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Leading Off:
• MD-06: Ahh, wonderful. Looks like GOP Rep. Roscoe Bartlett has decided to place an emergency hotline call to Godwin:
"Not that it's not a good idea to give students loans, it certainly is a good idea to give them loans. But if you can ignore the Constitution to do something good today, tomorrow you will be ignoring the Constitution to do something bad. You could. There are more people in our, in America today of German ancestry than any other [inaudible]. The Holocaust that occurred in Germany—how in the heck could that happen? And when you start down the wrong road, it can be a very slippery slope."
Student loans: just like the Holocaust!
Senate:
• NJ-Sen: In their first New Jersey poll of likely voters, Quinnipiac finds both Dem Sen. Bob Menendez and his Republican opponent, state Sen. Joe Kyrillos, moving upward. Menendez leads 50-40, the first time he's clipped the 50% mark in Quinnipiac's polling. In mid-July (using a registered voter model), Menendez was up 47-34. Kyrillos shouldn't be too heartened by his improvement, though, since he has no apparent path to victory with Menendez where he is. And note, too, that same poll has Obama up just 51-44, which is a very pessimistic sample for Democrats.
Oh, and it looks like Kyrillos has an internal from Magellan, which has him trailing 45-41. Meh.
• Ads:
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IN-Sen: Center Forward, the Blue Dog PAC, attacks Republican Richard Mourdock over his claim that Social Security is unconstitutional. The group
told The Hotline their buy is "over half a million" bucks, but their first IE report shows an expenditure of
$250K.
• MA-Sen: Democrat Elizabeth Warren says that "the system is rigged against" small businesses and wants to "get rid of the loopholes and special breaks" that benefit big corporations.
• ME-Sen: The super PAC Maine Freedom, which has been trying to boost Democrat Cynthia Dill in an attempt to sabotage independent Angus King, all as a way to help Republican Charlie Summers, is spending another $112K for TV advertising in furtherance of this effort. That takes them to about a quarter-mil all told so far.
• ND-Sen: A new DSCC spot attacks GOP Rep. Rick Berg for being "beholden to his national political party" and says "he votes the way he does because Washington tells him what to do." Meanwhile, Berg tells the usual lies about Obamacare to tar Heidi Heitkamp, while promising "no changes" to Medicare "for those 55 and over." Think about what it means, when the big selling point of your plan is that "it won't affect you"!
• NM-Sen: Republican Heather Wilson tries a slightly different version of the typical GOP "defense" against charges they're out to eliminate entitlements, which usually involves having a candidate's mom protest that their son or daughter would never, ever do such a thing. This time, Wilson cites the Social Security survivor's benefits her family received after her father died when she was seven years old as the reason why she'll protect the program.
Wilson also has a new negative spot attacking her opponent for supporting the stimulus and allegedly voting to raise taxes (but no mention, interestingly, of healthcare). Narrator: "If you like Washington, you'll love Martin Heinrich."
• NE-Sen: Democrat Bob Kerrey says he wants to "change the rules of the Senate to force both parties to work together."
• WV-Sen: Republican John Raese's fresh out of ideas, since his latest ad is almost identical to this comically over-the-top spot from three months ago. The introductory voiceover is unmatched in ridiculousness.
Gubernatorial:
• NH-Gov: New Hampshire gubernatorial candidates just filed fundraising reports for the two-week period ending Sept. 5, just ahead of Tuesday's primary. Thanks to a $50K loan, Jackie Cilley finished up with slightly more cash on hand than her Democratic rival, Maggie Hassan, $45K to $34K. Hassan's spent almost a million on the race while Cilley's spent about $270K. Meanwhile, on the GOP side, Ovide Lamontagne has half a million in the bank, more than 10 times the warchest of his only opponent, Kevin Smith.
• Ads:
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IN-Gov: Democrat John Gregg compares "two kinds of public servants": Brian, the hard-working preacher at his church who gets paid "next to nothing," and GOP Rep. Mike Pence, who earns $174,000 a year but allegedly "missed 86% of his committee votes."
• MT-Gov: A campy-sounding announcer attacks Democrat Steve Bullock as the tool of "extreme environmentalists" in this new RGA ad.
• WA-Gov: Republican Rob McKenna promises to create jobs and fund education.
