Carney's 2-to-1 lead

Chris Carney put out a press release yesterday trumpeting the results of a recent Momentum Analysis poll.

The Momentum Analysis poll showed Carney with a dominant 2-to-1 lead over Hackett (54% to 27%)

Said campaign manger Vince Rongione, "These polls confirm what we already know. Congressman Carney has very strong support across party lines and across the district. We will continue to fight for every vote and focus on the issues that really matter, but it is very encouraging to see that our positive message is connecting with voters in every corner of Northeast and Central Pennsylvania."

The Momentum Analysis poll, however, stands in stark contrast with the Survey USA Poll that announced a statistical dead heat between the Carney and Hackett.

Several things to note about this Momentum Analysis poll:

1. The polling data that Chris Carney is using to demonstrate his 2-to-1 lead over Chris Hackett comes from Momentum Analysis which is a self-identified liberal-leaning
   organization. According to its own mission statement, Momentum Analysis helps "forward Democratic and progressive causes."
2. Margie Omero, who serves at the President of Momentum, worked for Chris Carney in 2006 campaign to unseat Don Sherwood.
3. The Momentum Analysis survey is less statistically sound than the Survey USA poll. The sample size in the Momentum Analysis poll is only two-thirds of what the Survey USA poll was and a much larger margin of error.
4. While this poll may not be credible on its own, the latest poll from Momentum Analysis could serve as a comparison to a poll they took of the district in January. These two snapshots demonstrate that Carney's disapproval rating has increased, his approval rating has decreased, and the race has tightened.
   
• In January, Carney had a 58% approval rating (12% disapproval rating) with a 55% to 21% lead over Chris Hackett.
• Now in August, Carney received a 53% approval rating (18% disapproval rating) with a 54% to 27% lead over Chris Hackett.

On the whole, it's very difficult to compare these two polls. Obviously, reasons #1, #2, and #3 above tend to render the Momentum Analysis less accurate. As Hackett campaign manger Mark Harris stated, "Carney can make up any numbers he wants. The independent polling is far more credible."

In addition, Survey USA has a strong reputation for it's accuracy:

"SurveyUSA, which pioneered these polls, has an impressive record for accuracy. The company ranks second among more than 30 pollsters rated by Mr. Silver. Its own report card shows it ranking at or near the top in predictive power for recent national election cycles."

If I were a betting man, I would wager the situation in the 10th District currently looks more like the Survey USA poll (Carney 49%- Hackett 45% ) than the Momentum Analysis poll posits.

Hackett's Day

Yesterday, Chris Hackett received some statistical support and some closure from his rough primary fight with Dan Meuser.

The first poll out of the 10th District shows a statistical dead heat between Chris Carney and Hackett.

The poll from Survey USA conducted for Roll Call magazine sampled 623 likely voters and found that Carney (49%) lead Hackett (45%) by only 4%--within the margin of error (4%).

Breaking down the results further:

CARNEY
Favorable -- 40%
Unfavorable -- 23%
Neutral --30%
No Opinion -- 7%

HACKETT
Favorable -- 36%
Unfavorable -- 23%
Neutral -- 31%
No Opinion -- 10%

Also from the survey, the most important issue to voters in the district was the economy (40%) with gasoline coming in a distant second (14%).

The survey did analyze the gasoline issue further. Most believe the oil companies are to blame (40%) followed by Congress (13%) and foreign governments (11%). Furthermore, the sampled voters stated alternative sources of energy (54%) provide the best answer to solve the problem with offshore drilling receiving 36% .

Obviously, this is a big liability for Chris Hackett. Carney has been trying very hard to tie Hackett to the big oil companies. Either through Hackett's personal investments in the sector or his energy policies which are perceived to benefit the bottom line of oil companies, the Carney camp has been pushing the issue into the laps of voters.

On the other hand, the fact that voters blame Congress more than the President could be a sign that voters are impressionable to the idea that some blame can be laid at the feet of Carney.

Overall, the Hackett camp interpreted the poll to mean that they were neutralizing Carney's incumbency advantage and closing in.

Said campaign manger Mark Harris, "We’re very pleased. After more than a month of TV ads trying to promote his paper-thin record in Congress, Chris Carney is still being rejected by voters. We fully expect Carney and his liberal Washington allies to ramp up their negative message now."

One other noticeable problem for Hackett is the fact that he only received a 52% favorable rating from Republicans in the district. Most of this, I would hypothesize, still stems from the Meuser-Hackett primary feud.

However, Dan Meuser did voice his support for Hackett yesterday by offering a formal endorsement. Meuser said, "I will always support good Republicans for office. In a choice between Chris Carney and a conservative Republican, I will always choose the conservative Republican."

It will be interesting to see whether Meuser actively campaigns for Hackett in the coming months. Encouraging his supporters to get involved for Hackett would be a good first step in demonstrating the unity between the two and driving up Hackett's favorability among Republicans.

Tour De 10th District

You have to hand it to Chris Hackett for being creative with his new campaign tour of the 10th District. Either that or the cost of gasoline is beginning to affect the Hackett campaign's bottom line.

