Brad Ellsworth Stinks At Math
One of the 219 Democrats who voted in favor of Obamacare Sunday night was Indiana’s Brad Ellsworth, the Democrat nominee for the Senate seat being vacated by Evan Bayh in November. It was said by a number of pundits when Ellsworth announced over the weekend that he would vote for the bill that he was essentially surrendering his chances of winning that Senate seat.
A Rasmussen poll out today confirms that suspicion. Ellsworth is a dead duck.
There are three major Republican challengers for Bayh’s seat, all of whom lead Ellsworth in polling done before his vote for Obamacare. Former Congressman John Hostettler leads Ellsworth 50-32, former Senator Dan Coats has a 49-34 lead and state senator Marlin Stutzman, a fresh, attractive candidate enamored by Tea Party groups who many think might be the dark horse winner in the race, leads Ellsworth 41-34.
Ellsworth can’t command more than 34 percent support in any matchup with the Republican contenders.
Will that change much? It’s difficult to answer in the affirmative. Rasmussen also polled Obamacare in his Indiana sample, and found that by a 63-35 margin Hoosier State voters oppose the health care plan – with 54 percent saying they Strongly Oppose Obamacare (just 21 percent strongly favor it). In other words, all the GOP candidate, whoever it might be, needs to do is make the campaign a referendum on Ellsworth’s vote for Obamacare and it’s impossible for the Democrat to win.
Strategically speaking, one might argue it is races like these, when a Republican victory is all but a foregone conclusion, in which the most conservative candidate possible should be nominated on the GOP side. After all, Democrats nominate Nancy Pelosi, Barney Frank, Bobby Rush and Charlie Rangel in their respective districts – they don’t nominate Sam Nunn or Parker Griffith. If abuses like Obamacare are going to be rolled back, it won’t be with a Republican Senate caucus dominated full of Richard Lugars and Lindsey Grahams.
Meanwhile, Rasmussen’s daily presidential tracking poll shows that Barack Obama is getting a bounce from the passage of Obamacare – among Democrats only. His Approval Index is now minus-10, with 41 percent Strong Disapproval and 31 percent Stong Approval. But among Republicans, 70 percent strongly disapprove of Obama (58 percent of Democrats strongly approve), and among independent voters his Approval Index is a woeful minus-22, as 45 percent strongly disapprove against only 23 percent strong approval). Obama’s overall approval score has him upside down by a 52-48 margin.
I'm still stunned. You can look back on it and wonder why the Democratic leadership did it, when they could have at least let Ellsworth stay with the Stupak group to the end and pretend to have some pro-life convictions, which would have at least been marginally better for him.
I think that the answer is that Ellsworth's defection was the key to cracking the Stupak group. As a U.S. Senate candidate, Ellsworth had the highest profile of the group besides Stupak, and I think his defection led to Carney's and then the strong push from Rahall, Mollohan, Dahlkemper, and (especially) Kaptur to make a deal — any kind of deal.
I don't know if Pelosi had video of Ellsworth in tickle fights or what, but if you're looking for a scapegoat, Ellsworth is a better one than Stupak in my opinion. If Ellsworth hadn't defected when he did, the Stupak group might have held together at a dozen for a while and Stupak would have actually had the leverage to either truly modify the bill to protect the unborn or to bring the bill down. Without Ellsworth's flip, I don't think the bill would not have passed in its current form.
I'm still stunned. You can look back on it and wonder why the Democratic leadership did it, when they could have at least let Ellsworth stay with the Stupak group to the end and pretend to have some pro-life convictions, which would have at least been marginally better for him.
I think that the answer is that Ellsworth's defection was the key to cracking the Stupak group. As a U.S. Senate candidate, Ellsworth had the highest profile of the group besides Stupak, and I think his defection led to Carney's and then the strong push from Rahall, Mollohan, Dahlkemper, and (especially) Kaptur to make a deal — any kind of deal.
I don't know if Pelosi had video of Ellsworth in tickle fights or what, but if you're looking for a scapegoat, Ellsworth is a better one than Stupak in my opinion. If Ellsworth hadn't defected when he did, the Stupak group might have held together at a dozen for a while and Stupak would have actually had the leverage to either truly modify the bill to protect the unborn or to bring the bill down. Without Ellsworth's flip, I don't think the bill would not have passed in its current form.
Nate Silver of fivethirtyeight.com, though extremely liberal, came up with a good statistical way to compare members of Congress votes to the partisan makeup of their districts. When you look at things that way, Joseph Cao becomes the most valuable member of Congress to the GOP, because he votes much, much more conservatively than you would expect from a district that went 75-23% for Obama.
That is also why the Club for Growth is pushing a primary campaign against Sen. Bennett of Utah. He's a middle-of-the-road Republican in the most conservative state in the union. Utah should have a much more conservative senator. They oppose Crist for the same reason. I'm sure Lindsey Graham will eventually get the same treatment.
In the same vein, I'm quite comfortable supporting moderate Senate candidates like Kirk and Castle because Illinois and Delaware are liberal states and it would be hard for them to elect someone more conservative.
