Republicans have been laughing for months about the ease of a Franken-Coleman match up. The claim goes that Franken can’t possibly be taken seriously by Minnesotans and that Coleman will walk all over him with negative campaigning as November closes in. When spoken to in private, those same Republicans have revealed their worries after seeing Franken at a rally or some other event, but that’s a different story.
The story today is that, perhaps, those Republican operatives should trust their gut worries a little more because a new KSTP/Survey USA poll displays that this race will be anything but laughable.
The poll asks “if the election for United States Senator were today, and the only two candidates on the ballot were Republican Norm Coleman and DFL candidate Al Franken, who would you vote for?” And the answer from 650 registered voters is 47% for Coleman and 46% for Franken with a margin-of-error of ±3.9%. Notably the same question substituting Franken for Ciresi yields a more decisive 51-40 break in favor of Coleman.
Putting on my non-partisan analyst hat first, this is significant in that it confirms that MPR’s poll of a couple weeks ago is not a fluke. That poll showed Franken beating Coleman 43.2% to 40% which is just barely within the margin-of-error of 3.2%. Polling always requires a grain of salt, but these two polls show Franken in a statistical tie with Coleman — a large trend upwards from the beginning of the race. That being said, there’s a lot of time left in this race and Coleman has yet to really start banging the attack ad drum but Franken has yet to as well; and, despite what Republicans think, the ammunition is equivalent on both sides. The most significant aspects of this poll are that (1) Franken is gaining on Coleman in a way that people had previously dismissed and (2) Franken being the nominee is almost a fore-gone conclusion at this point.
Taking off my non-partisan hat (but honestly adhering to what I believe is the truth), I think that Franken is situated very nicely right now. Interestingly enough, however, the biggest element necessary for his success in November may be out of his hands: the Presidential nominee. Many people think we’ve drunk the Obama kool-aid here, but this is the honest truth: Obama being the nominee will help Franken immensely. They both appeal to the same demographics in Minnesota and Obama’s unprecedented GOTV machine will bring otherwise disenfranchised voters to the polls that will vote Franken. The Survey USA poll, for example, only polled registered voters, and as we’ve seen across the nation, Obama brings out voters who don’t usually come out otherwise; and he brings them out to vote Democratic. Also, Obama wins over independents and while Minnesotans are known for splitting tickets, there’s no doubt he’ll help Franken to a degree.
Another bit of insight provided by the Presidential races is the different value of different fundraising techniques. Franken has opted for the same sort of grassroots, big-base fundraising mode that Obama has. This has the downside of a high burn-rate upfront, but (hopefully, as it has for Obama) a wealth of pockets to dig into when you need the money later. While Franken’s fundraising base grows, Coleman will increasingly find himself scraping for cash from maxed-out donors in a year where the national party won’t have much to give him. Assuming that the Presidential race sucks funds away from down-ticket races equally on both sides of the aisles, this should be advantage Franken when the races really start to heat-up.
But, it’s really early still and we have many miles to go before we sleep. In the end, this could go either way for a variety of reasons, but the lesson today is that Coleman isn’t going to walk away without a fight.
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Wait a second, didn’t the poll say that Franken has support among older voters and women? Those are Clinton supporters right? And Coleman, oddly enough, has the support of younger voters? I have very serious doubts about that poll. Not that I don’t want Franken to win - it would be nice to have a swath of Durbin/Feingold/Franken in the midwest, true honest progressive Senators. But let’s put as much faith in these polls as they’ve proven they deserve.
1) I woundn’t get too excited about Franken’s polling until the Republican ad campaign starts.
2) I really think Franken is the Clinton candidate in this race. Unfortunately, there is no Obama candidate.
The DFL endorsement race has not decided its candidate, and most DFL delegates don’t even know all three candidates yet. So this is just is just hopeful hype, like when the Clinton campaign used to say it was inevitable. It is just way too early.
“and most DFL delegates don’t even know all three candidates yet.”
I find that hard to believe.
“It is just way too early.”
