While most of the rest of the media, local and national, have so far been unwilling to mess with the accepted narrative, the folks at Talking Points Memo at least are acknowledging what’s been obvious on the ground for quite some time: Sen. Patty Murray just ain’t all that vulnerable.
While the political earth shifts around her, Sen. Patty Murray appears to have grounded herself in Washington state. While the national press largely passes her race by, Murray — who at the start of the summer was, according to conventional wisdom, a Vulnerable Democrat — appears to have built the momentum she needs to comfortably compete for a third term.
[…] If Murray was the Vulnerable Democrat in the original Washington state narrative, Rossi was (in the view of most Republican establishment figures) the ideal Formidable Opponent to defeat her. But as election season has proceeded, that storyline has proven to be more and more far-fetched. Murray, quite simply, is winning while Rossi is losing. And it’s been that way for awhile.
TPM goes on to graph the polling averages, emphasizing that the polls have been trending in Murray’s favor for quite some time. And while it’s still close, yeah, filter out that clearly bogus SurveyUSA outlier, and not quite so much.
So what’s to blame for Rossi’s lackluster performance at the polls? Well, one factor might be his lackluster performance on the campaign trail. Indeed, to say that his campaign is in disarray would imply a level of energy and passion, even negative, that Rossi has never been able to muster this cycle.
To paraphrase Clint Didier (the quote escapes me at the moment) before voters get excited about Rossi, Rossi is going to have to get excited about Rossi. And so far, we just haven’t seen that happen.
Rossi’s big problem is that he doesn’t really want to be senator. He wants to be governor, but that’s not gonna happen either, so he may as well rake in the campaign cash..
To reiterate, my prediction is Murray by 11%.
Which would mean that Joel Connelly was right in saying that this could be our closest Senate race since Cantwell-Gorton in 2000. That’s a very easy prediction to make, seeing as the narrow
ester margin since then was Patty’s 12.2% margin over Nethercutt in 2004.Didn’t Goldy predict this?
BTW, Republicans here are ALWAYS convinced that they have a Formidable Opponent to put up. They thought John Calrson was. They thought Mike! McGavick was. Heck, they even thought Ellen Craswell was!
But if Rossi loses again statewide and by 10+ points, he’s finished.
Jesus Christ. WEA endorsed Reichert once again. WTF is wrong with you teachers? Are you suffering from beaten dog syndrome or something? Or didn’t you do your homework? This just doesn’t make any sense what-so-ever except in the most myopic of ways.
Patty “NAFTA” Murray is toast; the base is not going to turn out in huge numbers, thanks to the ineptitude of false promises and compromise over fear that someone on wall street might feel upset.
6 tpn
Oh, tpn, you certainly are good for a lugh. And on what do you base this timeless wisdom? Certainly not the “likely voter” polls that show Patty up by 9.
Oh, and Democrats PASSED the Wall Street reform bill that Republicans hate. Were you not paying attention? I think Democrats are pretty happy about that.
And holy cow, NAFTA? DId you just wake up from 1992?
BTW, the GOP is about to roll out their “Pledge to America” as a campaign gimmick. Here’s a quick rundown:
Permanently extend the Bush tax cuts (all of them), or, as Republicans put it, a promise not to raise taxes on January 1, 2011 (the day the Bush tax cuts expire).
– Repeal and replace health care reform (increase the deficit and take away benefits such as the bans on lifetime and annual benefit limits, free preventive care, no extra charges for out-of-network emergency care, and consumer protection such as barring insurers from canceling policies retroactively when you get very sick and runs up high bills. These all kick in tomorrow 9/23)
That should be real popular.
– End the stimulus program
Kill jobs.
– A cap on discretionary spending
Kill jobs, and don’t touch my $700 billion “defense” budget.
– Phase out Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac
What does thiseven mean–privatize them? What’s that supposed to do? They weren’t to blame for the crisis. How about if we “phase out” Phil Gramm?
– Permanently end the TARP program
This is their program, and it ends next month anyway (Geithner annnounced it today), and $640 billion of the $700 billion in loans are expected to be repaid. Do they even know these things? Do they expect us not to?
– Keep Guantanamo open
It kinda is. But it’s not their call, is it?
– New sanctions on Iran and more money for missile defense
Because THAT’S the big problem we face, other nations shooting missiles all over the place. Their heads are still buried up Reagan’s ass, and they wouldn’t know how to respond to a terrorist threat if one crawled up onto the beach. I think that 9/11/2001 showed us that.
– Require every bill to be available online for three days before it is voted on.
Whatever. They didn’t do it when they were in power before, why would we expect them to now?
– Require every bill to be certified as constitutional before it is voted on
And that is so very meaningful. Surely no court would ever rule against legislative “certification.” It’s such bullshit, and does ANYONE think that they won’t just declare whatever batshit-crazy idea they have to be “constitutional?” I prefer to courts to rule, thank you very much Mr. Boner.
It’s just such a grab bag of empty promises and election slogans, and as always, no concrete cuts to ANYTHING.
Mis-formatted and then overlooked in that last post:
– Permanently extend the Bush tax cuts (all of them), or, as Republicans put it, a promise not to raise taxes on January 1, 2011 (the day the Bush tax cuts expire).
It was the Republican plan to expire that tax cuts so that they could hide the enormous hole they would blow in our tax revenue stream. In other words, INCREASE THE DEFICIT. Which they claim they don’t want to do. Unless you’re threatening to allow their original plan to resume the 1993-2002 levels for a small percentage increase on marginal income over $250K for only the richest 2% of all Americans, because then increasing the deficit by $700 billion over ten years is OK.