Apparently, Hackett is an avid cyclist and decided to work it into his quest for Congress. He and his wife Ramah--at points on separate bikes and at others on a tandem Trek bike--will be looking to speak with voters in all thirteen counties.

Hackett is planning to hit 20 stops on the tour and kicked it off yesterday by visiting Tick Tocks in Honesdale where he had lunch with local officials.

It seems point along the journey are evening sparking further discussion in the debate between he and Chris Carney. From the Times Leader:

Riding west on Route 6 between Honesdale and Carbondale, Hackett passes within a mile of the Waymart Wind Farm, a rare symbol of agreement between the GOP challenger and his Democrat opponent.

Be sure to catch Chris Hackett's Cervelo tour when it comes to an area near you:

• Today: Forest City, Montrose and Tunkhannock

• Wednesday: Wyalusing, Towanda and Sayre

• Thursday: Dushore, Forksville, Kreamer, Selinsgrove and Williamsport

• Friday: Danville, Shamokin and Sunbury

Debate Analysis

This whole blowup between the Hackett and Carney camps over the debate schedule is relatively fascinating.

It seemed pretty obvious from the beginning that Carney wasn't into debating Hackett. Even early last month after Hackett proposed his format for eight debates, the October 30th debate was already scheduled and the Carney campaign seemed lukewarm at best towards the notion of entertaining more debates. Carney spokeswoman Rebbecca Gale even addressed Hackett like a little child saying, "If he’d behave himself, perhaps we’d discuss more debates."

Then, the Hackett campaign essentially tried to smoke Carney out from hiding. They seemed to believe calling him a liberal debate dodger enough times would force Carney above ground. While that did keep the debate issue simmering, I'm sure at the end of the day there wasn't enough of an incentive for Carney to accommodate the added political risk.

There should be more debates between these two candidates, but I think at the end of the day the reason we are not seeing more between the two candidates is because the debate schedule became a campaign issue rather than a scheduling formality.

After the initial challenge to eight debates, Hackett began beating this issue like a drum (see here, here, and here). It seemed to be one area where the Hackett campaign thought they got some traction. There was even a big campaign point made about Carney possibly agreeing to a second debate and a sense of vindication emerged which drove the issue further into political territory.

It could be a matter of micro-analyzing the situation, but allowing Hackett to have more debates could have been viewed in the Carney camp as handing him an early political victory (not to mention the needed publicity it could have given Hackett). Yesterday's reaction by Mark Harris essentially proved how important the issue was to the campaign.

One thing that is for certain, we haven't heard the last from the Hackett campaign regarding Chris Carney's failure to defend his record in public debates.

One Debate

It looks like the debate schedule for the 10th District has finally been ironed out with an unfortunate outcome for the Chris Hackett campaign.

You'll remember that Hackett challenged Chris Carney to eight debates, but the Times Leader announced this afternoon that Carney and Hackett will face off in only one debate.

The one-hour debate will occur one week before the general election and be simulcast on WVIA-TV and Pennsylvania Cable News Network.

Hackett campaign manger Mark Harris responded by saying, "Chris Carney obviously thinks he’s a Washington big shot now. First he abandoned his promise to represent Pennsylvania values by voting with Nancy Pelosi and the liberals 90 percent of the time. Now he refuses to even show enough respect for voters to defend his record in open and honest debates. Carney is a sorry excuse for a congressman, trying to win an election behind negative attacks instead of debates."

Chris Hackett might spend more time speaking at the Republican National Convention than he will in his debate with Chris Carney.

Video Overload

Chris Carney will be receiving some TV competition as Chris Hackett introduced his first two ads of the general election cycle. Both Carney and Hackett unveiled two new spots which will be up and running soon.

While Carney has an $880,000 cash advantage, the NRCC helped Hackett purchase time for the spot which marked their first congressional ad involvement in Pennsylvania.

All the ads essentially cover the same territory: oil prices, energy solutions, ending corporate handouts, etc. Hackett's "Plan" ad is slightly different and seeks to emphasize his Declaration of Principles that he published earlier in the year.

For your viewing pleasure (in alphabetical order):

Chris Carney -- "Made In America"



Chris Carney -- "Oil Shock"



Chris Hackett -- "New Direction"



Chris Hackett -- "Plan"



In addition to Hackett's ads, the campaign also put out a press release calling into question the accuracy of Carney's ads by claiming two Carneys exist: a "Campaign Carney" and a "Washington Carney".

The Carney campaign tried to throw the hypocrite label at Hackett as campaign spokesman Vince Rongione said, "Our opponent always says one thing and does another. Displaying an almost pathological inability to tell the truth. He runs against Washington insiders and then has them fund his TV advertising."

A Master Triangulator

The Wall Street Journal had an article in today's paper discussing the abandonment Chris Carney is experiencing from his own party as the liberal Democrats seek to turn their back on him.

