I find this MI poll alarming. Like in WTF alarming

[michreject]

http://detnews.com/article/20100910/POLITICS02/9100367/Schuette-leads-for-AG--Johnson-in-Secretary-of-State-race

Republican Bill Schuette leads Democrat David Leyton 43.2 percent to 34 percent in the race for attorney general, with 21.8 percent of voters undecided. Schuette's name was recognized by 43.5 percent of voters; and 23.5 percent said they had heard of Leyton.

For secretary of state, Republican Ruth Johnson leads Democrat Jocelyn Benson 43.5 percent to 31.3 percent, with 24.2 percent undecided. Johnson was known to 27.2 percent of those interviewed, and Benson to 21 percent.


From The Detroit News: http://detnews.com/article/20100910/POLITICS02/9100367/Schuette-leads-for-AG--Johnson-in-Secretary-of-State-race#ixzz0z8L6wnZU

I mean WTF. Schuette is a stranger to more than half of the voters and yet has a double digit lead. Johnson is only know by a little over a quarter of the voters and she too has a double digit lead.

In other news:

http://detnews.com/article/20100910/POLITICS02/9100389/Poll--Snyder-keeps-lead-on-Bernero--with-few-undecided

Snyder is ahead of the Lansing mayor 56.2 percent to 35.9 percent among likely November general election voters, according to a Detroit News/Local 4 WDIV poll released Thursday.


The Ann Arbor businessman's margin is roughly the same as he had in a Detroit News/Local 4 WDIV poll taken just days after the primary. Voters seem to be making up their minds early as the number of undecideds has fallen from 17.8 percent in August to 7.5 percent today.



A few weeks ago, the undecided voters was around 30%. It seems as if they have made their decision.

Again WTF!!!!!!!

[opihimoimoi]

1. Things are not going very well for the Whacko GOPers..they are blowing it big time

[michreject]

2. They're pulling ahead

here in MI. How are they blowing it?

[opihimoimoi]

3. easy.....just watch for their fail message.....

[FBaggins]

4. The post was an exercise in "If wishing made it so"

Or "I would never vote for one of these idiots, so I assume that nobody else would"

You can't blame people. They want to win and they natually assume the best possible outcome. If six polls show no movement, but rasmussen shows the race tightening - the same people who reminded us how awful rasmussen polls can be will suddenly talk about how momentum is shifting our way.

The momentum shift has been called at least half a dozen times now. The Gallup generic poll briefly turned up for us several weeks ago an suddenly people were willing to look at that poll... momentum was shifting... republicans had blown their chance and peaked too soon. When the same poll shiften back to the largest lead republican's had ever held... it was to be ignored. Now that it's back to neutral the poll is in favor again.

All while the professionals see the global picture and are still waiting for that momentum shift. Charlie Cook has adjust his call on 25 House races over the last week and a half. Every single move has been against us. It's worse in the Senate, where prognosticators who thought things were bad a coupld months back but the senate was not in play... have changed their tune.

Now we're left hoping that the tea party has success in the remaining primaries to give us a shot.

[michreject]

5. Thanks

I've noticed the poll thing. Right now the poll in vogue is PPP. It's owned by a progressive group. I look at poll numbers from Real Clear Politics. It's a compilation of polls. It may show 6 polls leaning republican and one leading democratic party. The one leaning Democratic is so large a lead that it skews the results of the other 6.

I guess it best to just vote and look at the results when you wake up the next day.

[Imajika]

10. Your post is dead on...

It is laughable to me the way people applaud and then dismiss the same polling firm based on whether they like the results or not.

I know, people are just trying to be optimistic, but aren't we talking amongst ourselves here? Why can't people just be honest?

In general, the polls are not looking good. Throwing PPP under the bus when people don't like the result is just silly. Heralding a Rasmussen poll when people DO like the result, after just hours/days/weeks earlier claiming it is an unreliable right wing pollster is entirely ridiculous.

Cook, Sabato, Silver, etc, etc, are all seeing the same trends when weighing ALL the polls. They are unmistakable to professionals. So how does it make sense to just dismiss them when people don't like what they are saying?

[DemocratSinceBirth]

21. Cook, Sabato, Silver

The same gentlemen who correctly predicted 06 and 08 would be big Democratic years.

