There’s a new poll showing that Carl Paladino has escaped from a cloud of bestiality porn and is closing the gap with Andrew Cuomo in the New York Governor’s race:
“This is Paladino’s best showing yet. It remains to be seen whether this is a short-lived post-primary bounce or a tightening of the race that Cuomo has dominated for months,” Rasmussen said.
Ah, wait, it’s a Rasumussen poll that left out Rick Lazio, who’s running on the Conservative line, because it fits his narrative that Paladino is “not a joke”. A poll that doesn’t include Lazio is worthless, because the real question in the race is whether Republicans will vote for Lazio or Paladino, not whether Paladino has a chance against Cuomo.
This is a typical Rasmussen gambit, but it takes two to make a fuck-and-run. Every time Rasmussen spits out a poll that dovetails with his ideology, he gives a bunch of reporters a hook for their “this could happen” story. In this case, the culprit is the New York Daily News, which printed Rasmussen’s op-ed and also uncritically led a post on their politics blog with the quote inserted above.
J.A.F. Rusty Shackleford
OT, Sorry – I can’t access Balloon Juice from home. I have no problem with BJ at work (I use Chrome) but when I get home I can’t load the page from anywhere with any browser. I have not noticed any other site that is unloadable at home. Comcast is my provider at both home and work.
Back to your regularly scheduled posting.
stuckinred
@J.A.F. Rusty Shackleford: I had the problem for two weeks. ON the advice of a BJ poster I unplugged my modem all day yesterday and it now works.
John Bird
The link to the Daily News is not working for me, but change it to “.html” and it works fine.
And yeah, the host for Balloon Juice is really big on temporarily banning IPs if they time out, is my guess; I’ve had the same problem twice this year. Tinker with your MAC address or reset your modem.
Bobby Thomson
FYWP
steve duncan
There really is nothing a Republican can do to botch his/her electoral prospects or voice on the national stage. Serve your wife divorce papers while she’s bedridden in a hospital recovering from cancer surgery? OK, check. Confess to dabbling in witchcraft and lounging about atop a bloddied sacrificial altar? OK, check. Distribute the most vile and/or pornographic e-mails to coworkers and friends using state computers? OK, check. Play both sides of a lobby game to rob Native Americans of casino revenue and gaming licenses? OK, check. Behavior that would drive most Democrats OUT of an office they already held actually seems to help Republicans get elected INTO an office they have no business holding. Failing that they’re still held up as a “go to” person for wisdom and advice on everything wrong with the nation and what needs done to fix it. Boggles the mind.
mistermix
@John Bird: fixed
stuckinred
@mistermix: My dogs ears went up when they read that!
Nick
My boss, who is very liberal, made the case for Paladino yesterday, saying maybe he could be the one who finally “blows up” Albany and allows us to start again from scratch.
I suggested the suffering wouldn’t be worth it and he said “we’re already suffering” (although realistically, we’re not, we have one of the lowest unemployment rates). But this state is as right wing on taxes as Alabama is on gay marriage. The perfect Albany + Tax message could be candy for otherwise liberal Democrats.
I don’t see Paladino winning, and Cuomo isn’t taking any chances, he’s running ads and campaigning, but I wouldn’t put it past the electorate to look at Paladino as some shiny new object.
EDIT- Also the local media likes him, because they don’t want another rout like in 2006.
J.A.F. Rusty Shackleford
@stuckinred:
Thanks, I’ll give it a try.
Odie Hugh Manatee
All that matters is that the M$M breathlessly reports it as fact. If a poll is by Raspootin you know you can count on it…
to be a distortion of reality.
John Bird
@Nick:
As a proud member of the left, I will never understand the disgruntled notion that if we just get the worst right-winger ever elected into office, a gigantic explosion will go off and we’ll fade to black and fast-forward to FOUR YEARS LATER when Sharon Kroeger is taking the oath of office.
