Santorum has momentum!? That is the conclusion of the wingnut Human Events Online (h/t Santorum Blog) as it tries, ever so desperately, to rally the right to the support of incumbent Rs in trouble. The word on K Street mid-summer was that the smart R money was abandoning Santorum in favor of more profitable purchases. The wingnut machine ramped up the PR and used the late summer polls, which showed the spread between Casey and Santorum narrowing, to promote Their Rick as surging forward and Casey as floundering -- all this, mind you, before Labor Day.
It's downright silly -- Voodoo Politics. A year ago, when pollsters were the only ones paying attention to polls, Santorum was polling in the mid-to-upper thirties, with an occasional foray into the low forties. Today, he is polling in the upper thirties and very low forties. Yes, the spread has narrowed, but that's a natural result of the race being slightly more on the radar and slightly more people thinking seriously about it. Casey polled unduly heavily "early" on in this race because people are fed up with Santorum and Bush, looked for a fresh face, and were sending a message. But they really weren't thinking about it. (Actually, to say that the March polls were "early" in the race is silly -- NOW is "early" in the race. March was wonk time.)
Despite starting his advertising very early (the benefit of all that K Street money) Santorum hasn't gained anything in the last six months except perhaps a return to the R column of disenchanted or "confused" right wing Rs who are easily scared by sex, homosexuals, and brown people speaking Spanish. In the latest WSJ/Zogby poll, Santorum moved a whole 0.2% closer to Casey. (At that rate, he'll pull even in about 2009) Casey, on the other hand, has yet to do enough to define himself in a way that generates passion and, as a result, bunches of people in the late summer polls have yawned when asked to assume the election were held today.
Santorum's approval rating is among the lowest of all 100 Senators, in a state that approves of his fearless leader at a rate lower than the nation as a whole, in a state that has recently had a mini-revolt against incumbents, and in a state that has lost more of its citizens to the fubar excursion into Iraq than 47 other states.
He ain't going nowhere. He doesn't have the room to go up much more than the low forties in which he finds himself mired and Casey will, despite himself, stumble into Washington in January '07.
It's downright silly -- Voodoo Politics. A year ago, when pollsters were the only ones paying attention to polls, Santorum was polling in the mid-to-upper thirties, with an occasional foray into the low forties. Today, he is polling in the upper thirties and very low forties. Yes, the spread has narrowed, but that's a natural result of the race being slightly more on the radar and slightly more people thinking seriously about it. Casey polled unduly heavily "early" on in this race because people are fed up with Santorum and Bush, looked for a fresh face, and were sending a message. But they really weren't thinking about it. (Actually, to say that the March polls were "early" in the race is silly -- NOW is "early" in the race. March was wonk time.)
Despite starting his advertising very early (the benefit of all that K Street money) Santorum hasn't gained anything in the last six months except perhaps a return to the R column of disenchanted or "confused" right wing Rs who are easily scared by sex, homosexuals, and brown people speaking Spanish. In the latest WSJ/Zogby poll, Santorum moved a whole 0.2% closer to Casey. (At that rate, he'll pull even in about 2009) Casey, on the other hand, has yet to do enough to define himself in a way that generates passion and, as a result, bunches of people in the late summer polls have yawned when asked to assume the election were held today.
Santorum's approval rating is among the lowest of all 100 Senators, in a state that approves of his fearless leader at a rate lower than the nation as a whole, in a state that has recently had a mini-revolt against incumbents, and in a state that has lost more of its citizens to the fubar excursion into Iraq than 47 other states.
He ain't going nowhere. He doesn't have the room to go up much more than the low forties in which he finds himself mired and Casey will, despite himself, stumble into Washington in January '07.
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