I wouldn’t use a Rasmussen poll to wipe myself, but there is one bit of good news in their polling of Harry Reid’s chances for reelection. It’s this:
From the pollster’s analysis: “Seventy-nine percent (79%) of Nevada voters say they have followed news reports about Reid’s comments about Obama, including 55% who have followed very closely. But his bigger problem appears to be his championing of a health care plan that remains unpopular in his home state.”
I don’t think the health care bill will be much of a topic in November (provided it passes). There will be elements of the bill that are popular and elements that are unpopular, but the unpopular bits will not have kicked in yet by November, while many of the popular elements will have. Either way, the issues that will be at the forefront of the electorate’s mind are bound to be different from what they are right now.
So, if what’s weighing Reid down right now the most is his high profile role in leading the health care fight, he doesn’t have to worry too much about that carrying over and hurting him in the fall. In fact, it’s likely to be a net positive for him by then.
The recent controversy about his comments about Obama isn’t helpful, but the Republicans aren’t going to win a debate over who is more concerned and responsive to the needs and desires of the African-American community. I suspect this controversy will have next to zero impact on the November election.
I think the problem Reid has is probably something that is shared with all other elected officials in Nevada. Their economy is terrible and they are suffering through one of the worst foreclosure crises in the country. People are hurting and they are blaming incumbents of both parties. Reid’s other problem is not something he can control. As the Majority Leader, he is the face of the Democratic Party, and that motivates his opponents to a higher degree than what an average senator faces. So, he has a highly motivated opposition, an anti-incumbent mood, and an inability to cast strategic votes against his party to kind of soften the partisan edges. He’s also not the greatest retail politician. Add it all up, and he’s very vulnerable. But he’s also got a big money advantage, the support of labor in a state where that really matters, ties to the Mormon community that Republicans need to win state-wide elections, and the seniority and power that no prospective backbencher from the minority can hope to match.
His poll numbers, I predict, are as low as they are going to go. The question is whether he can make a comeback in popularity so that he doesn’t have to spend all his money destroying his eventual opponent to get to a point where he has a chance. That’s the situation Jon Corzine found himself in, and he couldn’t get over the hump. But Corzine’s problems were deeper, more substantive, and completely topical at the time of the election. Reid has more reason for hope.
Well you’re right about that last. It’s hard to go down below one third re-elect numbers anywhere. I mean Bush did it, but Bush is a special case.
But it’s more than the economy. Reid has had negative favorables for years as you can see from the chart it began after he became Majority Leader in 2006.
http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_ov-pT1x-W8Y/S0rphTzdcBI/AAAAAAAADS8/8O7Vxy3fWxM/s400/reid.png
That could be because the senate gets nothing done, republican obstructionism, ineffectiveness on his part or a combination thereof. But people have hated his guts for years now.
It’s because he’s the face of the Dem Party and that riles up anyone who isn’t 100% down with the party. And he can’t trim votes or separate himself from the party to appeal to independents.
interesting graphic. l think the correlation between his negatives and his position as majority leader is crucial here.
perhaps harry should consider resigning as majority leader and go back to representing his constituents. that’d be a win-win in my estimation. he’s certainly not been successful in that role, he’s just not a strategist, always being gamed by the RAT oppo and his own centrists. his PO debacle really was the last straw, imo. it’s time to give durbin a shot at it. it’s hard to imagine he’d be any worse. schumer, otoh, would probably be more of the same..
He could make a good case by resigning the leadership position — “As majority leader, I feel that we accomplished tremendous things with the healthcare reform that passed after such a bare-knuckles fight to put the interests of the American people above those of insurance company CEOs. I am proud of winning a fight, if not the whole battle, that our leaders have been attempting for a century. But Nevada has been hard hit by the Bush economic crash. I feel that now I need to focus like a laser on what Nevada needs to climb out of the depression that was thrust upon us. I need to stand up to rapacious bankers and CEOs with a single-minded ferocity that I cannot always bring to bear as the face of the Senate majority….”
Isn’t it sad that people do not bother to listen and learn about what caused things like economic downturns before they blame people.
It is one thing to take your anger out on someone if you think they caused it. But, it is another if other things caused it and you are just looking for a scapegoat and end up cutting off your nose.
I keep hearing this mantra of term limits and I wonder if these people ever learned that we do have elections and if someone is not doing a good job —
And if you lose a senator that is trying to do their job, but, you are mad and need to punish someone, and this senator has seniority then you lose out.
