In the end

While Portman and Kasich are certainly credible candidates taht are probably going to keep it close, they are both so Wall Street corporate -- and Ohio isn't the best place for that right now!

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by: IndianaProgressive @ Wed Jun 30, 2010 at 17:41:39 PM UTC

Plus

Portman was President Bush's budget director and trade representative. So it should be easy to link him with the unpopular Bush policies as well as hit for being a Washington insider.

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by: AC4508 @ Wed Jun 30, 2010 at 18:20:42 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

On top of getting to say all of that

in Ohio of all places.  I personally have this at a slight lean Dem seat because of those reasons.

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by: Andrew @ Wed Jun 30, 2010 at 19:09:59 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Finally, a post on campaigns...

Got pretty tired of seeing that "DKos alleges R2k fraud" thing.

Indepedent/Lean D. Dude.
All 5s (now TX-5; frmly VA-5 and CA-5)  

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by: Shinigami @ Wed Jun 30, 2010 at 18:15:06 PM UTC

One of the Senate races that I feel pretty good about it

We got really lucky that Republicans chose Portman. Although his financial edge could cause problems, he's going to be easily tagged to the Bush administration and the free trade policies of corporate America, which do not obviously fit much with swing parts of Ohio. In general, the extreme views and/or lack of great fit (in terms of matching the ideology of their states) candidates among the Republican nominees could really save us in November, particularly on the offensive side with Burr, Portman, Blunt, Paul, Rubio, and possibly even Grassley. If Fischer runs the race in a strong manner, he could easily beat Portman similarly to how Critz won over Burns. I imagine Bill Clinton would once again be of great assistance.

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by: Progressive America @ Wed Jun 30, 2010 at 18:26:33 PM UTC

Grassley's likely vote for financial reform

probably guarantees his reelection.

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by: NewMex9999 @ Wed Jun 30, 2010 at 18:45:15 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Is that vote likely at this point?

Do you have a link?

"I'm not a member of any organized political party, I'm a Democrat!"
--  Will Rogers  

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by: Pan @ Wed Jun 30, 2010 at 19:00:35 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

He was one of four Repubs

to vote for the Senate bill (with Snowe, Collins, and Brown).  The expectation is that he will vote for the conference report as well.

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by: NewMex9999 @ Wed Jun 30, 2010 at 19:09:05 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

I'm sure all he needed and wanted was cover from the same 3 GOP colleagues......

None of these GOPers wants to be on an island as the lone Republican allowing a Democratic bill to pass, drawing the full wrath of teabagger rage.

As long as the Maine twins and Brown vote yes, I'm sure so will Grassley.

I do think he sincerely wants strong Wall Street reform, and I bet he privately would support even a more liberal bill if only he could get some fellow Republicans to vote yes.  

43, male, Indian-American, Democrat, VA-10

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by: DCCyclone @ Wed Jun 30, 2010 at 19:14:20 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Didn't he vote to filibuster the bill

and then vote for it? I would NOT count on his vote.

"I'm not a member of any organized political party, I'm a Democrat!"
--  Will Rogers  

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by: Pan @ Wed Jun 30, 2010 at 19:51:33 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Fisher seems to be in a good position for now

The race will probably break on whether Portman can maintain his lead with independents though.

"Fisher and Portman are each getting 69% of their party's vote, and Portman has a 40-25 lead with independents. One thing striking in the numbers is the level of voter indecision. 22% are undecided and they don't know their candidates particularly well yet. 45% don't know enough about Fisher to have formed an opinion and 53% say the same when it comes to Portman."

If Portman maintains a similar or even slightly diminished lead as the other 50% of independents get to know him, he'll win. With his huge war chest, there's a very distinct possibility of that. Definitely going to be one of the closest races of the cycle.

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by: MIJunkie @ Wed Jun 30, 2010 at 19:23:08 PM UTC

They'll get to know Portman alright

as the outsourcer-in-chief to George W Bush who helped ship their good Ohio jobs overseas.

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by: NewMex9999 @ Wed Jun 30, 2010 at 20:06:55 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Ohio

you just gotta love it.  Always an electoral hotbed.  

Again I'm just going to reiterate what I've thought all along, that Portman-Fisher is a total tossup and that Kasich-Strickland is somewhere between tossup tilt democrat and lean democrat.  At this point despite what the numbers say, the fact that Strickland is a superior and more charismatic campaigner to Fisher, and the fact that Portman has an abundance of cash are the factors that in my mind make the senate race a better opportunity for Team Red.  