[JNelson6563]

6. Many take MI going blue for granted.

Few seem to understand how hard we have to work to pull of each and every victory. Lots of pockets of red, as in blood red, throughout our state.

Julie

[firedupdem]

17. You are so right about the pockets of red. I think Engler was

governor when I first moved to Michigan, and all I can remember about him was the closing of mental health care facilities. I would think that the administration saving the auto industry while the republicans didn't give a shit would help Virg. A friend told me that some people are comparing Virg to Blago? What's that all about?

[JNelson6563]

20. Engler closed those hospitals & homelessness skyrocketed!

That heartless bastard.

I don't know about these charges against Virg. I strongly favored him over Dillon in the primaries. He's a powerful debater and will not back down from a good fight. Snyder, on the other hand, was on the board when Gateway shipped many thousands of jobs overseas and claims he knows what'll help Michigan grow and prosper. Yeah, like Engler knew those things. ugh.

Julie

[amandabeech]

7. I'm a Michigan expat living in the DC area for job purposes.

It is a tough slog for Dems in Michigan. The western and northern parts of the state are quite conservative. Grand Rapids, the second largest city and metro area, is often called the Salt Lake City of the Midwest because of the concentration of extremely conservative Reformed or Christian Reformed descendants of Dutch settlers who left the Netherlands in the 1840s because the Netherlands was far, far, far too liberal.

In 2006, the Grand Rapids nuts, who now control the Republican party in MI, fielded a wing nut fundie from the Scamway empire as governor and a guy from a wealthy Detroit suburb for Senator whose platform consisted of two words: cut taxes.

A lot of regular Republicans could not vote for those two bozos.

Now, I understand, the gubernatorial candidate isn't a loon and is fairly moderate for a Puke these days.

Governor Granholm hasn't been able to get things going enough (not that any one would given the trade laws), and now the Dems are going to take all the blame for the unbelievably bad economy.

It's a "throw the bums out year" and the bums in Michigan are the Dems.

[Imajika]

9. Sadly, even your post is too optimistic...

"It's a 'throw the bums out year' and the bums in Michigan are the Dems."

It's actually not. The reality is, it's a "throw the Dems out year". It is actually our sides spin that it is a "throw the bums out year", but that really isn't what most polling is showing.

Most Republican incumbents are not really in trouble. There are a few GOPers that will need to sweat a bit (a handful House republicans and perhaps Perry in TX and Burr in NC), and there is certainly some anti-incumbency mood amongst the electorate - but for the most part, and even though the Republican party brand is still beyond horrible, voters seem to be indicating via polling that they will be coming out enforce to vote against Democrats.

2 months to go is a lifetime. The polls must be treated as the proverbial canary in the coal mine. If the election were held today we'd be in serious trouble. The President is finally out fighting, and I think we have a far better ground game. All we really need is to just hold the House and Senate and we win. 2012 should be much better with Obama at the top of the ticket and IF the economy starts really improving.

[amandabeech]

11. You're the first person who has ever called me an optimist.

I stand corrected.

Despite my optimistic stance, I don't think that it is a given that we will retain control of any house of Congress.

The President is indeed once again talking the talk.

However, as many commentators here and elsewhere have argued, the President spent his political capital on health care when the #1 issue with the voters has been jobs and the economy.

He's been really close with Wall Street, and people know that.

He's ruled out WPA-type programs and he refuses to address the trade agreement issues. Notice that the Steelworkers are taking on China in a trade dispute alone.

He will not do what many consider necessary to get the jobs back.

And that's a big problem.

[golfguru]

15. And IMHO the reason dems are in trouble is because

of the horrible HCR bill. The president said yesterday in that
press session that "nobody said adding 30,000,000 people would be free".
The HCR bill is crap. It is highly unpopular, both for right wingers & left wingers.

Here are the reasons:

For profit private insurers (FPPI) win 40 million additional paying
customers, courtesy of middle class workers who will pay higher premiums.

There is not a single restraint on premium hikes by FPPI in the bill.
The FPPI's are free to increase your premiums as high as necessary until
their profit goals are met. Annual rate hikes as high as 34% are already
showing up in this year with majority to reset higher on January 1st 2011.
Note that the average premium increase has been under 9% per year over last 10 years.