14 Days from the first SD/CU conventions?
:| Sean
dan,
franken is the clinton candidate, you are correct. however i would suggest that jack nelson pallmeyer represents the obama candidate. someone who is inspirational and progressive, yet not divisive and distracting (like a clinton or a franken). jnp is also the candidate who has been against the war without waiver, unlike franken and clinton. jnp is also the candidate with the strongest environmental stances. he was recommending a reinvestment in renewable energies through the creation of green collar jobs long before obama or hillary picked up on that message of helping our environment while investing also in our economy.
the media and this blog may want to consider franken inevitable, but i see the conditions as ripe for a jnp upset. too many delegates undecided and not for a lack of exposure to franken. minnesota has given a chance to an opinionated radio personality who though that qualified them for state held office and will not be willing to make that mistake again. jnp is the grassroots candidate in the tradition of wellstone and mccarthy who has the most potential to inspire the electorate beyond the politics as usual/ “safe” candidates and take back the seat of wellstone from norm.
I agree that y’all shouldn’t get too excited until Normie starts an add campaign. Up to this point, the exposure has been all for the Democrats.
I don’t even remember Coleman’s COH, but I bet it’s up there. Reagrdless of the candidate, Coleman and Scott Howell are going to have a great three months before the election.
I think the term Progressive gets thrown around pretty loosely. Franken was in favor of the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2002, supports nuclear power, and a private for-profit healthcare system (to name a few things). That does not make him a Progressive in my book. There is a big misconception among DFLer’s that Franken is good on the issues.
I vividly recall Norm Coleman’s “Bad Wellstone” ads of 2002. I am sure his campaign will come out with “Bad Al” ads as well.
In the MPR candidate survey, Jack Nelson-Pallmeyers’ stands on the issues reflect the priorities of 42% of respondants, as opposed to Al Frankens’ 20%. As we have painfully learned from the 2006 elections, it is not enough to elect a Democrat. We need to elect progressive democrats and, as has been pointed out here, that is most definitely not Al. Despite what his slick ads and caustic commentary may lead folks to believe, Al Franken is not progressive. And, oddly enough, when it came right down to it, Al believed the lying liars he so often ridiculed, and followed them right into a disasterous war.
My worries are getting a whole lot more local. In particular, because its a Presidential election year, the state House of Reps are the only ones up on the state side.
Now, most of the time the down ticket will break with the upticket, as people who have no idea who either person running for state rep, or state senator, or even Auditor, AG, or Secretary of State, are. So they vote the party of the candidate they voted up ticket. In a Klobuchar year, that is quite a gift. (sidenote: I’m not denying the importance of a voter ID & pull campaign down ticket - they make the critical difference, often)
So if you’re a state rep this year, its , then , then . Think about this. Think about it long and hard. What if Clinton pulls it out in OH and TX and gets the nod, and Franken is the nominee, as is looking likely?
We put our state House majority together on DFLers in districts in the suburbs that have generally been Republican. You think that Kaelin, Benson, Bly, Hortmann, et al. keep their seats if they are tied to the upticket ‘gifts’ of HRC and Al Franken?
Franken now looks like the nominee - time to do damage control, and hire extra organizers for the districts we need to keep the state House.
The irony is that these freshmen reps who have come out in support of Franken may lose their jobs because of him.
Sorry, I should have been clearer in my post. I wasn’t referring to the specific cross sections in this poll when I said that Obama and Franken appeal to the same demographics. What I meant, and now that I re-read my post I admit to it being phrased misleadingly, is that Obama helps Franken in demographics that will vote Franken. I’ll also admit that this logic appears like an attempt to do a loop around the data, but stick with me for a sec: the voters that Obama brings to the polls that usually don’t come will vote Franken.
Matt,
That is “hopeful” thinking. I might vote for Obama but Franken is a no go no matter what. Obama is the candidate that has the automatic upside of improving how others perceive us around the world. Franken is more likely to get us noticed in the way Ventura did. Obama being against the war from the get-go shows judgment on a critical issue where Franken failed to get his head out of his ass. Obama presents the personal integrity and civility that allows people with differing views to respect each other enough to work together. Franken has a history of bad judgment, weak rationalization of those mistakes and being purposefully divisive and insulting.
Franken has little hope of convincing the independent voters that might support Obama that he is worth a vote. His rhetoric and attitude sounds more like Hillary.
KH,
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IYBA9JD5oW4
I didn’t trust Bush The Lesser, but: I trusted Powell. And I watched Powell’s testimony to the UN, and to the WORLD, live.
Now, I also remembered Wolfowitz callin’ General Shinseki “wildly off the mark.”
So, I didn’t trust the civilians in the misAdministration, but I still trusted Powell.
So, I too backed the invasion; I believed what Powell testified.
I was wrong to have believed Powell.
