New battleground: New Jersey
posted at 10:10 am on September 16, 2008 by Ed Morrissey
Barack Obama has another Atlantic seaboard state slipping away from him. A new Quinnipiac survey shows Obama losing seven points in a month and declining to a virtual tie in New Jersey. With New York down to a five-point lead, the traditional Democratic bastions have now come into play in the election, boding ill for Obama in more traditional battleground states:
The contest between Barack Obama and John McCain in New Jersey is too close to call, with a new Quinnipiac University poll showing the battle for the state’s fifteen electoral votes at 48%-45% among likely voters. Obama led McCain by ten percentage points, 51%-41% in an August Quinnipiac poll.
This is the fourth independent poll within the last week to show New Jersey as an emerging battleground state in the presidential campaign. A Monmouth University/New Jersey poll released this morning shows Obama leading by 8 points, and a Marist College poll released Friday night had identical numbers to Quinnipiac, 48%-45%. A Fairleigh Dickinson University poll from last week had Obama up by six points. …
In New Jersey, Obama has a 56%-34% favorable rating, while McCain is at 56%-35%. GOP vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin is at 42%-32%, while Joe Biden, the Democratic VP candidate, is at 48%-25%. Nearly six out of ten New Jersey voters (58%) say McCain’s choice of Palin was a good one, while 59% say Obama made a good pick in Biden.
“In addition to the Palin bounce, Republicans seem to be scoring points with their attacks on the Obama tax plan,” Richards said.
The economy remains the biggest issue in the election in New Jersey, as in most other states. However, Obama’s edge has narrowed to almost a tie on the economy, edging McCain by only five points, 48-43. On foreign policy, McCain has a 2-1 advantage over Obama, 64-27.
Democrats carried the Garden State by seven points in 2004. Seeing a lead within three points at this point in the race means that Obama will have to spend time and money campaigning in a state that should have been a gimme in 2008. Its 15 Electoral College votes outpaces Virginia’s 13, where Obama hoped to win the Presidency by flipping a red state. Rasmussen puts this in a tie today, but does the same with Pennsylvania, where Democrats need to retain its 21 EC votes (polls at Real Clear Politics).
Not only is this race tightening, it’s spreading. Can Obama fight on defense? The next round of polls should be very telling — and the debates are looking more crucial to both candidates. However, as Power Line quips today, this isn’t what Obama had in mind when he talked about a 50-state strategy.
Blowback
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The real question is, where is all of his celeb millions going if it’s not winning him anything? And after the election, where does the left over money go?
ErinF on September 16, 2008 at 11:50 AM
Agreed. However, McCain has been moving for about a month now (even before the conventions), 3-4 points every few days and is starting catch up with Obama. Everything is starting to snowball. The turning point (at least the timing) appears to be the Paris Hilton/Britney Spears add followed by the German extravaganza and the Stadium speech (with Britney Speer’s production manager designing the stage and props). Once Obama confirmed the ‘pop star’ celebrity status by these two events, voters began taking a closer look and found there was no substance. After the election the Dems will tell us (once again) that they did not get their message out. What message? We want to raise taxes, increase the cost of gasoline, and let babies die?
jerseyman on September 16, 2008 at 11:50 AM
It appears that every time the Obama campaign has attempted to stop the bleeding over the past month, McCain has come up with a new ‘punch’ to open up a fresh wound. The selection of Palin, her convention speech, her announcement about her pregnant daughter, taking on the mantel of reform/change, McCain can’t type because of his injuries, the release of the ‘trooper gate’ memos. Each step negates Obama’s latest move and keeps the momentum going. Keep it up through the debates and another 7 weeks, and we could have a very merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!
jerseyman on September 16, 2008 at 11:58 AM
The bugler has sounded reveille and the combat units have been assembled. The General will be addressing them shortly.
ManlyRash on September 16, 2008 at 11:59 AM
Good list. Add his and Michelle’s legal license status, i.e. when did they pass their bars, how long did they keep their licenses up, or not, and why.