No competition to FPPI from public option to keep rate hikes under control.
This was the only effective means of restricting run away rate hikes.

Competition to FPPI from across the state lines by other FPPI's is missing in bill.
So each state has it's FPPI operating as a monopoly without outside competition.

Nothing in the HCR bill to restrain frivolous malpractice suits which end up
costing all consumers of health care more.

No wonder democrats all over the country running for election are running away
from it and I can't blame them one bit. I have not seen many democratic political
ads from candidates running in 2010, touting the HCR bill.

[Imajika]

16. The problem with HCR is...

...most Americans whom had insurance won't feel any significant benefits anytime soon (if really at all). The majority of Americans had health insurance, and what benefits they do receive just won't be outweighed by the expectations that they had from such a long protracted fight.

For most people, their healthcare bills will still go up by shocking percentages, and the fact that it might have been more worse had it not been for the Democratic passed HCR legislation just won't be enough to help at the polls.

Basically, too little benefit to the voters most likely to turn out on election day. Their rates will continue going up, and now that Democrats literally OWN healthcare, EVERYTHING will be blamed on them.

I supported this bill over doing nothing. It's what we could get, so I think it was worth passing. Still, sometimes the right thing to do just won't be popular for a very long time - if at all. Bottom line, HCR in this election cycle is going to be a massive negative for us in my opinion.

Unless some dynamic changes, I think we will be very lucky to hold the House and maybe even Senate. We could with a great campaign, and the President was impressive on Labor Day kicking off the Fall campaign season, but these underlying dynamics are very hard to change this late in the game. Polls will shift around, but a real electoral catastrophe is a possibility. I'm talking worse than 1994 bad.

[golfguru]

18. Correct, benefits if any come after 2014, penalties are immediate

So 2010 & 2012 % 2014 will be very bad for dems.

[sweetloukillbot]

8. Is that Repub an incumbent?

I know the Michigan AG has been beating the anti-immigrant drum in support of Arizona. That could account for the higher numbers...

[michreject]

23. No

Our current Governor, Jennifer Granholm, a Democrat, is term limited.

[KingFlorez]

12. People will get exactly what they vote for

Obviously most of these people don't remember that Republicans are no good and are willing to give them another chance to screw things up even more. You don't deserve better when you make poor voting choices, so if the Republicans make an even bigger mess in places, it serves voters right for being stupid.

[blue_onyx]

13. The election isn't over yet

Schuette isn't a complete stranger. He did run for state-wide office before, although it was a long time ago (1990 against Sen. Levin). Leyton is unknown to 75% of voters (20% more than Schuette). Schuette doesn't have a double digit lead (43.2-34 = 9.2%). Given how much better known he is and the political environment, Schuette should be doing better.

I don't think people know much about the SoS race either. I think Jocelyn Benson is a great candidate and I'm pretty excited about her.

Snyder has marketed himself well. He didn't get much criticism during the primary. With nobody poking holes in his "tough nerd" image, his favorability ratings are high. The Dems just started running ads about Snyder outsourcing while at Gateway. Also, there are other polls from this week that show 20% or more of voters are still undecided. There's still time and I think the election will be closer than polls currently show.

[amandabeech]

14. Yeah, that outsourcing isn't going to play well.

Wasn't there a problem with DeVoss and Amway expanding in China not the U.S.?

It was only one of that creep's faults, but it seemed to have particular resonance, at least in the Muskegon Chronicle which I often read online.

[blue_onyx]

19. No, it won't

DeVos didn't do a good job of combating the "shipped jobs to China" argument and lost. Snyder is more likable and doesn't have the Amway association. It will come down to how well Snyder deals with these criticisms.

[amandabeech]

22. Also important is the completely dire economic circumstances prevailing now

as compared to four years ago.

2006 wasn't good for Michigan, but it looks like 2010 is much worse.

[michreject]

24. And those currently in power

are taking the blame. In this case, it's the D's.

[amandabeech]

25. You couldn't have said it better. n/t

[handmade34]

26. Michigan is the last place that

needs republicans in office... you're right WTF?