nitpick: GQR's MoE is ±4

not 3.5%

So, this poll has Christie's lead within the MoE! For the first time in a quite while. Go Team Corzine.

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by: homerun @ Thu Aug 27, 2009 at 23:54:42 PM UTC

Thanks

I'll fix that.

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by: James L. @ Fri Aug 28, 2009 at 00:03:44 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Undecideds in Rasmussen

Whats interesting is that undecideds went up by 2 and Christie lost 2 points. I feel that more Christie voters are moving into the undecided column and because they are unsure whether they really want him as their governor. The sign that voters are loosing confidence in Christie shows that the momentum is on Corzine's side. I expect Corzine to start leading in the polls in early October.

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by: jmartin4s @ Fri Aug 28, 2009 at 00:00:36 AM UTC

Normally I'm a proponent of the Ras methodology,

because people eventually almost always ignore the irrelevant alternatives anyway. But it looks very much like Daggett is becoming a sink for anti-Corzine votes that might otherwise go to Christie. In the meantime, Christie is self-destructing.

I think this race is becoming somewhat more winnable--and I'd written it off between August and the most recent R2K poll (I hope we get another one of those before long).

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by: andgarden @ Fri Aug 28, 2009 at 00:02:08 AM UTC

Daggett could get anywhere from 15% to 20%

once Daggett's commercials start airig and the debates happen. It looks like all Corzine might need to do is keep his proportion of the vote in the low 40s and he can win re-election. Out of curiosity, does anyone know why Corzine decided to go from being in the senate to being governor, it sounds like he may have been safer in the senate.

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by: jmartin4s @ Fri Aug 28, 2009 at 00:26:07 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

I will be surprised if Daggett gets to 10%

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by: andgarden @ Fri Aug 28, 2009 at 00:33:06 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

High level exec

Corzine is a former high level exec who was CEO of Goldman Sachs until pushed out by future Bush Treasury Sec Henry Paulsen in a palace coup.  As governor, he tends to be autocratic and abrasive, i.e. corporate and not consultative.  The appeal of being the one, rather than one of 100 for him is natural.

It also explains his pro-business tilt as Gov.  Fortunately, Christie except for standard GOP horse **** on taxes has not zeroed in on Corzine's cavalier handling of the all-important property tax rebates.  Earlier in the year, Corzine was talking about ending the $1,000 a year rebate checks for everybody but senior citizens.  The legislature won't do it but Corzine put himself in a bind by lavish tax cuts (he advertised it as $15 billion) for the corporates.

For out of staters, NJ has a lower sales tax and a lower income tax than NY but substantially higher property taxes (usually stated to be the highest in the nation by Jersey papers).  That's because the state pays a smaller share of the bills for education. The state is pushing (or is being made to push) property tax reassessments state-wide that would transfer more of the property taxes onto homeowners while substantially benefitting businesses.  I have no idea who is behind this, but so far the towns have been unsuccessful at tranferring the blame to the county or state.  Christie makes vague statements about Corzine raising taxes (he raised the sales tax from 6% to 7%) but is AWOL on property taxes.

Republicans are usually AWOL on property taxes here. Whitman nearly lost re-election because her income tax cuts merely shoved taxes back to the property tax and shifted the burden from high income people to middle class people.  Middle class here would be considered affluent in many states but the cost of living is high.

There are other areas where Corzine has threatened but pulled back.  The state's two major roads, the Garden State Parkway and the New Jersey Turnpike, pre-date the Interstate Highway system.  They were toll roads in the 1950s when built and remain toll roads.  Corzine proposed making the non-toll interstates in Jersey toll roads.  The regressive and bothersome tax fell flat (his alternative was to raise the sales tax).

Mr. White Knight Christie is corrupt as all get out.  He was supposed to be fired as US Attorney but unlike those who got the ax agreed to prosecute only Democrats.  Those prosecutions are more than the centerpiece of his campaign.  They are all he has except that "Corzine raised taxes."  He has no-bid contracts.  He pulled strings and lots of them to see that his brother, a crooked Wall Street trader, was not indicted.  The fourteen people surrounding bro on the corporate food chain were all indicted.  Christie is a bigot.  Nearly all the Democrats he went after post-Rove were black and hispanic.  He got his job solely because of his work as a bundler for the Bush campaign.

Daggett certainly has room to really eat into Christie's vote,  He's not pompous or corrupt and he's not Corzine.  One more thing, Republicans here love to complain in the most grade school manner.  I suspect they get the nicknames from talk radio.  McGreevy became McGreedy in a heartbeat.  Corzine is Corslime on bumperstickers, blogs, and letters to the editor. They dominate what passes for political discussion but it convinces very few people.  I wonder if that has anything to do with the phenomena of polls overstating Republican strength.  Maybe a few people are reluctant to tell the pollster they are voting Democratic?

I've lived in NJ, PA, IL, MA, NY and FL but only Jersey has this low-level nastiness to such an extent and it has gotten worse.  

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by: David Kowalski @ Fri Aug 28, 2009 at 07:39:48 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Excellent summary

Corzine was indeed more popular as a Senator, and he may have done better to stay there. But he wanted the governorship.

To add to the summary, part of the reason why property tax bills in New Jersey are so high is because the state has long focused state school and municipal aid on the state's poorest and most urban districts. The property tax plan that both of Christie's conservative primary rivals were pushing basically came down to distributing school and municipal aid to school districts and municipalities on a per-pupil/person basis. Cities would see their share of aid drop, suburbs and exurbs would see their share of aid go up considerably. The idea is that with more state money, municipalities wouldn't have to tax so much, and property taxes would finally go down.  Of course this would never fly, thanks to a Democratic legislature that loves pouring money into urban districts without keeping track of it and political machines at every level of government. Still, it'd be worth a shot.

Christie's inability to talk about the issues is what really frustrates me. He wants to get as much of the anti-Corzine vote as he possibly can without alienating anyone, I suppose. Hence the ludicrous non-specificity.  As the Star-Ledger's resident conservative columnist, Paul Mulshine, noted today, Christie said he would be releasing his property tax plan soon -- six months ago, during primary season!  He still hasn't. Four years ago, Corzine and Forrester made their property tax plans the cornerstornes of their campaigns.  This year, it's all about petty ethics attacks and never about the endless taxes, fiscal waste, and failed policies coming out of Trenton.

For the record, Corzine has hiked not only the sales tax but also the income tax. Realty transfer taxes, cigarette taxes, car rental taxes, "health taxes," and business taxes have all gone up as well since the Democrats took over in Trenton in 2002. I'm not out to criticize the Democratic Party here -- just the New Jersey Democratic Party.

And regarding Corzine's toll hike plan:  Yes, a public outcry and outrage by the legislature silenced Corzine's proposals a while back. But just last fall Corzine circumvented the legislature and hiked tolls on the Garden State Parkway, NJ Turnpike, and Atlantic City Expressway by going directly to those roads' toll authorities to get approval for the hikes. Seemingly unbelievable, until you actually drive on those roads and realize you're paying more.

I've said it many times, and I'll say it again. I know Christie's an awful alternative. But Corzine has been such a terrible governor, I cannot with good conscience vote for him this November. I'm for Daggett.

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by: NJCentrist @ Sun Aug 30, 2009 at 19:43:41 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

This one's going down to the wire,

but, all the same, it seems like God just likes to toy with Jersey Republicans.

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by: SC @ Fri Aug 28, 2009 at 01:28:42 AM UTC