I posted on Seattlepi.com today, re: Dino Rossi
Repost here.
DaddyLove @ 8: (Quoting Republican Agenda):
My God, if there were ever a statement the Republicans made which made it clear that they didn’t understand ANYTHING about the Constitution, this is it.
There are three branches of government, and legislation requires two of them (legislative and executive) before it can go into law. As Chief Justice John Marshall explained in Jay vs. Madison, both of them arguably have already, in effect, certified the Consitutionality of the law. The Congressmen and the President all took oaths to uphold the Constitution, and a majority of both houses passed the bill and the President signed it. Other than the courts, what other administrator/agency/politician should have the power to effectively veto the legislation by withholding “certification”????? Are they proposing to create a fourth branch of government?????
And if they are thinking about having the U.S. Supreme Court “certify” the law as Constitutional before it goes into effect, think again. The jurisdiction of the U.S. Supreme Court is defined by the Constution, which limits it to “cases and controversies”. It has repeatedly held over 200+ years of decisions that it CANNOT issue an “advisory opinion”. Litigants have to come before the court with a real controversey, and a showing of a real impact upon them specifically (as opposed to being a taxpayer or a citizen or resident in general) before the court will even hear their arguments.
This isn’t some obscure premise of Constitutional Law, it’s basic to any understanding of the judicial branch of the government. I learned it in some detail as a sophomore in college. You would think that a politician who is complaining about the potential unconstitutionality of laws would at least possess this minimual level of understanding of our U.S. Constitution.
So in conclusion, the Republican plan for upholding the U.S. Constitution is to violate the U.S. Constitution, ignoring it’s plain meaning by (a) setting up some official in a fourth branch of government which is superior to the other three, or (b) expecting the U.S. Supreme Court to ignore the plain language of the Constitution which limits it’s own jurisdiction.
This, surely, deserves a prize of some sort.
I’m pretty sure the press has printed the same thing about every single one of her races. Murray’s seat is safe.
Clarification: Justice John Marshall’s description of the President’s and Congress’ oaths as placing upon them the power/duty to pass upon the Constitutionality of a measure is dicta, addressing the arguments of one side to the dispute. The ultimate holding in the case said that the judicial branch had the final say on whether or not a law was constitutional.
8 and 11
This certification of constitutionality proposal would be laughable if it didn’t disclose just how incompetent a whole bunch of people with real power really are. Anyone in Congress who votes for legislation he or she believes to be unconstitutional has no business being in Congress. These folks are certifiable.
I called it at 12-15% Murray and the cyniklown popped another synapse (how many can he have LEFT???)…
Add the Dino-Sore to the political scrap heap.
Sherrif Joe’s got problems.
16
Ah, what’s $50M given all the good Sheriff Joe has done for the fine people of Maricopa County?
@16, My bad….wrong thread.
$450,000 for a bus to transport prisoners? And it’s sitting unused in a backlot?
More from Nate Silver on Patty Murray:
Hey, FYI… Mary Lane Strow is back to her old tricks again.
http://blog.seattlepi.com/seat.....222267.asp
It’s Marummy Time! Every Rossifarian – as you call us Goldy – is back to work. The SecDefWA, recently hospitalized for morning sickness, is a force of nature who got a call from a former wingman warning that Rossi2010 was about to fail this morning. But no, she said it was “recoverable” and returned to The Force 90 minutes later.
Goldy, we’re back. We’re ready. We’re rockin’… the Rossifarians are going to cross the Aurora Bridge very, very soon!!
ya’ll be zombies…mindlessly voting for the dullest bulb on the shelf. Patty is such a waste of a senate seat
You halfwits probably think murray is pretty bright. Worthless drone libtards suck.
Correction: I posted # 11 @ 13 rather quickly, before dashing off to an extended business dinner. Getting home around midnight, just as I was climbing into bed, I realized that I said Jay vs. Madison, but the correct reference is Marbury vs. Madison (1803).
Sharruff Hairspray. I suppose he is what wingnuts look up to in admiration for his brilliance?
And Dino the perpetual candidate. I bet you wingnuts look to him for the quality of his ethics and honesty.
# 24, 25: You would think the Republicans would have quite a few competent candidates in the wings, available to run for office at the appropriate opportunity, wouldn’t you?
Oh, I forgot. When they did their jobs responsibly while in public service, they fired them for not performing their jobs in a sufficiently partison manner (i.e., John McKay, etc.).
And when they do run for office, the Tea Party wingnuts run them over at the primary level (Connecticut, Nevada, Alaska, etc.).
You mean Dick Morris was wrong? OMG.
SEATTLE – Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., told a group of high-school students in her state that the U.S. should adopt Osama bin Laden’s nation-building tactics.
“We’ve got to ask, why is this man so popular around the world?” said Murray, according to the Vancouver Columbian newspaper. “Why are people so supportive of him in many countries that are riddled with poverty?”
Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash.
The second-term senator, who faces re-election in 2004, was responding to questions from world history students and student government leaders at Columbia River High School in Vancouver, Wash., on Wednesday.
Murray said, according to the Vancouver paper, that bin Laden has been “out in these countries for decades, building schools, building roads, building infrastructure, building day care facilities, building health care facilities, and the people are extremely grateful.
How’s Patty feeling know?