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IN-Sen: In case you somehow haven't seen this yet, well, it's the story of the day—maybe even of the week. Republican Senate nominee Richard Mourdock, at Tuesday night's debate:
I believe life begins at conception. The only exception I have for to have an abortion is in the case of the life of the mother. I struggled with myself for a long time but I came to realize life is that gift from God, even when life begins in that horrible situation of rape. It is something that God intended to happen.
The political world exploded upon hearing these remarks, with everyone with a conscience condemning Mourdock for suggesting that there's some supreme being who "intends" rape to happen. Predictably, Mourdock
furiously tried to backpedal in his post-debate remarks:
"What I said was, in answering the question form my position of faith, I said I believe that God creates life. I believe that as wholly and as fully as I can believe it. That God creates life," Mourdock said. "Are you trying to suggest that somehow I think that God pre-ordained rape? No, I don't think that. That's sick. Twisted. That's not even close to what I said. What I said is that God creates life."
But that's not what Mourdock said, and that's not what anyone heard. Hell, even Mitt Romney didn't want to have
anything to do with Mourdock:
"Gov. Romney disagrees with Richard Mourdock's comments, and they do not reflect his views," Romney spokeswoman Andrea Saul said in a statement.
Oh! But there's a wee problem, Governor!
If you're not able to watch, Romney (as you may know)
just cut an ad on behalf of Mourdock. American Bridge has helpfully mashed up some of Mourdock's greatest hits (including, of course, the new rape remarks you read just above), sandwiched between Romney's words of endorsement from that new spot. Just brutal. Kind of like Mourdock's entire campaign.
8:26 AM PT: The Mourdock fallout continues:
"I strongly disagree with the statement made by Richard Mourdock during last night's Senate debate. I urge him to apologize,” U.S. Rep. Mike Pence, the Republican candidate in Indiana’s race for governor, said in a statement Wednesday morning.
Pence is almost a lock to win his race, so it's interesting that he's taking no chances and disavowing Mourdock. But NRSC chair John Cornyn is digging in:
“Richard and I, along with millions of Americans – including even Joe Donnelly – believe that life is a gift from God. To try and construe his words as anything other than a restatement of that belief is irresponsible and ridiculous,” Cornyn said.
Of course, Cornyn's truly up against a wall. After watching Todd Akin brutally undermine one of the GOP's best pickup opportunities in Missouri, Cornyn can't afford to abandon yet another Senate candidate. He must want to strangle Mourdock, though, who turned what was an almost certain Republican hold into a very vulnerable tossup. For that alone, Democrats everywhere should send Mourdock Christmas cards.
8:53 AM PT: You don't really get any points for guessing that Scott Brown wants out:
"Scott Brown is pro-choice and does not agree with the views expressed by Richard Mourdock," Alleigh Marre said in a statement. "They do not reflect his thinking at all."
New Hampshire Sen. Kelly Ayotte
going to ground is a little more interesting, though:
Ayotte's spokesman, Jeff Grappone, said Wednesday that the senator disagrees with Mourdock's comments, which do not represent her views. Ayotte was scheduled to campaign with Mourdock on Wednesday, but canceled her trip and is in New Hampshire instead.
Hilariously, Mourdock's campaign is claiming that
they asked Ayotte
not to come!
9:13 AM PT: • MA-Sen (MassINC): Elizabeth Warren (D): 50 (45), Scott Brown (R-inc): 44 (48); Obama 56-36 (52-36).
• OH-Sen (SurveyUSA): Sherrod Brown (D-inc): 43 (43), Josh Mandel (R): 42 (38); Obama 47-43 (45-42).
9:33 AM PT: • CT-Sen (Quinnipiac): Chris Murphy (D): 49 (47), Linda McMahon (R): 43 (48); Obama 55-41 (54-42).
• CT-Sen (Mason-Dixon): Chris Murphy (D): 44, Linda McMahon (R): 44; Obama 49-42.
9:56 AM PT: FL-18 (FrederickPolls for Murphy): Patrick Murphy (D): 47 (45), Allen West (R-inc): 47 (45); Obama-Romney 48-48 (Romney 49-46). Note that the trendlines date back to May. Despite the millions that have been aired on attack ads—or perhaps because of them—I wouldn't be surprised to see this remain a game of inches.
