We're going to do a final PA-12 poll over the weekend.
There are a lot of reasons, from our last poll of the district, why Republicans should win this race:
1) Barack Obama's approval rating there is just 33%
2) The district has a very low minority population and nonwhite voters have been sticking with the Democratic Party to a much greater extent than white voters over the last year.
3) Only 24% of voters there have a favorable opinion of Nancy Pelosi.
4) Republican voters in the district are more excited about voting than the Democrats.
But there's also one big reason why the Democrats may just pull it out- and why Republicans may not have as big an election year as we're anticipating. And that's because only 26% of voters in the district have a favorable opinion of Congressional Republicans, with 56% seeing them unfavorably. Voters there aren't real happy with the Democrats, but the Republican Party hasn't provided much of an alternative either and that's going to make Tuesday night very interesting.
We plan to have our final PA-12 poll results out late Sunday night.
The democrats should win. They have a huge enrollment advantage.
ReplyDeletePeople are voting for Republicans, not because they like Republicans, but because they want to vote against Democrats. Republicans are as unpopular as ever and they're still doing this well. So I don't think you can bank on their unpopularity.
ReplyDeleteIf they elect Tim Burns they're not voting for congressional Republicans. They're voting to change congressional Republicans into what they want them to be. I'm sure if you polled the public's desire to vote for congressional Republicans vs. new fresh Republicans the latter would score 10 points higher.
DBL, you're probably right about that last point.
ReplyDeleteKevin, a lot of places, including NC, have Democratic registration advantages, even significant ones, but are still red states/districts. The Democrats are not as liberal as elsewhere and often vote Republican in federal races. McCain won PA-12 in 2008, and Murtha was a pretty moderate Dem.
More voters in PA12 approve of Congressional Republicans than approve of Nancy Pelosi.
ReplyDeleteDemocratic registration advantages mean little when the national party is far to the left of the party's voters.
Who would Critz vote for, for Speaker of the House?
ReplyDeleteIs there some popular Democrat that Democratic challengers could run on voting for them as speaker? I can't think of any. I think if the Republicans ran on Ryan as speaker, they'd do better than Boehner.
ReplyDeleteWT, good point. Part of Oliverio's appeal in West Virginia may have been his statement that "if elected, he would hope to support someone other than Nancy Pelosi for speaker of the House." (Politico) In his own words, Oliverio said: "Hopefully, there will be a better candidate than Nancy Pelosi."
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