House:
• CT-05: Hrm. The GOP is pushing back against a recent DCCC poll which found Democrat Elizabeth Esty leading Republican Andrew Roraback 44-35. Roraback and the NRCC are touting their own internal, from National Research, which shows almost the exact opposite: Roraback up 42-35. If you're going to believe those numbers, though, you have to believe that Obama has experienced a huge collapse in the 5th District: According to this survey, he leads Romney 50-46, but he beat John McCain 56-42 back in 2008. (However, most state-level polling of Connecticut has shown Obama doing worse there than he did four years ago.)
• GA-12: After a recount which failed to change the certified vote tally by a single vote, state Rep. Lee Anderson has been confirmed as the GOP runoff winner over businessman Rick Allen. Allen won't be pursuing any further challenges; in a statement, he congratulated Anderson on his victory. But Dem Rep. John Barrow has to be happy that this contest went into overtime, even if only for an extra two weeks.
• MI-11: I was so enraptured by Bill Clinton's speech at the DNC on Wednesday night that, remarkably, I managed to forget there was a weird little special election going on! (But seriously, who holds an election on a Wednesday?) Anyhow, on Nov. 6, voters will pick a replacement for Thad McCotter not just for the next Congress, but for the final two months of this Congress as well. That required a special primary, but the results were pretty uninteresting: Republican Kerry Bentivolio, who is already the nominee for the full term, also won his party's nod for the stub term, beating Nancy Cassis 42-36. (Cassis of course made a failed write-in bid in the regular primary last month.)
In the special (which will be held under the old MI-11 lines), Bentivolio will face Marine vet David Curson, who was the only Democrat on the ballot. Physician Syed Taj, Bentivolio's opponent in the regular election, did not run in the special primary.
• Ads:
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AZ-01: The DCCC launched eight new attack ads on Thursday, and alphabetically by district, the first targets Republican Jonathan Paton for lobbying for the notoriously predatory payday loan industry. Meanwhile, Ann Kirkpatrick goes for some
bio stuff and offers general Democratic nostrums (protecting Medicare, etc.).
• CA-03: Democrat John Garamendi attacks Kim Vann for supporting something called the "Peripheral Canal," a proposed project that would allegedly divert water from northern California to the southern part of the state, and something which farmers in the north hate.
• CA-09: An Army sergeant who suffered a traumatic brain injury in Iraq praises Dem Rep. Jerry McNerney's support for veterans and their health needs.
• CA-10: The DCCC attacks GOP freshman Jeff Denham for supporting the Ryan plan.
• CA-21: How did Democrat John Hernandez, who at last count had negative $1,641 in cash-on-hand, find the money to pay for this ad about protecting the social safety net? Sure, it's as cheaply produced as possible, but it can't have cost negative money!
• CA-30: Howard Berman touts his efforts to help victims of the highly destructive 1994 Northridge earthquake.
• CA-52: The DCCC attacks Republican Brian Bilbray for being a "politician or a lobbyist" for "thirty-six years."
• CO-04: Democrat Brandon Shaffer introduces himself to voters in his first spot, though he starts off by dinging GOP Rep. Cory Gardner for being cozy with special interests.
• CO-06: GOP Rep. Mike Coffman goes totally non-partisan, calling himself "the congressman for the middle class."
• FL-18: Republican Allen West attacks Patrick Murphy for supporting the stimulus, then trots out the standard garbage about how the legislation created jobs "in China" (complete with footage of Chinese soldiers drilling) and also claiming it provided money for Wall Street bonuses. Uh, is West confusing the stimulus with TARP?
• GA-12: Dem Rep. John Barrow goes for the "groany earmarks" and "wasteful" spending route, claiming "we gave Pakistan $30 million to help mango farmers." Guess what? He's against it!
• IL-12: The DCCC says Jason Plummer's "only had one full-time job, working for his dad, but he's got millions in the bank," then slams him for praising the Ryan plan and supporting tax breaks for "millionaires like himself."
• IL-17: The DCCC attacks GOP Rep. Bobby Schilling for supporting the Ryan plan and preserving "tax breaks for companies that ship jobs overseas."
• IN-02: Democrat Brendan Mullen wants to freeze congressional pay until the budget is balanced.
• IN-08: Democrat Dave Crooks compares his views on trade with Larry Bucshon's voting record on ending tax breaks for outsourcing, taxation of overseas corporate income, and tariffs to punish China for currency manipulation.
• LA-03: GOP Rep. Charles Boustany touts his efforts to get the Obama administration to roll back the offshore oil drilling moratorium put in place after the BP disaster in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010.
