{"id":14423,"date":"2010-10-18T07:00:22","date_gmt":"2010-10-18T12:00:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/?p=14423"},"modified":"2014-10-02T10:19:38","modified_gmt":"2014-10-02T15:19:38","slug":"how-the-hell-does-emmer-win-this-thing-part-ii","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/?p=14423","title":{"rendered":"How The Hell Does Emmer Win This Thing, Part II"},"content":{"rendered":"

In this past week, Minnesota has been presented with four different polls on the Minnesota governor’s race; the risible\u00a0Minnesota poll<\/a>, the oddly-disconnected Humphrey Institute Poll<\/a>, the Rasmussen Poll<\/a> (which may or may not<\/a> have overpolled Republicans, as opposed to the MN and HHH polls, which certainly overpolled Democrats) and, late last week, the SurveyUSA (SUSA) poll<\/a>. \u00a0These polls showed a smorgasbord of results. \u00a0You can pick the one you prefer, really – as, indeed, most Minnesota political junkies have done.<\/p>\n

I prefer Rasmussen. \u00a0Not because it showed Emmer in the lead – that fact made me happy, but then so would a “Berg Institute” poll that showed Emmer leading 100-0; the BI poll has no real track record, so I’d put no real stock in it – but because Rasmussen has been the closest pollster on the past couple of elections.<\/p>\n

Still, the SUSA poll sort of splits the difference between the two. \u00a0It shows Dayton with a lead just outside the margin of error.<\/p>\n

But it shows two other things that should be hugely encouraging to the Emmer campaign.<\/p>\n

Peoples’ Hearts In Right Place – With Their Wallets: <\/strong>While the poll shows Emmer slightly behind, it asks the question “how should we resolve Minnesota’s budget deficit?”<\/p>\n

And here are the answers:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Minnesota likely voters – however measured -prefer raising taxes over “not sure” by less than the margin of error. \u00a038% favor some combination of spending cuts and tax hikes. \u00a0And 53% <\/strong>favor cuts in spending.<\/p>\n

Given that there is only one candidate who favors getting government spending under control, the target of Emmer’s next two weeks should be fairly clear; reaching the 53% of Minnesotans who support Emmer, but just don’t know it yet.<\/p>\n

Is The Big Break Here?<\/strong>: \u00a0The week before last, I reported on the landslide taking shape in District 32A, Kurt Zellers’ district in Maple Grove. \u00a0The DFL’s been targeting that district all year, but it’s just not working – Zellers is clobbering Katie Rodriguez by 24 points<\/a>, even though Margaret Anderson-Kelliher proclaimed the district to be prime upset territory bare weeks earlier.<\/p>\n

But the real <\/em>development in that story, as I noted, was that independents – people who are non-GOP-affiliated in that GOP-leaning district – are breaking toward Emmer by a 4-1 margin.<\/p>\n

And in this SUSA poll, we see for the first time in this cycle that Independents are trending toward Emmer, 37-35 (with 19 for Horner). \u00a0Independents tend to make up their mind at the last possible moment; this next two weeks is Go time.<\/p>\n

It’s inside the margin of error, to be sure – but it’s trended up in since the last SUSA poll, while Dayton’s support has trended down.<\/p>\n

So how does Emmer win this thing?<\/p>\n

Show them that he’s got an actual plan<\/strong>: As this campaign has progressed, it’s become painfully clear that Dayton’s budget “plan” is nothing but wishful thinking<\/a>; its entire focus is on taxes (barring a few ludicrous putative spending cuts that flunk every stink test from here to MPR<\/a>), as opposed to the spending cuts a majority of Minnesotans favor<\/strong>. \u00a0Emmer’s plan is real, it’s rational, the numbers check out <\/em>(unlike either Horner’s or Dayton’s). \u00a0Emmer must hammer this<\/em>. \u00a053% of Minnesotans, say SUSA, are ready and waiting.<\/p>\n

Point out that Dayton and Horner’s “plans” are vaporware<\/strong>. There is no there there. \u00a0The plans don’t pass any <\/em>fact-checks. \u00a0And Dayton’s is utterly dead on arrival with the legislature<\/a>. \u00a0(“But so is Emmer’s”, the leftybloggers bleat, ignoring the fact that Emmer’s plan can virtually pass on pure inertia, as opposed to Dayton’s, which will require a legislative miracle – and to paraphrase Monsieur Ferrari, the Tea Party has outlawed legislative miracles that involve hiking taxes or spending). \u00a0In a legislative cycle where voters want things to get done<\/em>, Dayton and Horner’s plans are both complete wastes of time, <\/em>doomed from inception.<\/p>\n

He Rides The Tide<\/strong>: It’s not just a, er, shot in the dark on my part. \u00a0Rasmussen notes a bit of recent history:<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd by two-to-one, voters say they prefer a congressman who will reduce overall spending to one who promises to bring a \u2018fair share\u2019 of government spending to their congressional district,\u201d the veteran pollster said, adding that a plurality of Texas voters backed Texas Gov. Rick Perry\u2019s recent decision to turn down federal dollars a program because federal strings were attached to it.<\/p>\n

The Republicans\u2019 strong position three weeks before midterm elections began, Rasmussen recalled, \u201cwhen every Republican [in the House] said they would oppose the stimulus package…And support for it never recovered.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\u201cAnd by two-to-one, voters say they prefer a congressman who will reduce overall spending to one who promises to bring a \u2018fair share\u2019 of government spending to their congressional district,\u201d the veteran pollster said, adding that a plurality of Texas voters backed Texas Gov. Rick Perry\u2019s recent decision to turn down federal dollars a program because federal strings were attached to it.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

So that’s how Emmer wins this thing; show that 53% of Minnesotans that he’s got the answer.<\/p>\n

We can all, help, of course. Pass the word. \u00a0I don’t remotely believe that the major polls’ likely voter models accurately predict likely voter turnout – but there’s no reason not <\/em>to make sure everyone gets the facts.<\/p>\n

Emmer’s going to win this thing. \u00a0Suck it up and let’s make this happen.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In this past week, Minnesota has been presented with four different polls on the Minnesota governor’s race; the risible\u00a0Minnesota poll, the oddly-disconnected Humphrey Institute Poll, the Rasmussen Poll (which may or may not have overpolled Republicans, as opposed to the MN and HHH polls, which certainly overpolled Democrats) and, late last week, the SurveyUSA (SUSA) […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[60,101],"tags":[312],"class_list":["post-14423","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-campaign-10","category-what-the-hell","tag-mngov-2010"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14423","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=14423"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14423\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":47656,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14423\/revisions\/47656"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=14423"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=14423"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=14423"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}