As the piece points out, liberal Democrats were able to stomach Carney in 2006 for a couple reasons. First, the most important priority for the Democrats was regaining the majority in Congress. Therefore, the liberals saw Carney as an advancement towards that end. Second, several argue that Carney disguised his commitment to progressive ideas when he ran for office. In order to win the election, Carney would appear as a moderate in order to provide an acceptable alternative to Sherwood. However, after getting into Congress, Carney has moved away from those liberal groups whose support he relied upon in 2006.

2008 is a much different year for Democrats because they are likely to increase their majority which enables them to eliminate--or at least threaten to eliminate--some of those moderate Democrats now viewed as turncoats.

While not endorsing Hackett, Glenn Greenwald told the WSJ, "Our goal is to attach a real price to the type of things Chris Carney is doing. If that means he ends up losing, then so be it. I would rather see a smaller majority but fewer Blue Dogs than a big majority with the Blue Dogs in charge."

These liberal groups have been voicing their disdain for Carney over the past year and have targeted him with TV and print ads. However, it is likely they will intensify this campaign.
Blue America alone is expected to spend $100,000 on Carney during the months in September and October. In addition, a recent "Moneybomb" aimed at Carney from the Accountability Now PAC was able to raise $150,000 in 24-hours. Not necessarily the $1 million the group had in mind, but still admirable given the scope of the target.

Ironically, Carney has not had the fortune of being too conservative for the likes of his opponent, Chris Hackett. Hackett has continually invoked the word liberal when referring to Carney and grouped him in with the Pelosi Democrats. The last three press releases alone from the Hackett camp have included the word "Liberal" and "Carney" in the release's title. This has obviously been a significant part of the Hackett campaign's message.

Two completely different strategies for attacking Carney.

Eroding Base

Good article from the Associated Press this morning regarding the Republicans and their fight to hold rural voters in November.

It seems rather obvious to many observers that Republicans will carry these voters in the upcoming election, but tough economic times over the last four years combined with a declining standard of living in some of these rural parts have caused pundits to question how strong that support will be this election season.

The article makes note of the fact that Bush won 60% of rural voters in the last election cycle. While early polling this election still highlights a McCain lead in rural voters, the margin has tightened. Obviously in such a close election, Republicans can't bleed votes in this bedrock category.

Certainly, the economy will be a powerful issue this fall, but it won't exist in a vacuum for most voters. Other social issues could help to stabilize this demographic. Yet, even if Obama is able to make inroads with this group (as he's already started a "Barns for Obama" campaign in Ohio), it may not necessarily motivate people to vote for him. Rather, it could just cause rural voters to stay home which would equally erode McCain's projected base.

Nationally, the importance of connecting with rural voters is significant because in battleground states across the country they represent anywhere from 10% to 20% of the electorate. Reaching out to these voters needs to become an important component of McCain's strategy if he's going to have success.

That's a point Terry Madonna also concedes: "McCain will have problems getting a high turnout among those voters unless he finds some way to identify with them, some way to make them think that, A, he’s not connected to Bush, and B, his economic plan is superior to Obama’s."

Obama Uses Carney Tactic

Barack Obama took a page out of Chris Carney's political play book by announcing his own "Republicans for Obama."

The group emerged yesterday and sought to emphasize Obama's "bipartisan appeal." Most of these supporters have already endorsed Obama publicly, but by rounding up all the Obamaicans into one group with some marketable apparel, the campaign hopes to attract disenchanted Republicans.

Former Congressman Jim Leach and former Senator Lincoln Chaffee along with a former GOP fundraiser who endorsed John Kerry in '04, Rita Hauser, led the way on the announcement of the new group.

The biggest news concerning the group was that Chuck Hagel has not joined the group and was not part of the opening ceremony. There is no word yet on who Hagel plans to endorse let alone whether he plans to join the Republicans for Obama.

The move by Obama seeks to neutralize McCain's campaign for the center and recent ad which sought to contrast the previous words of praise from Democratic bigwigs (Kerry, Biden, Obama) with their current reversals.

Barletta's First Television Ad

Lou Barletta paid for his first television time of the campaign season and will begin airing his new campaign ad today.



The ad is essentially the same piece that was put out in his first internet ad almost two months ago. However, the TV version is chopped down to 30 seconds with the tag line "I'm Lou Barletta and I approved this message" added to the end.

Barletta spent close to $50,000 to have the commercial aired 174 times on the four local networks: WNEP, WYOU, WBRE, & WOLF. Rep. Paul Kanjorski has already been up on television with a variety of spots.

Also up on Barletta's YouTube site was another just released Internet ad in which Barletta responds to Kanjorski's negative attacks and repeats his call for a change of leadership.

The brand-new Pindell Report from Politicker.com called the race a "Toss-Up" and ranked it at the seventh most competitive race in the country. Ed Mitchell from the Kanjorski camp denied the report was of an significance and claimed, "We’ve got Barletta on the run and that will be more evident in the next few days."

Other well regarded Pennsylvania pundits like Terry Madonna have resisted the urge to call the Barletta-Kanjorski campaign a "Toss-Up" due to Kanjorski's long record in the district.