Entelechy on September 16, 2008 at 12:01 PM
Is the public beginning to recognize the “executive” management style of a tax (or beg) and spend ultra-liberal (socialist) Senator Barack “57 States” Obama?
desertdweller on September 16, 2008 at 12:15 PM
Somebody posted an interesting article yesterday on Obama’s scholastic history. It said that Obama did not graduate with honors from Columbia University, which raises the question of how he gained admission to an elite law school like Harvard with such an undistinguished undergraduate record.
The article also said that Obama got onto the Harvard’s law review through the write-on competition. (For those unfamiliar with law reviews, usually the top 10% or so of students, according to their first year GPA’s, are invited to join the law review; then there is an open writing competition for the rest of the students, and a number of students (40 in Obama’s class) who write well enough (according to the people judging the competetion) are invited to join the review. The write-on competitions were devised as a way to allow more minority law students to participate on law reviews). After joining the law review via the writing competition, Obama was elected Editor as a compromise candidate, during a year in which there was some unrest on the Harvard Law campus due to a liberal professor’s protests about the lack of sufficient diversity on the faculty.
I found the article interesting because I’ve read so many comments about Obama’s alleged “brilliance.” I’ve also read many posts on the internet that claimed that Obama graduated at the top of his class at Harvard — which is extremely unlikely if he had to write-on to the law review.
Obama has already admitted that he benefitted from affirmative action. Is he refusing to release his Columbia and Harvard transcripts because he doesn’t want us to know just how much he benefitted? Or is he just afraid that if he releases his grades then the myth of his much-hyped “brilliance” is going to be exploded?
AZCoyote on September 16, 2008 at 12:24 PM
I’m also in Hudson, in Jersey City, I’ve seen about 3-4 Obama signs or bumper stickers, but they’ve been up like 6 months. More and more around here and Hoboken I’ve seen things for McCain.
Rbastid on September 16, 2008 at 12:33 PM
Inner Patton rises to address the troops of the New Jersey for McCain/Palin army:
At ease.
As you men and women are aware, reconnaissance reports furnished by Colonel Rasmussen indicate that support for the enemy has weakened considerably in the great Garden State of New Jersey. Given the margin of error, John McCain is withing striking distance.
I should not have to remind you of the critical role New Jersey played in the War for American Independence: at the Battle of Trenton, on the day after Christmas in 1776, Gen. George Washington scored the first major victory for the struggling Continental Army.
By all indications, it appears that New Jersey may once more be in a pivotal historical position. I know that many of you are chomping at the bit in anticipation of a battle to bring this state into the McCain column.
I know also that many of you have despaired that such a battle is not winnable.
Well I am here to tell you that all this pessimism is a pile of horse dung and the simpering pantywaists who snivel at the prospect of retaking New Jersey are the spiritual if not actual descendants of the same nattering nancies to told George Washington he was making a huge mistake attacking Trenton.
I will not tolerate this kind of negativity in my army.
I will repeat what I have said before: True Conservatives love a winner and will not tolerate a loser. True Conservatives play to win all the time. I wouldn’t give a hoot in hell for a man who lost and laughed. That’s why true Conservatives have never lost and will never lose a political war. Because the very thought of losing is hateful to Conservatives.
I don’t want to get any messages saying that we will lose New Jersey or that we are holding our position in the polls. We’re not holding anything. Let the Obamatons do that. We are advancing constantly and we’re not interested in holding onto anything except the enemy.
We’re going to advance in New Jersey, town by town and county by county – from Bergen to Somerset to Mercer to Cape May. We are going to hold onto them by the nose and we’re going to kick them in the balls. We’re going to kick the piss out of them all the time and we’re gonna go through the Democrat party in New Jersey like sh!t through a goose. Not only are we going to elect John McCain president and Sarah Palin vice-president, but we are going to toss Frank Lautenberg out on his wrinkled cadaver ass!
There’s one thing that you people will be able to say when we are victorious in November – and you may thank God for it. Years from now when you’re together with your children or grandchildren – sitting on the beach at Cape May or riding horses in Basking Ridge or watching the Newark Bears play amateur baseball – and they ask you what you did in the Election of 2008, you won’t have to say, “Well, I shoveled sh!t in Lodi.”
