Survey USA Poll--WA-03--Dem Heck closing in on GOP candidate Herrera

[WI_DEM]

With only five days left in the race, 3rd District Democratic Congressional candidate Denny Heck appears to be closing in on his Republican rival, Jaime Herrera.

A King 5/SurveyUSA poll released Wednesday showed Herrera's lead has dwindled to four points, with 50 percent of respondents saying they would vote for Herrera and 46 percent saying they would vote for Heck. Four percent were undecided.

That's within the poll's margin of error, which means the race could now be a dead heat.

A SurveyUSA poll had Herrera leading Heck by 11 points two weeks ago. The same polling organization has shown similar leads for Herrera throughout the race.

"But not today," Heck said Wednesday during a visit with volunteers operating a small phone bank at the Democratic Party's Cowlitz County headquarters in Longview.

"I like our chances," he said. "I'm full of cautious optimism."

Herrera spokesman Casey Bowman said in an e-mail Wednesday: "Jaime has led in every single poll in this election, yet she hasn't taken this race for granted for a second. She'll continue to meet as many voters as possible from now through election day."

SurveyUSA polls have "a built-in 4-to-6-point Republican bias," Heck said. "The science is pretty clear on that. Our own polls, frankly, have shown us at a dead heat, and that's where we think (the race) is."

Still, he said, "This is a tough year. I've known it a long time, and we're just going to fight to the end."

Democratic candidates have struggled this fall as the economy has continued to falter. "People are afraid and they're angry," Heck said.

He also noted that midterm elections have gone poorly for the party holding the White House in all but two elections since the Civil War.

Heck and Herrera are vying to replace retiring Rep. Brian Baird, a Democrat who has held the seat for 12 years. The race has drawn national attention — and millions of dollars in money from both national parties — as Republicans try to snatch back a seat that has tended to lean Democratic for the last half century

http://tdn.com/news/local/article_fa986376-e247-11df-a972-001cc4c002e0.html

[Cognitive_Resonance]

1. K & R nt

[Guy Whitey Corngood]

2. Oh what the Heck?..... Somebody had to do it. nt