I keep hammering this point too.  These races will mirror each other in the vote.  Portman may run slightly ahead of Kasich because of money, but in all honesty, they are pretty much the exact same candidate, and so are Strickland and Fisher.  Not only that, but the democratic and republican bases in Ohio are both ideologically and geographically difficult to crack.  I would be stunned, shocked, if there wasn't 95% straight ticket voting in these two races.  If Strickland wins by more than 5%, Fisher's going to win too, and if Strickland loses outright, it's going to be virtually impossible for Fisher to win.

23, Male, Democrat, OH-13

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by: StephenCLE @ Wed Jun 30, 2010 at 19:46:59 PM UTC

Strickland in from Southeast Ohio

So he can definitely make a crack along the working class voters in that area.  

for more election analysis, visit  http://frogandturtle.blogspot....

17, CA-06,  

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by: Alibguy @ Wed Jun 30, 2010 at 20:00:14 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Isn't Strickland more socially conservative

than Fisher, who seems like a establishment Northeast Ohio liberal.

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by: NewMex9999 @ Wed Jun 30, 2010 at 20:05:03 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

The only real issue I can think of

where the two were somewhat divided was on casino gambling (Ohio Issue 3).  Strickland was against it, Fisher didn't really take sides on the issue that I can remember.  I guess if you really push the issues, maybe Fisher isn't quite as adverse to stuff like social unions/gay marriage as Strickland would be.    

If moral/social issues are heavily brought up in both campaigns, I suppose Strickland may do slightly better in southeast Ohio, while Fisher could pick up a few more votes in Columbus and Cincinnati, but I don't expect a huge difference.  Now had Jennifer Brunner won the primary over Lee Fisher, that would've been totally different.  She's much more liberal on social issues than Strickland, and Fisher too, so she probably would have had to try to re-create the Obama map by winning big in Columbus (her home base), and winning Cincinnati outright.

23, Male, Democrat, OH-13

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by: StephenCLE @ Wed Jun 30, 2010 at 20:41:57 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Brunner coming out in favor of gay marriage

forced Fisher to so he's already said he's for the grand-daddy of all social issues.  

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by: Andrew @ Thu Jul 01, 2010 at 00:22:47 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

How is that likely to play

with the general electorate?

"I'm not a member of any organized political party, I'm a Democrat!"
--  Will Rogers  

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by: Pan @ Thu Jul 01, 2010 at 06:06:14 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

PPP Ohio sample reasonable, which is why they are similar

PPP projects a turnout here where 2% of Obama voters don't vote in 2010 compared to a parallel group of Mccain voters.  Their horrible Pennsylvania sample was 22%, and their Wisconsin one was a ludicrous 28%.

Obviously this is completely impossible.  Ohio is not that different than pennyslvania and Wisconsin.  If anything, Ohio's Obama-2008/not-voting-2010 group should be higher than PA and WI.

The basically sane Ohio sample though is what keeps it in line with Quinnipiac (although Quinnipiac did not release numbers of Obama vs Mccain voters).

Hopefully PPP has righted itself after two outlier blunders.

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by: tommypaine @ Wed Jun 30, 2010 at 22:21:38 PM UTC

Not so sure

Look at the partisan numbers of all three polls compared to the 2008 exit poll.

OH 2008 D 39, R 31, I 30 (D+8)
OH PPP  D 44, R 38, I 18 (D+6)

Electorate is therefore 2 points more Republican.

WI 2008 D 39, R 33, I 29 (D+6)
WI PPP  D 33, R 32, I 34 (D+1)

Electorate is therefore 5 points more Republican.

PA 2008 D 44, R 37, I 18 (D+7)
PA PPP  D 50, R 42, I 8  (D+8)

Electorate is therefore 1 point more Democratic.

As I keep saying New Jersey was 6 points more Republican compared to 2008 and since things have arguably got worse nationally for Democrats since last November it seems clear to me that on this measure all three polls may actually be be a touch favorable to Democrats.

I think we just have to trust the toplines since the margin of error for these internals is so high and PPP have a great track this cycle for calling races correctly with a high degree of numerical accuracy.

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by: conspiracy @ Wed Jun 30, 2010 at 23:19:34 PM UTC

[ Parent ]