Particularly when I truly believe that the majority of voters in this state share far more in common with Holt's positions than with Blanche.
Of course, it doesn't help that the state Republican Party has no backbone, and the national didn't help out much. I still run into a lot of folks that say "Holt who?"
Add to that all the old straight "D" voters - cause their dad voted that way, their granddad voted that way, etc.....
Did Governor Huckabee help out any?
Yeah, it seems with some national help that Holt could have had a good chance to beat the liberal Lincoln.
They always have to spend money where they think it can do the most good, and I'm sure that if Huckabee had run then they would have. But if Lincoln is vulnerable to Huckabee, then there must be some inherent weakness to her, and therefore maybe Holt could have beaten her with some help.
If this had been two yrs from now maybe they would have tried, but with 5 other races in the South, plus South Dakota, Oklahoma, Colorado, and Alaska I guess they felt they couldn't spare any resources. Of course that thinking may have cost Bob Franks the chance to beat Corzine in NJ back in 2000 as he made it a very close race with almost no help from the national party.