At some point, I'm going to compile a target list of candidates to support. This is going to be a wave election, and we need to capitalize on it the best we can.
Nate Silver of fivethirtyeight.com, though extremely liberal, came up with a good statistical way to compare members of Congress votes to the partisan makeup of their districts. When you look at things that way, Joseph Cao becomes the most valuable member of Congress to the GOP, because he votes much, much more conservatively than you would expect from a district that went 75-23% for Obama.
That is also why the Club for Growth is pushing a primary campaign against Sen. Bennett of Utah. He's a middle-of-the-road Republican in the most conservative state in the union. Utah should have a much more conservative senator. They oppose Crist for the same reason. I'm sure Lindsey Graham will eventually get the same treatment.
In the same vein, I'm quite comfortable supporting moderate Senate candidates like Kirk and Castle because Illinois and Delaware are liberal states and it would be hard for them to elect someone more conservative.
At some point, I'm going to compile a target list of candidates to support. This is going to be a wave election, and we need to capitalize on it the best we can.
I tend to believe that this congress is in serious trouble. Before this boondoggle of a health care bill was passed, the general feel was that the progressives would lose the house. The way that they passed the bill only strengthens that theory.
The problem comes with what happens next. If the president were smart, he would back off and let the anger somewhat lessen. That is not what he is going to do. He will push the accelerator to the floor and accelerate in to the proverbial tree.
If the keep going forward on other parts of his agenda, like Amnesty, they will be in more that serious trouble. It they keep going forward, then it could give the other side a veto proof majority.
That's the thing — he has to push for amnesty now. A promise to do just that is what got the House Hispanic Caucus on board the Obamacare train. They were going to vote no otherwise. If he doesn't, he'll face an open revolt in Congress.
I think he's going to get an open revolt in Congress either way. All weekend long there were quotes attributed to unnamed Democrats in the House to the tune of "I've cast my last difficult vote for this guy this term." Dragging them through the much on Obamacare exhausted a ton of capital and I don't think these guys have enough unless they can get Graham and the two lobster hags from Maine to offer them bipartisan cover.
I anxiously await him coming out on amnesty, though, because if he's dumb enough to go there now that the American people are more engaged in politics than we've been since 1968 it's going to turn a 55-60 vote swing in the House and 6-8 in the Senate to something more like 90-100 seats in the House and 10-12 in the Senate – and he still won't get his bill passed.
On amnesty, though, I think that most of the Democratic caucus has convinced themselves that illegals represent a nice new pool of 30 million or so voters who can be counted on to pull the "D" lever. I think most of them want it and don't care that it's unpopular.
They indeed have, though if they expect that the new flood of illegals they'll make legal are going to help them in 2010 or 2012 they're horribly misguided; even in the most vigorous ACORNing of the vote they're not going to be able to make those people citizens and register to vote in time to save them in those two cycles. By 2014 it's possible they would begin seeing some benefits of such a move, but I would expect the federal government to be bankrupt by then and the entire game will have changed.
I tend to believe that this congress is in serious trouble. Before this boondoggle of a health care bill was passed, the general feel was that the progressives would lose the house. The way that they passed the bill only strengthens that theory.
The problem comes with what happens next. If the president were smart, he would back off and let the anger somewhat lessen. That is not what he is going to do. He will push the accelerator to the floor and accelerate in to the proverbial tree.
If the keep going forward on other parts of his agenda, like Amnesty, they will be in more that serious trouble. It they keep going forward, then it could give the other side a veto proof majority.
That's the thing — he has to push for amnesty now. A promise to do just that is what got the House Hispanic Caucus on board the Obamacare train. They were going to vote no otherwise. If he doesn't, he'll face an open revolt in Congress.
I think he's going to get an open revolt in Congress either way. All weekend long there were quotes attributed to unnamed Democrats in the House to the tune of "I've cast my last difficult vote for this guy this term." Dragging them through the much on Obamacare exhausted a ton of capital and I don't think these guys have enough unless they can get Graham and the two lobster hags from Maine to offer them bipartisan cover.
I anxiously await him coming out on amnesty, though, because if he's dumb enough to go there now that the American people are more engaged in politics than we've been since 1968 it's going to turn a 55-60 vote swing in the House and 6-8 in the Senate to something more like 90-100 seats in the House and 10-12 in the Senate – and he still won't get his bill passed.
On amnesty, though, I think that most of the Democratic caucus has convinced themselves that illegals represent a nice new pool of 30 million or so voters who can be counted on to pull the "D" lever. I think most of them want it and don't care that it's unpopular.
They indeed have, though if they expect that the new flood of illegals they'll make legal are going to help them in 2010 or 2012 they're horribly misguided; even in the most vigorous ACORNing of the vote they're not going to be able to make those people citizens and register to vote in time to save them in those two cycles. By 2014 it's possible they would begin seeing some benefits of such a move, but I would expect the federal government to be bankrupt by then and the entire game will have changed.
[...] guy, Stupak hasn’t pointed the finger at the others in his group who were selling out, but as I mentioned in the comments to Scott’s post, if you’re looking for a scapegoat, Brad Ellsworth is a better [...]