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Friday, October 15, 2010

Are there Kosmas Polls We Don't See?

The news this week that the DCCC was pulling out of Florida's 24th was widely viewed as a sign that Suzanne Kosmas is toast. The move surprises me, because the race looks neck-and-neck from where I sit. That doesn't mean the conclusions are wrong. It just seems odd to me that the nationals would give up on Kosmas just when it felt like fighting time.

It makes me wonder if there are polls sitting in the DCCC offices to which we aren't privy. That's no surprise of course. Partisans tend to release polls with good news and sit on polls with bad news. But then, Sandy Adams hasn't exactly been issuing repeated polls showing a growing margin. Obviously, if things are tight, I'd rather save Alan Grayson myself, but then, I think we can still win both of these seats.

The last poll released by the NRCC, back on Sept. 28, put Adams 10 points ahead. But the day before,Kosmas put out a poll showing herself up by 7. Since then, its been silence from both camps. Unfortunately, House races don't get polled enough, so its hard to tell what to make of these polls. While internals are treated with skepticism because campaigns are reserved about what they release, candidates still need accurate information on where they stand.

Compare the data to a recent Sunshine State out of Florida's second which shows Steve Southerland trouncing incumbent Allen Boyd 56-30. Now even pessimists have questioned this poll, which gives a couple of also-ran candidates a combined 14 percent of the vote. But nobody in Democratic circles is yet talking about throwing in the towel in the Panhandle seat Boyd holds now.

Maybe it's because Boyd is a long-time incumbent and Kosmas is a freshmen. Maybe they figure Kosmas' seat was hand-drawn for Tom Feeney and we just got jucky two years ago when the Abramoff scandal swallowed Feeney whole. But this whole thing just seems odd.

The thing is, Sandy Adams has been the subject of much negative coverage since winning the GOP primary. Her extremist positions on the 17th amendment and a woman's right to choose make her prone to effective attack ads. When Florida Today endorsed Kosmas, they said Adams "lack of knowledge about NASA is appalling," something which matters a great deal in this space-happy district. And while we're talking endorsements, Kosmas snagged the support of the Republican-leaning Orlando Sentinel as well.


3 comments:

  1. In the past the Sentinel leaned in the direction of the GOP but in recent years that really hasn't been as true. They endorsed Obama in 2008 and have endorsed large numbers of Democrats for various seats in the last two election cycles. Today's Sentinel is pretty independent, both in their endorsements and in the mix of op-ed columnists they run

    They did endorse Daniel Webster over that nutjob Grayson, but I would expect any reasonably objective newspaper to do that

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  2. You know, it's too bad that the two sharpest cartoonists of recent memory, Doug Marlotte (Kudzu) and Jeff MacNelly (Shoe, Pluggers) died so young. It would be fun to have their take on today's political scene

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  3. I still see them as leaning to the right. When they endorsed Obama, and John Kerry for that matter, it was a rebuke of the Bush administration. They endorsed Jeb Bush both times, and Crist in '06. This time, they have endorsed Rubio for Senate, and I know they backed Mel Martinez as well. They did Sink this go-round, but so has just about everyone. Even they heavily-Republican Tampa Tribune, which I admit is far more conservative than the Sentinel, endorsed Sink.

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