Alright now, you sons-of-b!tches, you know how I feel and what we have to do to win this thing. And I will be proud and honored to lead you wonderful people into battle – anytime, anywhere.
ManlyRash on September 16, 2008 at 12:36 PM
This is the best way i can describe New Jersey:
We wanted to get a sign painted in the middle of the street to alert Firemen where the Hydrant is. We had to write in a letter and someone came do do it. Granted they had to come twice because there needs to be different people to paint the sign and then paint the lines around it. No less then 2 weeks later they repaved the street, a year later we’re still waiting to get the sign repainted.”
It takes 2 groups of people here to do a 1 man job, then they destroy the time and money they put into that work.
Rbastid on September 16, 2008 at 12:43 PM
That was me who linked to the Jack Cashill article yesterday.
Dr.Cwac.Cwac on September 16, 2008 at 12:44 PM
I’m curious to know if McCain has even campaigned in New Jersey or New York. And if he hasn’t (or at least hasn’t done a lot of campaigning), what will happen when he does?
jbohanon on September 16, 2008 at 1:03 PM
AZCoyote and Dr. Cwac.Cwac, thanks for the reference and the link, as I’d missed it yesterday.
Entelechy on September 16, 2008 at 1:26 PM
I don’t know how familiar you are with law review procedures, but in no way does the write on competition favor minority candidates. All write on submissions are blind. The people that review/grade the write-on submissions don’t know anything about the person that wrote them, not even their name. The write on submission is only identified with a number. If a school differentiates between a write on competition and the grade-on competition, the purpose is mainly to favor those that write very well, but maybe did not have great grades in 1L.
You and the author of the article seem to be similarly ill informed about the process for law review selection at Harvard. In fact, there is no grade-on portion. The law review is 100% write-on. See Harvard Law Review Membership requirements. Whether or not the selection was the same in 1990 is unclear. But at least I’ve provided some cite rather than some unknown author’s suppositions and your proven lack of knowledge of how a law review writing competition is conducted.
In point of fact, all tests in most Law Schools are blind graded like the law review. The professor never knows whose paper they are grading, they only see a number. Stupid charges about affirmative action once Obama got to Law School are fairly ill informed of how law school works.
New_Jersey_Buckeye on September 16, 2008 at 1:38 PM
Well, let’s settle it. Let’s see (all) transcripts. Let’s see if he passed the Illinois bar.
Dr.Cwac.Cwac on September 16, 2008 at 1:58 PM
Ahh… Easily done in proving that he passed the Illinois State Bar. See here.
As for Obama’s college and law school transcripts. I don’t see Mccain’s Academy transcripts anywhere, so why should Obama produce his. From reports, any comparison between the two transcripts would not favor McCain. Then again, since i’ve never seen McCain’s transcripts, why should we believe the reports that he did not exactly excel at the Naval Academy. These petty antics are just like the birth certificate “controversy” that wasted soo many conservative man hours chasing a red herring.
New_Jersey_Buckeye on September 16, 2008 at 2:27 PM
Wait. Good news on polls for McCain/Palin? Guess AP’s not posting.
Sultry Beauty on September 16, 2008 at 4:24 PM
Dude, this is The Glorious Democratic People’s Republic of New Jersey we’re talking about here. A Republican can’t even get elected dogcatcher in this state. =\
ZK on September 16, 2008 at 8:03 PM
Yes, the situation of our state government is quite blue. It is also true that, in my Mercer County, we have not one Republican county official, not even dogcatcher, thanks to the triple trouble demographically of desperately poor Trenton, lots of state office workers in its suburbs, and the university utopia of Princeton.
My town of Hamilton, though, has bucked the trend. We have a pretty awesome Republican mayor and veto-proof Republican majority on the council. The state has not had any worthwhile statewide office candidates for a while, but Bill Baroni seems to be a rising star in the state senate and a guy who I would like to see running for Governor or Senator in another few years. Chris Smith, my congressman, has done a pretty good job, too.
I’d like to think that the state could somehow follow my town’s lead. I won’t bet on it yet, but I’d love to see us at least be part of the discussion, more so than Laura Bush’s lone visit in 2004.
flutejpl on September 16, 2008 at 9:08 PM
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