack. The labor-backed challengers also did quite well in the open seat races – Rebecca Walker in RD9 and Ed Osienski in RD24. Maravelias did not prevail over incumbent Jaques in RD27, however.

The 30,000

Yesterday, Christine O’Donnell garnered 30,561 votes compared to Mike Castle’s 27,021. Let’s put that in perspective. In the 2008 Primary, both . . . BOTH . . . Democrats Markell and Carney picked up more than 30,000 votes: 37,849 to 36,112. Coons, in his run against Gordon, received 31,405 votes. Here’s one that will make you spit out your morning coffee, Karen Hartly-Nagle in her run for Congress took in 35,995 votes.

There’s a lot of hard work ahead for Chris Coons, Democrats and moderate Republicans. But 30,000 is not all it’s cracked up to be.