Year: 2012

According to the Wall Street Journal's Jeff Yang, “[i]f enough people see it, this is the photo that singlehandedly re-elects Barack Obama.”

In recent years I have voluntarily applied as an intervener in several cases involving DP&L rate increase requests filed before the Public Service Commission. The process itself is cumbersome and complex and requires resources and time that is not always available to me. Unfortunately the reality is that the public, the ratepayers’, and my constituents’ interests have been inadequately represented in many of these proceedings and my obligation and responsibility as an elected public servant is to ensure some semblance of fairness in the discussions and decisions rendered. The most recent filing in which I have intervener status is identified as PSC Docket # 11-528 and involves a multi-pronged request for rate increases which includes but is not exclusive to recovery of depreciation values by Delmarva for obsolete meters that have been replaced with “smart-meters” for Delmarva residential customers. I have continuously and strongly objected to any ratepayer funding for new technology costs such as advanced metering purchase and installation since the provable economic benefit from these devices rests solely with the utility

And now for our Senate Forecast. I imagine we will do one more of these on Monday. As the polls stand now, the Democrats will pick up a net 1 seat, increasing their total to 54 seats (52 actual Democrats, and 2 Independents caucusing with the Democrats). The Democrats will pick up, or take away from the Republicans, the Senate seats in Massachusetts, Indiana and Maine. The Republicans will win seats in North Dakota and Nebraska, according to recent polling. Though it is not out of the realm of possibility that the Democrats can retain both of those seats. Heidi Heitkamp has led in recent polling in North Dakota, and Bob Kerrey just got the endorsement of Chuck Hagel, and recent polling before the Fischer internal had the race tightening significantly. If they do win both, the Democrats will hold 56 seats. Impressive feat in a year that Republicans were suppose to retake the majority.

Nate Cohn: "Absent a possible but unlikely last-minute shift in the polls between now and Election Day, Romney's chances will come down to the low but existent risk that the polls are and have been completely wrong. As Senators Harry Reid and Michael Bennet can attest, the polls have been wrong before and could be wrong again. But the Romney campaign's revival of August's welfare attack and their recent Jeep outsourcing antics suggest that Boston's numbers don't show something too different, while Chicago has unwaveringly maintained that they hold a modest and clear lead in Ohio. With Obama near 49 percent and just six days to go before the polls close, Romney's window for a comeback is getting vanishingly narrow." Meanwhile, 78% rate the President's response to Hurricane Sandy as excellent or good, while 8% view it negatively. It's good press for the President, and in fact it is good governance, but I doubt it moves the polls that much. The polls were already moving in the President's way before the Hurricane struck, both nationally and in the battleground states. We once again have a lot of polls today. The only major change is moving North Carolina back to a Tied status, from LEAN ROMNEY.

This Halloween Polling Report is scary for Republicans. Normally when a challenger defeats an incumbent, he is leading by wide margins right now. Remember 1992? Clinton was leading in all the polls, both national and state, by margins enough to ensure he would win 270. That is not the case for Mr. Romney right now. He is woefully behind the ball in the battleground states. In the end, he may win Florida and North Carolina, but the rest of the toss ups have Obama leading, as you see on our map. Indeed, the point of our map, and why it is different from all other polling maps, is to show you who would win the election if the election where today. For that is all a poll can ask you. So that is all we are showing. And right now, we are showing an clear Obama victory. If Romney were to win, this map should be showing a clear Romney victory right now. It's not. So we have a lot of new polls out. The biggest surprise to me? Georgia is not lockdown safe for Romney. Georgia.