Free Republic

Info appreciated if anyone has it, thanks.

Hate to say it, but he just looks too dorky to run for President. I think he’s the best bet to knock off Landrieu anyway.

Whatever it is he does, I would be willing to bet on one thing for certain: the Dems will get Kal Penn to do an impersonation of him, probably an OFA web ad like the one they did with the dykey slut. And, it’ll be vicious as hell, even allude (if not state outright) that Jindal is a sell-out.

I expect, however, there will be enormous pressure on all Senate Dem incumbents to stay put in 2014

That would go against the Dem strategy of the past two elections, wouldn't it? The Dems know it's often easier to win with a blank slate that can promise anything than it is to defend an incumbent who has ruined his reputation by actually voting like a Democrat.

I’ve assumed that Jindal would be running for this. I recall some scuttlebutt on Twitter that the Lt. Gov’s race was so important, precisely because Jindal wasn’t expected to complete the term, hint hint. And this was from folks working in the Lt. Gov. campaign.

the GOP WILL take the Senate in 2014.

Seriously? Are we going to go into 2014 like we did 2012, assuring ourselves that victory is certain like it's the law of nature?

Come on. Unless we start busting our asses now, the majority will be perfectly content to remain stuck on stupid.

Why don’t these Morons use a Guy like Dick Morris?

That's funny - you call people morons and then you wonder aloud why no one uses the 'services' of that clown Dick Morris, who has spent the last decade sensationalizing everything in order to make money off of conservatives. He has the worst track record imaginable.

If Barone had predicted 400 electoral votes for Romney, Morris would have predicted 450. In 2010, Morris projected something like 90 House pick-ups, just to excite naive conservatives enough to go buy his books and subscriptions or whatever it is he's doing now.

In short: please stop believing what he says about himself, and please stop encouraging him.

Here are a couple of posts I made about my ORCA experience, yesterday on the NC forum:

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Project ORCA... Was anyone else here involved in that?

For anyone who didn’t hear about it, it involved being a poll watcher for the Romney campaign, but the idea was to collect the names of those who had voted throughout the day, and to relay that info up to the HQ in Boston, by way of smart phone app. From there they’d apparently bug those Rs who hadn’t yet voted.

Really interesting concept, I heard about it a month or so ago, realized I had some personal days I could take at work, and put them all in for this week. Signed up for the program (they called it a “task force”), and was accepted. Was really excited about helping out. They ended up assigning me to the precinct next to my own in Cornelius.

Sadly it was a bust. That morning I couldn’t even log on to the “app” they provided (actually it was just a website, not sure why they were calling it an app). Collecting the data on voters was next to impossible, as there was one of me, and voters checked in as many as five at a time at two long tables as I sat at an assigned chair off to the side, and as I wasn’t allowed to view the books of registered voters, I had to sign off only as many names as I could actually hear. 3% would be a generous estimate as to how many that turned out to be - most people speak too softly. On top of that I had to quickly flip through the more than sixty pages of names I had printed out the night before.

I was told by both the campaign and the poll manager that at 10, 2 and 4 I could view lists of who had voted. At the time I assumed that meant the books, but later found out (at 10, of course, when I was rebuffed) that I couldn’t go near the books, and instead had to wait for a print-out of names, after the certifications had been scanned and processed. At 10, and again by 2, they hadn’t even begun to scan them, as they were apparently backed up. So, I had nothing to work with.

By 4, they said I could sort through the stacks of certifications. I did as many as I could before being told that they needed to begin scanning, so I had to hand ‘em back. I took the names that I did have, and after spending over an hour bouncing around on the phone with several different kids in Boston, they finally reset my log-in info. Eventually it accepted my log-in and as I began to input the names... the website crashed on me, never to return.

My understanding is that most of the volunteers experienced similar problems. Interesting idea, could really be a powerful tool one day, but this year it was a bomb. Who knows... I’ve read that Romney lost OH, FL, VA and CO by a combined ~300,000 votes, and had this been working properly, maybe it could have made the difference.

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I think something like ORCA could be a powerful tool. Really, each state GOP should undertake something like this, but combine it with traditional outreach and GOTV. Don’t overly centralize it either, delegate it out by regions, to counties, to neighborhoods. Probably better to have a neighbor knocking on doors than it is to get a robo-call from across the country. And instead of waiting for a prez or congressional election to try it out, do a dry run in the odd-year elections.

I know how you feel.

In case I haven’t said so before, I think your art is incredible.

Boy, do I hope I’m wrong, but I don’t think Mack will make it, big win for Romney or not.

