Continuing with my “things a should have blogged about over the holiday but didn’t” series, SurveyUSA released approval ratings for this month and, once again, Amy Klobuchar scored over 60%. I have to agree with the vast majority of my fellow Minnesotans: Amy is doing a great job.
Minnesota’s other Senator, Norm Coleman, saw his approval rating bump back up over 50%, which is certainly a positive for his camp. But a couple of the poll’s internals should give him pause. Coleman scores a 64% approval in Northeasten Minnesota. For anyone who knows anything about Minnesota politics, that should be a warning sign. There is absolutley no chance that 64% of Minnesotans on the Range and in Duluth approve of Coleman’s performance. My guess is that this number will drop next month by 15-20 points, which would drop Coleman back to about a 45-48% approval statewide (which is what he has been scoring in most polls recently).
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Related Posts: Told You So, Senator Norm Coleman’s Father dies at 82, Tom Bakk Registers 2010 Gov Campaign Committee, Survey USA: Franken 40, Coleman 41, Brodkorb’s Bookkeeping Problems,
10 Responses to “Amy Still Loved In Minnesota, Norm Gets A Bounce (Maybe)”
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Now, do we want to talk about why Coleman would be so high in Northeastern Minnesota? That place is a DFL stronghold, and what about the DFL in the Senate race might not people like?
Frankenites, discuss!
John S -
Your argument makes no sense. The poll measured Coleman’s approval rating, not a head-to-head with any DFL candidate. It is doubtful that Coleman’s approval would increase because of distaste for Franken.
The reason why Norm’s approval was high in NE MN? Probably a bad sample.
Jim -
So Coleman’s approval rating is totally in a vacuum, unaffected by how he looks in comparison to the man the media paints as his mostly likely challenger?
Northeast Minnesota tends to be an area that goes very much to the DFL in state-wide issues, but tends to be much more socially conservative than the national party as a whole. And in Franken, there is a candidate who seems more like a national Democrat than a Minnesota DFLer.
Writing it off as a bad sample is a bit blaise, don’t you think? Any Republican getting good ratings in Northeast Minnesota should be setting off alarm bells, not just for Franken but for the whole DFL. (We do want to win in ‘08, right?)
Sorry man, but I just don’t buy it. Don’t get me wrong, I am not sold on Franken, and he might hurt us in 2008, but I just think that the idea that the average voter thinks “well, I don’t like this Franken fellow, so I think I’ll tell the pollster that I approve of Norm’s job performance” is pretty silly given that we’re a year away from the election. They probably interview 20-30 people up on the Range, if you get 2 or 3 more Republicans than you should, thats a 10 percent swing right there.
There’s no way Coleman is actually that popular in that region. However, it doesn’t seem logical that people would casting ‘08 ballots in an approval poll. That conclusion seems like reading WAY too much into those poll results.
People in the range will vote Democrat but they don’t necessarily like it. The vote Democrat because of their strong union affiliation but sure as hell don’t like most of the rest of the Democratic platform on social issues or even Iraq. I can see how there could be a significant difference between Coleman’s “approval rating” and who they would vote for.
John S - I think that we can all agree that Al Franken is a horrible candidate who has no chance of beating Norm Coleman, but the idea that this is reflected in Coleman’s approval rating is a bit of a stretch. I know you want Franken’s supporters to at least consider the fact that he will come across as the “liberal Ann Coulter,” but the kool-aid is just too strong.
Dan-
I’m not saying its an absolutely direct link. But at the same time, its a highly unusual number for that region, and its a big coincidence if its not connected to something.
JohnS -
Jim is right, its connected to a bad sample.
John S,
The most recent SUSA poll had the following numbers for NE Minnesota.
Franken 54%
Coleman 40%
Ciresi 51%
Coleman 45%
Coleman 46%
Cohen 43%
Coleman 47%
JNP 42%