With local race a snoozer, will Menendez suffer in Plainfield?

*
Blog-posting difficulties drove me from the house yesterday -- thankfully -- but you know politics didn't take a holiday. Went out and enjoyed the Mystery Mansions tour -- great job by the VWB crew!

On the tour, I ran across some workers putting up Menendez and Dem Council candidate signs and handing out materials for the local Dem slate of Van Blake, Burney and Gibson as well as those REALLY BIG Menendez doorhangers.

These were NEW DEMS, you should know. No other Dem workers were spotted in the area.

So, with one week to go...how ARE things going?


PT monitored the pundits and papers over the weekend, snagging the following observations --

On Saturday, Taegan Goddard's Political Wire, an online content partner of the Congressional Quarterly, reported --

"In New Jersey's U.S. Senate race, a new Rasmussen Reports poll shows Sen. Bob Menendez (D-NJ) and Tom Kean Jr. (R) in a tie at 43% each.

"A New York Times poll earlier this week also found the race tied.

"Key finding: 'What’s truly amazing about these numbers is the fact that Menendez can’t pull away despite the deep Blue nature of the state. By a margin of 54% to 36%, New Jersey voters prefer Democratic control of the Senate. But Menendez attracts only 74% of those who want Democrats running things.'"

That last sentence should be troubling for Dems charged with getting the vote out.

At 4 PM on Saturday, Congressional Quarterly posted its overview of competitive Senate contests, with this to say on the Menendez/Kean race --

No Clear Favorite
[...]
New Jersey Robert Menendez (D)
Vote for winner in 2000: 50 percent
"Menendez benefits from the Democratic lean of a state that hasn’t elected a Republican senator since 1972. He may need that edge to pull through. After 13 years in the House, he has had only a few months to establish himself as a statewide incumbent — in January, Democrat Jon Corzine tapped him to fill the seat he vacated to become governor — in the face of a GOP barrage portraying him as a corrupt urban “boss.” He also faces the problem of a challenger with a better-known name: Tom Kean Jr.’s father was a popular two-term governor. Kean wears his dad’s mantle as a GOP moderate. But Menendez brands Kean as callow and shallow, unable to spell out his views despite some efforts by Kean to distance himself from Bush. The challenger does support the Iraq War, however."

Over at Political Wire on Sunday, the good folks were busy slicing and dicing the New Jersey race somewhat differently --

"Though two recent polls show New Jersey's U.S. Senate race tied, a new Research 2000 poll gives Sen. Bob Menendez (D) a six point edge over Tom Kean Jr. (R), 48% to 42%.
"Key findings: 'The poll found the electorate sharply split by gender. Women preferred Menendez 52% to 37%, while Kean had a three-point edge among men. Kean also held a five-point lead in South Jersey, while Menendez had a 10-point lead in the more populous northern part of the state.""

The Research2000 citation led PT to the Bergen Record Sunday story ("Menendez has a narrow lead, but it's Kean N.J. trusts"), whose headline neatly captures the differences between North and South Jersey on Kean and Menendez. Guess who has more votes?

Having more votes does not, however, mean an AUTOMATIC win, as the New York Times warned ("A Race That Could Tip the Balance") --

"With little more than a week before the midterm elections, the battle between Mr. Kean and Mr. Menendez remains one of the tightest races in the country, although New Jersey’s electoral history would seem to favor the incumbent, even if he was named to the job last year after Jon S. Corzine traded his Senate seat for the governor’s mansion.

"A New York Times/CBS News poll released on Thursday revealed just how close the race is. In the poll, 38 percent of voters surveyed said they were supporting Mr. Menendez and 36 percent said they were backing Mr. Kean. With a margin of sampling error of plus or minus three percentage points, Mr. Menendez’s lead remains statistically insignificant.

"Adding even more uncertainty to the outcome is that 19 percent of voters said they were still undecided and more than a third of each candidate’s supporters said they might change their minds before Election Day."

On Sunday, Times correspondent Peter Applebome weighed in with his Jersey diner observations --

"In New Jersey and elsewhere, we’re defined almost completely by what we’re not (Rove-ian right-wingers. Liberal whack jobs) rather than by what we are.

"What that means for the United States Senate race in New Jersey is no big secret. So on the one hand, we have Helen Dluhy, who scrunches up her face and gives the thumbs down sign when asked about Senator Robert Menendez, in her view, yet another ethically challenged Democrat. 'Every time you read the paper there’s something not kosher about him,' she said.

"And on the other we have Stephen Hynes, who voted as recently as 2000 for a Republican, Bob Franks, when he ran for the Senate against Jon S. Corzine, but has no interest in giving the Republican candidate, Thomas H. Kean Jr., a look this year. 'I think the Republicans have moved so far to the right that people who might have considered Kean won’t do it now,' he said. 'I’m voting for Menendez because I want the Democrats to take the seat.'”

Gov. Corzine was also overheard on TV Sunday morning worrying that the effect of the Kean ad bliltz may be to DISCOURAGE Dem voter turnout.

BOTTOM LINE? As PT has been saying for weeks now, it's all going to boil down to the ground war -- also known as KNOCK AND DRAG -- getting the voters out.

There are plenty of indications that just relying on the Dem base in New Jersey may not hack it.

So the Dems have had to develop a two-pronged strategy -- getting INDEPENDENTS to vote Dem and SQUEEZING EVERY VOTE POSSIBLE OUT OF THE HEAVILY DEM CITIES.

A note on the Ferguson / Stender House race (also see the coverage of their debate yesterday in today's CLIPS) --

Chris Bowers, over at MyDD, has been watching the HOUSE RACES. By his reckoning, sixty some are in the single-digit range -- including New Jersey's 7th Congressional District, where Linda Stender and Mike Ferguson are duking it out.

(Plainfield was carved OUT OF this district last go-around, but many know both Linda and Mike and are following the race closely. Our current district's representative, Frank Pallone, is an expected shoo-in.)

"Currently, like pretty much everyone who isn't named Karl Rove, I forecast Democrats to take control of the House. This is based on a huge amount of data, including district-by district polls showing Democrats ahead by around 20-25 districts right now (see Pollster.com and Electoral-Vote.com).
"However, what keeps me up and night, what still fuels my desire for continued and unrelenting activism, and what still gives credence to the worries in the back of my head are the polls from over fifty House races are currently showing campaigns within the single digits.

[...]

"This might be the most fluid election situation we have seen in America in decades. As many as sixty House races will be decided by a very slim margin. In other words, these races could all very well come down to things like GOTV [ get out the vote] operations, election infrastructure, or even what the weather is like on Election Day."

That last sentence holds for both the Senate and House races.

Meaning -- LOCALLY -- the ball is in the Plainfield Democratic City Committee's court.

-- Dan Damon

Not getting your own CLIPPINGS email daily? Click here to get started.