On the other hand, I think McMahon has a decent shot, as does Brown of holding on. I wouldn’t be completely shocked if Akin somehow pulled it out, assuming the GOP is winning as many races as you think. He isn’t doing much worse than Mack in the polls, and unlike Nelson in FL, McCaskill seems to still be hated in MO.

Have a link for that Facebook post?

North Carolina's early voting info is provided by the state Board of Elections website, but it's sorted by the Civitas Institute at http://www.carolinatransparency.com/votetracker/.

North Carolina is already in the bag for Romney.

At this time in 2008:

Votes Cast: 2,129,739
Democrats 1,118,192 52.5%
Republicans 630,585 29.61%
Unaffiliateds 379,666 17.83%

As of today:

Votes Cast: 2,257,894
Democrats 1,083,225 47.98% [down 34,967]
Republicans 718,553 31.82% [up 87,968]
Unaffiliateds 451,488 20% [up 71,822]

Final results in NC 2008:
Obama/Biden 2,142,651 49.70%
McCain/Palin 2,128,474 49.38%

Obama won NC by a mere 14,177 votes.

McCain won the election day vote overwhelmingly, and I can’t come up with any reason why Romney won’t do the same (and to a greater degree). Thus, with the Dem turnout down and everybody else up, Obama has already lost here.

THE ONLY REASON that Bill Clinton and Michelle Obama are coming back to NC to campaign is in order to trick their base into getting excited - for the sake of their down ballot races... but not so much here in NC, but nationally. It’s the sort of thing that plays well to the dummies who read the Huffington Post.

How’s that Senate race looking?

My problem isn’t a legal one here. PRostitution is legal in the DR, and Menendez isn’t married.

Did you read the linked article? Always bringing in young women dressed a certain way, coming and going at exactly same time, every time, like clockwork. Sounds like Menendez is using hookers here in the US of A.

Another thing: we’re seeing an avalanche of polling from Democrat-aligned pollsters trying to tell us that Dems are leading or tightening all over the place. And yet Rasmussen, from what I’ve seen at least, has shown good numbers for our side in these last few days. Do you think this is a coordinated effort by the Dems to excite their base, while trying to depress Republicans into staying home?

This is an incredible series of posts you’ve given us. Thank you!

Just now looking at a map of TV market maps, I realize that people on here and Twitter and elsewhere must have been wrong when they were speculating in weeks past that Romney/Ryan campaigning in western PA was meant mostly for eastern Ohio TV markets. Particularly in the case of Ryan's stop at the Pittsburgh airport, because the Pittsburgh TV market doesn't even go into Ohio. The two markets that cover the eastern OH border are for Youngstown, OH, and Steubenville, OH/Wheeling, WV. Only Youngstown's goes into PA, and only for a single county.

http://dishuser.org/TVMarkets/
http://dishuser.org/TVMarkets/Maps/ohio.gif
http://dishuser.org/TVMarkets/Maps/pennsylvania.gif
http://dishuser.org/TVMarkets/City%20Maps/Pittsburgh.gif

You make some great points here. On messaging, one problem Republicans have had that Democrats haven’t is that the politicians on our side are less likely to fully embrace the general philosophy. I’m convinced that literally ALL of the Democrats are true believers in hardcore socialism, and that they will ALWAYS get away with every tiny bit as much as they think their constituents will put up with. There are no ‘blue dogs,’ there are only socialists smart enough to know which votes for socialist policy are permissible in the eyes of their state/district, as well as with an eye towards future higher office.

But on our side, we often have to fight members of our caucus, even those who are representing conservative states/districts. Imagine trying to do the kind of messaging you’re talking about, in the past decade, with some of the Republicans we’ve had in the Senate, for example. Could we have really trusted Lincoln Chafee, Chuck Hagel, John McCain, Greg Voinovich, Lisa Murkowski, Lindsay Graham, Bob Bennet etc. to carry out conservative messaging?

Could you imagine Dems representing Dem states breaking their messaging? Never in a million years.

Disagree with some of this list. Connie Mack has been a complete bomb, and even with these favorable conditions it will take a miracle for him to win. On the other hand Tom Smith and Linda McMahon are running ahead of Romney in their states, and if Romney wins the popular vote nationally by more than few percentage points, I think they’ll be swept in. Even Todd Akin has been polling better than Mack - so much for the predictions of a blowout there.

Kyrillos is a complete non-entity, and I’d rank him behind Summers, who could pull out an upset if the Dem candidate over-performs and Romney puts some focus on ME-2 in the closing days, and Lingle who at least is well known and liked. I’d like to see Ras or someone remotely respectable poll in ME and HI, because lately it’s been nothing but those untrustworthy newspaper polls there.