Republicans Sweating As Democrats Hold Leads In Georgia’s Senate And Governor Races

[babylonsister]

http://www.politicususa.com/2014/09/15/republicans-sweating-democrats-hold-leads-georgias-senate-governor-races.html

Republicans Sweating As Democrats Hold Leads In Georgia’s Senate And Governor Races
By: Justin Baragona
Monday, September, 15th, 2014


All the talk of a Republican takeover of the US Senate after this year’s midterms may have been a bit premature as a new poll in Georgia shows that Democratic candidate Michelle Nunn holds a three-point lead over Republican nominee David Perdue for Georgia’s open Senate seat. The seat is currently held by retiring Republican incumbent Saxby Chambliss. The poll, conducted by Landmark Communications, has Nunn up on Perdue, 46% to 43%. The poll’s margin of error is 2.9%, so Nunn’s lead is razor-thin. However, considering that Georgia is a deep-red state, it has to be extremely disheartening for Republicans to see themselves down in a race where they’d normally be holding a comfortable lead.

The GOP is also taking its lumps in the race for governor. Incumbent Governor Nathan Deal is currently trailing his Democratic opponent, State Senator Jason Carter. Like Nunn, Carter is the beneficiary of a famous last name. While Nunn is the daughter of former US Senator Sam Nunn, Carter’s grandfather is Jimmy Carter, the 39th President of the United States. The poll shows Carter leads Deal by three points, 47% to 44%. With Deal dealing with an ethics investigation, along with general voter dissatisfaction over his policies, trend lines seem to be pointing in a Democratic direction.

For both Nunn and Carter, their path to victory lies with women, African-Americans and independent voters. If they can energize these bases and have them show up on Election Day, then both candidates should have no problem pulling out victories. Both Carter and Nunn hold commanding leads with all three voter groups. When it comes to black voters, Nunn leads Perdue by a whopping 74 points while Carter is up on Deal, 79% to 12%. Women favor Nunn by 13 points while Carter is up by 15 points over Deal. Independents prefer Nunn over Perdue by a nearly 20-point margin while Carter holds a 19-point lead over Deal.

Republicans need to flip six Democratic Senate seats in order to grab the majority this year. Currently, it seems all but a given that Democrats will lose three seats that they currently control (South Dakota, West Virginia and Montana) as retirements/resignations in these red states have opened the door for Republicans to swoop in and grab them up. With that considered, the GOP only needs to pick up three other seats while not losing any of theirs. With so many competitive races and Democrats being forced to defend so many seats, the odds seemed stacked against the Dems. However, Republicans are now seeing that they are vulnerable in three states (Kentucky, Georgia and Kansas) and could lose any or all of them, making it increasingly difficult to overtake the Senate.

While Democrats are still extremely vulnerable this November and the GOP has a very good shot at taking over the Senate, conditions are looking more and more favorable for Democrats. Democratic incumbents and candidates in swing states are starting to pull away from their opponents, especially as many GOP candidates are revealing themselves to be extremists with far-right agendas that are putting off voters.

[Thinkingabout]

1. It has always been important to vote, when races are tight it is more important to get

Democrats out to vote, take your friends, check on those who may not have ID's and we can send the GOP strategy to the moon, let then think of a new way to stop Democrats from voting. It is getting exciting.

[Tarheel_Dem]

2. And Kay Hagan is up 4 over Tillis right now in NC. Not a huge advantage, but I'll take it.

[babylonsister]

4. YAY!!!

[sheshe2]

3. Let's make them sweat now and then

watch their heads explode when the Dems win!

I am loving this, bsis!

GOTV2014

[Cha]

5. Neck and Neck.. GOTV2014!! Mahalo babylonsistah~

[OldRedneck]

6. Let's not forget:

2016 when the GOTP has TWENTY-THREE Senators up for re-election.

[japple]

7. As a voter from GA in a very red corner of the state, I can only depend on the news

from GPB and it looks like the race is even from what I have heard, flipping up (dem.) or down (gop) from week to week. We cannot rest until the day after election day. GOTV folks. Oh, and spay and neuter your critters, too.

[brer cat]

10. Are you referring to our republican critters?

[japple]

13. Most assuredly! Spay and neuter your

reps!