I guess I am just tired of everyone with their knee jerk reactions and need to point fingers if things are not taken care of immediately – even if the other party caused it and it took them 8 years to do the destruction.
i would like to reid’s approval ratings among nevada Democrats and among likely voters.
It seems far from over. My sense is that the pendulum is swinging back in his favor as people start to realize that HCR was a great step forward even if it didn’t give anyone everything they hoped for. He can make a good case that its provision will help Nevadans enormously, even to the point of helping to revive the economy and boost employment. As noted above, though, a case can be made that he might improve his chances by resigning gracefully as majority leader.
This does not help burnish Reid’s credibility:
because NO ONE could have predicted that one. just as surprising as Lieberman, right?
Easy enough to turn around — we wanted this to be a bipartisan reform. Snowe insisted that that’s what she wanted too. That turned out to be false from the starting gate. From now on we have to operate on the assumption that not a single Republican senator is interested in fixing our healthcare mess, that there’s no such thing as a moderate Republican. There is still much reform needed in healthcare, environment, the economy, equal justice, and security, but we now know that he only way we’ll get there is to elect more Democrats to Congress.
Part of me agrees with you, but how’s that gonna work if we slip below sixty votes? Somehow, we have to keep feelers out and find ways to peel off at least a few Republican votes. We’ll need that next year if we don’t hold or net Senate seats. Meanwhile, something must be done about Rule 22.
I guess we’ll find out what happens to Lindsey Graham on climate change. I don’t think it’s possible to peel off Republican votes. Not after what’s been done to Crist.
in case you missed it; there was a very interesting opinion piece in the NYT the other day regarding rule 22: Mr. Smith Rewrites the Constitution
l don’t think the supremes are the answer, given the current make up of the court, but he makes some valid points that the dems should be considering.
Isn’t “original intent” supposed to be a conservative object of worship? The article makes a solid case that the current incarnation of the filibuster trashes the intent of the founders. Not that principle or logic have much standing in this court.
they’re only ‘strict constructionists’ when it suits the republican agenda. the late john hart ely has characterized strict constructionism as “not really a philosophy of law or a theory of interpretation, but a coded label for judicial decisions popular with a particular political party”.
wiki
What I was trying to say is, the 100 percent GOP obstruction can help us gain seats instead of lose them. If Snowe or somebody had cooperated we’d have a harder argument. Thanks to her and the other Noes we can make an absolute argument: Republicans, all of them, are toxic to every effort to fix what a Republican administration broke. We’ve all seen that there’s no such thing as a “moderate” Republican. The only way out of the mess they created is to put more Democrats in Congress.
how many republican votes have we peeled off so far?
Well, Specter flipped.
Since then, we’ve got Collins and Snowe on a couple of things, Lugar is supporting Dawn Johnsen. Graham is sounding open on climate change. There are areas where we can get a couple, but in this environment, it’s hard for Republicans to cross the aisle.
specter didn’t flip. he abandoned ship entirely, and until he got a primary from sestak, he was set to be a no on EFCA, a no on Johnsen, and a no on HCR.
we didn’t peel him off, he jumped. you can’t peel off these republicans. Even Harry Reid seems to have figured that one out.
I don’t dispute the meat of what you’re saying, but if we have fewer than 60 votes in the causus come 2011, we’ll have no choice but to win the votes of one or two or three Republicans. And we need to remember that because how we deal with them now will have an impact on how things will work next year. That’s all I’m saying.
well, so far dealing with them with inclusiveness, respect, and courtesy hasn’t worked: just ask max baucus and harry reid. Lugar may be supporting Johnsen, but i don’t trust Graham. Snowe has already shown herself to be an obstructionist with a smiley face. So when you say “how we deal with them now will have an impact on how things will work next year”, i don’t know if i understand where you’re coming from. I’m no psychic, but I know exactly how things will work next year: if the Dems hold seats, the GOP will try to obstruct everything. If the Dems lose seats, the GOP will try to obstruct everything. It’s what they do. It’s their trick.
You and I both know this is true: sometimes I think you believe the senate can be what it was, kind of a clubby place. but it’s not that anymore. So far as i’m concerned, the republicans need to be made to eat shit, the same way they made the democrats eat shit from 1994 on.
i agree we need to do something about rule 22.
Saying that the health care bill is unpopular in Nevada does not say why it is unpopular. In the early fall, a majority in Nevada approved of a health care plan with a public option. Think that his bungling of healthcare in the Senate might be a problem? Think that his waking up late to the idea that Snowe and Lieberman might doublecross him might be a problem?
His biggest problem is he is perceived as a majority leader who can’t lead.