Tuesday’s political round-up – The Carpetbagger Report

Today’s installment of campaign-related news items that wouldn’t generate a post of their own, but may be of interest to political observers:

* Sen. Linc Chafee (R-R.I.) is a top Dem target for 2006, but before former Rhode Island Attorney General Sheldon Whitehouse (D) gets his shot, Chafee appears poised for a primary fight. As I first mentioned in April, Cranston Mayor Stephen Laffey (R) has had his eye on the race for sometime and now appears ready to make his move. Laffey met with former Rep. Pat Toomey and the Club for Growth for recently, in part because the group specializes in backing right-wing Republicans battling moderates in GOP primaries. Toomey has the impression that Laffey “probably will” be a Senate candidate.

* In Oklahoma, former Rep. J.C. Watts (R) announced today that he will not run for governor against Brad Henry (D) next year. “I have determined that the timing for such an adventure is not right at this point in our lives,” he said in a statement. Watts is the second top-tier Oklahoma Republican to pass on the race, after Lt. Gov. Mary Fallin announced earlier this year that she will run for re-election instead. Watts has spent most of his time of late in the lucrative world of infomercials.

* A Repubilcan poll out today in Florida shows Sen. Bill Nelson (D) leading Rep. Katherine Harris (R), 47% to 38%.

* Though it’s still unclear if Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney (R) will run for re-election next year, his time on the presidential trail has not endeared him to his constituents. A recent Boston Globe poll showed Attorney General Thomas Reilly (D) leading Romney in a hypothetical match-up, 51% to 38%. What’s worse for Romney, Massachusetts Republicans were asked who’d they’d back for president in 2008, and Romney came in third, behind Rudy Giuliani and John McCain.

* Speaking of presidential long-shots, former HHS Secretary and former Wisconsin Gov. Tommy Thompson (R) acknowledged over the weekend that he’s “considering” a White House campaign in 2008. Thompson, who once outlined the most inefficient model for socialized medicine imaginable, said his campaign would emphasize the need to improve the nation’s health care.

Regarding the Nelson v Harris poll results in Florida, I went to the StrategicVision site and read ALL of the questions posed. Of course, it is maddening that they tell you how many people participated, margin of error, etc. and even that certain questions were asked of only (apparently self-identified) Rethugs or Dems, but they NEVER tell you how many/what percentage of the respondents were of which political party. ARRGGGGH!

Mr. C.B., I know that Jerome at MyDD and some other bloggers did some individual poll breakdowns during the 2004 election cycle, but apparently only got the information by calling the poll organizations and digging it out. Are you aware of any blogger or academic that regularly publishes this kind of data? I believe that Gallup sells this information to its subscribers, but I’m not certain. IF there is no one out there doing this, it strikes me as a ripe opportunity that is being missed by a lot of people (those who have more knowledge AND money than me).

I have studied this to a fair extent, and in today’s partisan “ideology-trumps-everything” environment, it would seem that party ID in each poll is a critical yet hidden criterion. It was damned frustrating that yesterday I spent more than three hours Googling and surfed on all kinds of sites of all political persuasions, unsuccessfully trying to find the party ID of the CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll conducted July 22-24, 2005. This paticular poll is the first time in which a majority of the respondents (51%) stated that they believe that the Bush Administration “deliberately mislead the American people” that Iraq had WMDs.

What prompted this was another of my periodic visits to a right wing site (Say Anything) — which is a misnomer, as I get called an asshole, full of shit, etc., but I go there just to keep up on the crazies, but also to preach a little truth to stupidity — and I was arguing/debating with a resident loon there that “deliberately mislead” is the functional, euphemistic equivalent to “lied” and that therefore Bush had “lied” to the American people to get us into this war. When I pointed to this CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll as support for my view, he claimed (without a link or citation) that THIS Gallup poll was the exception to Gallup’s typical practice of having a greater proportion of Rethugs respond than is otherwise the case in the general population as represented by voting trends during election cycles.

So, wanting to have facts with which to support my contention — that this
CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll DOES accurately reflect the mood of ALL Americans as the poll’s respondents fairly reflected the party ID in the general population at large — and I could not find a damn thing about the respondents’ party ID. I DID find a few mentions of the poll results, primarily at CNN and MyDD, but nothing about the party ID. The Gallup Organization website says detailed information (with no description of what types of information that might be) is available to subscribers (which I’m not).

So, Mr. C.B., can you direct me to any resource that regularly publishes party ID on political polls, for free, that I might be able to access digitally?

You would clearly help me in my periodic efforts to debunk the spinning done by the batshit crazies. I know, I know, this is like trying to empty out the oceans with a teaspoon, but as most of us realize, every one-on-one battle will create an awful lot of cognitive dissonance. For those who by mistake or ill-advised intent wander into the crazy websites — especially the few that actually permit open comments — then maybe, just maybe, we can persuade one or two to think for themselves instead of merely swallowing the daily vomit sprewed forth by the RightWingNoiseMachine. If nothing else, I love to generate at least two dozen knee-jerk reactions for each thread upon which I post a comment. YES, AT LEAST TWO DOZEN!! Talk about intolerance… It’s almost as much fun as watching them go after Howard Dean — just makes them look even crazier than usual!! 🙂