• MA-06: Eric Cantor's YG Action Fund attacks Dem Rep. John Tierney on—what else?—innuendo surrounding the gambling operation run by his brothers-in-law, which landed his wife in jail for helping them to avoid taxes. Again, no one's ever produced a shred of evidence that Tierney knew anything about the entire matter, but of course this spot slyly makes it sound like Tierney was directly involved and is hiding the truth.
• MI-01: The Michigan LCV attacks GOP Rep. Dan Benishek as a friend of polluters who threaten to roll back progress in cleaning up the Great Lakes. The spot also praises Democrat Gary McDowell as a "fifth-generation Yooper"—that's the term for a denizen of Michigan's Upper Peninsula, aka the "U.P." Size of the buy: $330K.
• MT-AL: Republican Steve Daines goes the biographical route, complete with super-peppy music, in two new spots. (A second is very similar.)
• NH-01: GOP Rep. Frank Guinta talks about his focus on jobs, buttressed by some very phony-sounding praised from ersatz "man-on-the-street" types.
• NH-02: Speaking on behalf of Annie Kuster, a New Hampshirite who says she and her husband "depend on Social Security" slams GOP Rep. Charlie Bass for supporting Social Security privatization.
• NY-24: The DCCC hammers GOP Rep. Ann Marie Buerkle for supporting the Ryan plan, going into close detail about what it would mean for Medicare.
• OH-16: In this DCCC spot, a breast cancer survivor expresses her disgust for GOP Rep. Jim Renacci because he "voted against critical funding for life saving breast and cervical cancer screenings."
• TX-23: The DCCC hits GOP Rep. Quico Canseco over a variety of alleged misdeeds, including: getting "hit with more than $715K liens"; getting "sued by former clients who charged he was stealing"; and losing "his business license for breaking state laws."
• UT-04: Dem Rep. Jim Matheson likens his personal frugality ("I get my shirts at Costco!") to his opposition to wasteful government spending.
Other Races:
• CA-St. Sen Wow, this kind of crap is really petty. Former Democratic assemblyman Steve Clute, who ran third to Republican Jeff Miller and fellow Democrat Richard Roth in the state's top-two primary in June, just announced that he is endorsing the Republican. Clute ran out the standard "blah blah" pablum about Miller "standing up for Riverside County"—even tossing up a whopper that he trusts Miller to fund local schools, something Miller and his fellow Republicans in the lege have been loath to do since shortly after the Earth cooled.
Clute, who lost despite the backing of the state party, ran eight points behind Roth in June. Roth, a former Air Force officer and small businessman, had the backing of labor and Senate leader Darrell Steinberg and is considered an even-money bet to knock off Miller. The district split virtually in half in the primary, an electorate which was several points more Republican than the November electorate will be.
It remains to be seen whether Clute's endorsement of the Republican in the race moves the needle, or is easily dismissed as sour grapes. But, with Democrats desperately trying to get to a two-thirds supermajority in order to actually, y'know, be able to legislate, and the 31st being one of the few legitimate tossups in the state, this has to be seen as an aggravating impediment to that goal. (Steve Singiser)
Grab Bag:
• AFSCME: AFSCME is not messing around with their recent round of TV ad buys targeting Republicans. They're spending an eye-popping $755K in MT-Sen to hit Denny Rehberg, a jumbo $899K in WI-Sen to attack Tommy Thompson, and a monster $1.1 million in NV-Sen to go after Dean Heller. Wowza. (You can find all their new spots here.)
• HMP: The Dem-aligned House Majority PAC's new IE report has TV ad expenditures in four races: CO-07 ($229K); NC-07 ($23K); UT-04 ($91K); and VA-02 ($56K). HMP said that the total buy is CO-07 is $500K, so be on the lookout for another report.
• Majority PAC: The Dem-aligned Majority PAC has new IEs for TV buys in IN-Sen ($52K) and ND-Sen ($135K).
Redistricting Roundup:
• NYC Redistricting: Redistricting had finally gotten underway for the city council map in the largest city in America. It's taken so long because New York holds its elections in odd-numbered years, so there was no urgency to get it done in 2012. But in any event, the city's redistricting commission has released proposed maps, and once again, the Center for Urban Research at the CUNY Graduate Center has devised the best system for exploring them. They've once again deployed their "comparinator" tool, which allows you to navigate both old and new districts at the same time. Anyhow, there's still quite a bit of time left for things to change, as final lines aren't due until March.