The last two major polls of the race had him trailing by a dozen, but last night on Hannity’s show he teased the fact that his internal numbers are showing things to be much tighter. And now, lo and behold, a Bielat campaign memo claiming that he’s within the margin of error has been leaked to Fleming and Hayes. I don’t normally link internal polls — as Ace says, you’re never sure how representative the leaked data is — but apart from the Nevada Senate seat, there’s no race in the country that conservatives more urgently want to win than this one. An internal poll showing one of the architects of the subprime meltdown in mortal peril of losing is like hearing from a friend of a friend of a friend that the cutest girl in school digs you. Deep down you don’t really believe it, but you want to believe it so badly that you’re ready to tell everyone.
Just one catch. Unless I missed it, there’s no actual hard number on where things stand in the race in the Fleming and Hayes memo. In fact, nowhere does the document itself say that Bielat’s within the margin of error; that’s F&H’s header for their post, but the closest the doc gets is claiming that Bielat’s very close or even ahead among specific groups, e.g., certain counties, audiences who’ve seen his ads, etc. The key takeaway is that the more people see of Bielat and the more they’re reminded of Frank’s record, the tighter the race gets — which leads to a none-too-subtle pitch for more money so that Bielat can blanket the district with ads over the next week. Here’s his donation page. Don’t think of it as a contribution, think of it as buying a lottery ticket: If Bielat’s number comes up on election night, you’re going to feel like you just hit the pick six.
Exit question: Good point near the end here by Hannity. Why isn’t Scott Brown out on the trail?
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