10:20 AM PT: Now IL-17 GOP Rep. Bobby Schilling, locked in a very tough re-election battle, is also calling on Mourdock to apologize. For Republicans who can do a convincing job of acting non-insane, this is kind of a freebie—they get an opportunity to distance themselves from the crazies.
10:49 AM PT: And speaking of that Quinnipiac poll, it looks like someone totally set McMahon up. From a press release late on Tuesday:
If tomorrow morning's release of new poll numbers from Quinnipiac University in Connecticut's U.S. Senate race hold true to recent polling trends, momentum will definitively be behind Linda McMahon.
Whoops! Turns out Quinnipiac saw a seven-point shift in Murphy's favor. So where does that leave Linda & Co.? Why,
unskewing, of course! Unskewing, and, I should add, and dreaming up conspiracy theories:
I'm sure you've seen the new Q Poll in the news this morning. It's made quite the splash, but it's misleading. The model the pollsters used underestimates how many Republicans are in Connecticut by six points—in 2008, 27 percent of Connecticut's voters were Republicans, but only 21 percent of the voters sampled in this morning's Quinnipiac poll were Republicans. That six-point gap accounts for the six points they say Linda is "behind." Did Quinnipiac intentionally undersample Republicans to help Congressman Murphy? Only Quinnipiac knows for sure.
Emphasis, I must note, in the original. And wanna know something hilarious? Democrats were
43% of the electorate four years ago—but they represent just 35% of respondents in Quinnipiac's poll. So that's an
eight-point gap—even bigger! Obviously it shows you just how pathetically misleading McMahon's attempts to unskew are, since the D minus R gap in this survey is only 14 net points, while according to the 2008 exit polls, it was 16.
So she's howling about a sample that's more favorable to her than the one she's citing as the proper standard. Oh, and the fact that she's accusing Quinnipiac of being in the tank for Murphy—an extraordinary charge backed by no evidence whatsoever—is just the icing.
11:05 AM PT: CA-36: How not to win elections:
Bono Mack: Latino voter outreach to come after election
"I pledge that after November, I will try my hardest to speak to Latino voters," Bono Mack said. "This election, I'm a little bit hamstrung. But I will do my best. Because I think that they deserve the attention that we need to give them."
And here's another vote of confidence in Democrat Raul Ruiz, following the release of his remarks about Leonard Peltier: The DCCC is
airing a new ad attacking GOP Rep. Mary Bono Mack, saying she "voted to end the Medicare guarantee." I think the treadmill imagery ("saving for retirement is like running on a treadmill") is pretty good.
11:25 AM PT (David Jarman): Polltopia: Simon Jackman, the behind-the-scenes numbers guy for HuffPo's Pollster, is out with a newly updated graph of all the various major pollsters' "house effects." While this doesn't look backward and assess how well they've predicted previous elections, this looks at how far from the overall averages the pollsters are operating this cycle. Who's the most pro-Dem? Well, you have to dig down four slots to find a really credible pollster (Marist); the top 3 are Zogby, Suffolk (despite that not squaring with David Paleologos's knuckle-headed public pronouncements), and wildly-volatile UNH. Who's the most pro-GOP? Rasmussen, Gravis, and at the very bottom... yes, the one-time-most-respected name in American polling, Gallup. Who's closest to the arbitrary middle? Fox News, of all people, with PPP a few slots behind.
11:25 AM PT: FL-26: Funny, GOP Rep. David Rivera's ethical woes are back in the news, but this time, it's got nothing to do with the whole Justin Lamar Sternad scandal. Instead, the Florida Commission on Ethics is charging Rivera "with 11 counts for allegedly violating state rules during his tenure in the Florida legislature." Politico summarizes the allegations:
The Florida ethics commission probe into Rivera’s personal finances covered a wide range of issues including: a $510,000 payment from a dog track to a company owned by his mother and godmother while he was still in the state legislature; use of campaign funds for personal expenses; and failure to disclose income in his state financial disclosure reports.
There's much more detail at the link, including Rivera's hilarious claims that the ethics commission is engaged in a conspiracy against him (driven by Democrat Joe Garcia, of course).
12:03 PM PT: The Live Digest continues here.