[McCamy Taylor]

8. But don't they still have the hackable E-voting machines that stole 2002?

And afterwards, won't the press make up some phoney-baloney "Bradley effect" story or maybe another version of "reluctant responders" to explain the discrepancy? Maybe they will claim that people's urge for health care goes down when they get close to voting machines.

[babylonsister]

9. This is GA:

it's full of crooks, so I don't know how legit the election will be. But I can hope, and vote!

[riqster]

16. Turnout neutralizes most hacks. Close elections are easiest to steal.

[questionseverything]

18. if turn out is large enough

it can help overcome the "hack" because the numbers reported will not make sense but then the ptb have to actually do something about it....which hardly ever happens

siegleman's election was stolen in 2002 by simply manipulating numbers in the middle of the night

http://www.bradblog.com/?p=6335

people need to count there own precincts by simply talking to their friends and neighbors, people need to watch the accumulation of reported votes (as they did last year in the ag race in virginia)

[riqster]

20. Same thing with Ohio in 2004. But the bigger the margin, the riskier it is to do.

It is not a coincidence that we had the White House stolen in 2000 and 2004, but not in 2008 or 2012: the margin was bigger. The in-place hacks are predicated on a predicted margin. If we exceed the projections, they have to do it manually, and explain the exit polls and such.

Nothing can make an election 100% safe, but turnout is one tool that we can control.

[questionseverything]

21. here is documentation of a manual change

http://www.bradblog.com/?p=7875

while i agree turn out has an impact i think watching the accumulation of results is important also

[riqster]

22. Oh, vigilance is important.

Not arguing at all.

For a good example of an automated hack, watch "hacking democracy" by Simon and Russell on HBO.

[questionseverything]

23. we are in agreement

just expanding of your idea of high turn out being necessary

[riqster]

25. Yes, it is necessary. But it cannot succeed alone.

We pretty much have to do everything the law allows, and do it en masse, if we are to succeed.

[AndyTiedye]

27. They Stole Double Digits in 2002

Sen. Max Cleland and Gov. Roy Barnes were ahead by double-digit leads the weekend before the 2002 elections.
They "lost", in the first elections counted by the newly-installed Diebold DRE voting machines.

Turnout cannot neutralize hacks when ALL of the votes are cast on Diebold Republican Electing Machinez.
Gotta get rid of those machines.

[riqster]

28. Yep. Those things were designed to commit fraud.

[trishtrash]

29. Amen sister!

I got a call from the Carter campaign this week. I voiced my support, made a donation, and then was told Mr. Carter wanted to speak with me. I said, no need, but the next thing I knew I was talking to Jason Carter himself. What a well-spoken, personable man he is.

[aikoaiko]

11. Yeah, baby. This is how it happens.

[freshwest]

12. Thanks for the good word... I know all our GA Dems are working on this!

[Laelth]

14. k&r for Jason Carter and Michelle Nunn. n/t

-Laelth

[Botany]

15. I hope people in Georgia vote early and on paper

In 2002 both Max Cleland and Gov. Roy Barnes had exit poll wins but
then Dibold did its work.

[questionseverything]

17. yea siegleman went to bed thinking he had won

during the night numbers were changed and viola....dems lose again


http://www.bradblog.com/?p=6335

[Botany]

19. Alabama not Georgia but the same election and the same K Rove operation

BTW After the election Diebold came into Georgia to "work on" their
ERD voting machines ..... they worked on the time stamps on the
ballots and the machines.

[muntrv]

24. Get Out The Vote, folks!

[mtngirl47]

26. My hope for Georgia is

that all the old Democrats who have been voting Republican will become nostalgic over the Nunn and Carter names. I'm hoping they will all remember the good years in Georgia before the Republicans took over.

[madville]

30. True toss-ups at this point

Hopefully it will continue to trend our way, 5 out of the 6 latest polls have Deal ahead of Carter by an average of about 3 points.

4 out of 5 of the latest for the Senate race have Perdue ahead of Nunn by about 3 points on average as well.

Turn out will decide these, going to be very close whichever way it goes. I just hope the state's Democrats show up, lackluster turnout is always a possibility.

[MannyGoldstein]

31. It's politicususa: did you happen to fact-check the article?

They often invent things.

Hopefully this is true!

[lovemydog]

32. Go Georgia Democrats!

Help turn the South blue.

There's more work ahead. That is, forcing democratic candidates to be more responsive to their voters. More populist. More progressive. But first things first.

Defeat the republicans.