It is no sin to have believed a man of Powell’s stature - I certainly didn’t believe pre-testimony, that the testimony would be so DELIBERARELY wrong.
That those that misled this country into war were never investigated by the Norm Coleman-led Investigations subcommittee, only proves why Norm Coleman deserves to be fired:
Norm Coleman didn’t do his job.
You and others were wrong to have believed Powell but that was not the important error. Even if people believed Powell, and I say this with as much conviction as humanly possible, there was still no valid rational moral reason to invade Iraq, period. There is no such thing as a justified preemptive war. The idea that believing that Saddam having WMDs was enough to go to war is on it’s face ridiculous. There are other countries that have or were looking to gain WMDs and nobody would have supported a U.S. invasion of Iran or Korea.
People that want to have responsibilities that include checking the power of the executive branch and it’s military power should be more able to see these facts than the average citizen. Franken simply does not have the judgment I look for in a person seeking such high office. Than again neither does Coleman or Clinton so he isn’t alone.
It wasn’t a sin to believe Powell, but it wasn’t very smart. There was lots of evidence available at the time to suggest Powell was wrong. And even if Powell was right, invading Iraq was a terrible idea. Everything that has happened with the occupation and the civil war was completely predictable. And I don’t know if I would go as far as KH and say there is no such thing as a justified pre-emptive war, but if there is one, you had better make DAMN sure that it really is justified. Even if you believed every word Powell said, he didn’t come anywhere near that.
TPT, I don’t know what you were doing five years ago and whether you should have known better. But Al Franken was writing political books and should have known better. There is no excuse for his ignorance and poor judgment.
It’s called the march to war and it’s very hard to resist. Those of us who are pasivists were secretly praying to the God I don’t believe in, that we we’re right. As it turns, out we were, but, if Powell had been on the solid ground we were all told he was on, it would’ve been a bad situation. Remember, Powell was the only character in the administration with any credibility and he was telling us there was a serious threat. That meant something.
Norm Coleman cannot defeat Al Franken by resurrecting old Franken sound bites establishing Franken’s confusion about whom to believe years ago about the Iraq War’s justification. Coleman has scraped along innocuously on the Bush coattails for years.
Now that Bush has nearly bankrupted the country on a trillion dollar fool’s escapade, while Minnesotans have a lot less money in their pockets, it matters little to the voters who believed Colin Powell years ago — the majority will vote to oust Coleman because he has no answers for issues that are important to most Minnesotans, and cannot bring himself to repudiate Bush’s failed war.
It did mean something but not enough in my book. There was never any evidence that Osama and his friends were active in Iraq and Iraq had possessed WMDs for years and hadn’t used them in a terrorist attack against the U.S. so I don’t see how it would have been different after 9-11. At no time was there enough evidence to justify a war and anybody who wants to represent us on a national level had better be smart enough to figure that out. A candidates policy positions or communication ability means nothing if they end up making a bad decision when put to the test. A war that kills thousands and costs trillions is infinitely more important than a slight variation in health care or trade policy.
KH, I was wrong.
Let me repeat that: I WAS WRONG.
And I agree, the idea of pre-emptive war, which is now called “The Bush Doctrine”, is abhorrent.
And the reason I fell for it, is I simply did not expect Powell to lie through his teeth.
He did.
Why? He was lied to, too.
And the republicans in the Senate and House completely abdicated their constitutional requirement of oversight duty, and let the lying liars get away with it.
If Norm Coleman is re-elected, those that vote for him are saying it was OK for Norm Coleman to abdicate his constitutional duty to conduct oversight.
And Norm Coleman is especially guilty of this abdication; he - as chair of the Senate Investigations Sub-Copmmittee - actually had subpoena power.
IMNSO, Norm Coleman does NOT get a pass; he didn’t do his job and now he must go.
I appreciate the fact that you have all along said that your support for the war was a mistake and I am in no way trying to continue to poke at you. I also don’t want to give Norm Coleman a pass. I do however think that because there are currently options available to the Democrats it would be a good idea to pick somebody who would have likely not have made that same mistake. Franken is not running against Norm yet. He is running against two people with more applicable experience and better judgment on the war that did not have to move across country to run for Coleman’s current office.
TPT, you have offered more contrition in this thread than Al Franken has in the last five years.
The march to war is tough to resist, but not nearly as tough as Franken claims it is.
Instead of praying as to whether Powell was right or wrong, I checked. And it was clear that he was almost certainly wrong.