GOP Poised to Win Tuesday Special Elections

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  • 08/21/2022

As we head toward two Congressional special elections Tuesday it appears Barack Obama is a guiding force on how many people will be voting. The deeply unpopular Obama, mired in the low 40s in approval ratings, may actually be the determining factor in the Democrats losing a New York City seat for the first time since 1923. I suspect if Democrat David Weprin loses we won't be seeing many headlines with the words "historic" and "unprecedented" in them.

According to the liberal Public Policy Polling, GOP candidate Bob Turner now holds a 47-41% lead over Weprin, numbers which closely mirror the Siena poll released Friday where Turner had a 50-44 lead.  Meanwhile, in Nevada's 2nd district, Republican Mark Amodei has a 13-point edge over Democrat challenger Kate Marshall. While it would be no surprise to see Amodei win, Democrats are in a panic over losing what was the Anthony Weiner seat. As PPP president Dean Debnam said, “It looks like Democrats will go 0 for 2 in Tuesday’s special elections," and that will leave national Democrats reeling.

How can they possibly spin losing the Weiner seat? From PPP:

The issue of Israel does appear to be having a major impact on this race.  A plurality of voters- 37%- said that Israel was 'very important' in determining their votes. Turner is winning those folks by an amazing 71-22 margin. With everyone who doesn't say Israel is a very important issue for them Weprin actually leads 52-36. Turner is in fact winning the Jewish vote by a 56-39 margin, very unusual for a Republican candidate.  This seems to be rooted in deep unhappiness with Obama on this issue- only 30% of voters overall approve of how he's handling Israel to 54% who disapprove and with Jewish voters his approval on Israel is 22% with 68 of voters disapproving.

If this discontent from Jewish voters is indicative of what Obama faces in 2012, he's in deeper trouble than anyone imagined. He's only one point ahead of Rick Perry in that district and would lose to Mitt Romney. In fact, Obama's disapproval in NY-9 is at 38% among Democrats, which is almost hard to fathom.

Meanwhile, the DCCC has poured half a million dollars into trying to save Weprin (they are saturating the airwaves in NYC today with "tea party extremist" Bob Turner spots), but they've also been called out for running false ads. Raise your hand if you're surprised by this tactic.

A Democratic ad falsely claims Republican House candidate Bob Turner would cut Social Security benefits for seniors, something Turner says he would not do. The truth is that Turner has taken contradictory stands, saying he'd preserve both Social Security and Medicare "as they are" for anyone age 55 or over — but also calling for massive budget cuts, elimination of the capital gains tax, and repeal of the new health care law which, among other things, improved Medicare's coverage of prescription drugs. But this ad goes too far in claiming Turner explicitly favors cutting Social Security benefits for gray-haired senior citizens, which is not true.

Hard to believe Democrats would demagogue and lie in a desperate attempt to win a race they should have taken in a cakewalk. Weprin's wishy-washy stance when it comes to Obama sure hasn't helped.

“I will probably not refuse to endorse him, because I think I will be more effective by supporting him, but at the same time being very strongly against him on some of his policies,” he told the Jewish Press recently.

Thanks for clearing that up, Dave.

As a side note, we may finally be reaching the point where Social Security is no longer the "third rail" of politics. The Weprin scare tactics aren't working against Turner and despite a liberal media jihad against Texas Governor Rick Perry for his calling Social Security a Ponzi scheme at the GOP debate last week, it isn't negatively affecting his poll numbers.

In a new CNN poll that finds Perry at the front of the Republican pack, the Texas governor's lead among GOP voters age 65 and older is actually bigger than his lead among younger voters. Fifty-two percent of respondents over 65 say Perry is their choice for president, versus just 21 percent who choose Romney.  In the overall numbers, Perry leads Romney 32 percent to 21 percent, with Ron Paul following at 13 percent, Bachmann and Gingrich at seven percent each, Herman Cain at six percent, and Jon Huntsman and Rick Santorum at two percent each.

As with Paul Ryan's plan, Perry notes that nobody currently or soon to collect Social Security will face any changes. If Social Security is to survive for future generations, it's obvious changes must be made. Let's give credit to today's seniors for seeing through the cheap demagoguery coming from Democrats.

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