I mean, morally, it’s reprehensible; practically, it’s impossible.
aimai
@Nick:
This is the problem the Dems always face: to the electorate its always a binary issue. If not X, then Y, regardless of how bad Y is. At least when its the Dems who are holding power. Obama’s win is the only time “Throw the bums out” worked to our advantage–even in the 2004 election the Republicans somehow benefited from that opposite cliche “don’t change horses in midstream.”
My point, and I do have one, is that to a certain percentage of the electorate once a guy makes it onto the ballot he has a certain air of plausibility about him that in the real world his horse porn and his hysterical outbursts of childish racism might indicate he doesn’t deserve.
aimai
John S.
@Nick:
That’s like a guy who says, “I’m a Democrat, but I agree with Rush Limbaugh about a lot of stuff.”
Look, I can appreciate holding your nose and voting for someone. As it looks right now, I’ll be voting for Crist instead of Meek, who is more ideologically sympatico with me. But I’m not doing it because I’m enthusiastic about Crist being in office or because I agree with most of his ideas. I’m just petrified of having Rubio as my senator for 6 years.
The dynamic in New York is totally different. You have two Rubios running against a solid Democrat. In that situation, no fucking way in hell I would consider voting for anyone other than the Democrat. No offense, but your boss sounds like a schmuck, not a liberal.
4tehlulz
@John Bird: It’s pretty easy to understand, actually; if everything blows up, everyone will conclude that _insert ideology here_ is the only option left.
Also, it’s supposedly must easier to build society from the ashes than to reform a current system.
Obligatory omelets quote.
Chyron HR
@Nick:
Or maybe he could be the one who literally blows up Albany. This is America circa 2010, after all.
WereBear
I run across this sentiment, which is akin to wanting to beat up your child so they will listen to what you are saying.
Things got this way over lotsa years. Having it break would be worse. How can otherwise intelligent people not get that?
Allison W.
@Nick:
Wasn’t the disgusting display in Albany last year enough to put New Yorkers in a throw the bums out mood?
Citizen_X
@WereBear: You know, when life gets complicated, and you get drunk, it seems like it would be a good idea to burn your house down and starting from scratch.
And then you sober up, and realize that that would be fucking stupid. Why politics is somehow different is beyond me.
Hugin & Munin
Remember, Nick is the one who thinks that ‘Jews control the media,’ so in his fever dreams this is proably the efforts of the ZOG, or some other paranoid conspiracy.
Why you all continue to treat this daffy bastard seriously is beyond me.
SapphireCate
slighty OT but a brit Sci Fi author has put forward a hypothesis about what the hell is bringing all the batshit crazy out at the moment: “future shock”.
It sounds plausible, we are after all just mostly hairless apes wandering through life wondering what the hell happened to our nice green savannah.
themann1086
@John Bird: I described it like this once on OpenLeft… This is like thinking that a wife will finally leave her abusive husband if he just really goes to town on her this time. I mean, what’s a few broken bones and a lifetime of emotional trauma compared to making her see the truth.
It got a mixed response at the time…
asiangrrlMN
@John Bird: I agree. If this country gets broken (by all the ‘Baggers and whatnot), it ain’t gonna get fixed. We’re already flailing from the eight years of the W. regime. We’re barely starting to climb out of the abyss–four years of batshitcrazy is gonna knock us flat on our asses again.
mistermix, I rarely read polls because they seem so random to me.
Nick
@Allison W.:
Only four incumbent state legislators lost in primaries last week. Fewer will lose in November.
Shalimar
That Paladino is still in the race is very depressing to me. The bestiality picture alone should have destroyed him if members of the rightwing had even 1% of the values they claim to have. We are headed over the cliff as a country and they are going to cheer the whole way because they are so happy to be driving the car.
Walker
I live in the conservative part of the Finger Lakes. The place where McCain/Palin signs were everywhere in the last election. And listening to my neighbors there is no way I can imagine anyone other than Cuomo winning.
PurpleGirl
@Nick: Actually, among the four incumbents who lost were the two who were the main cause of last year’s meltdown. Pedro Espada Jr. lost a primary fight to retain his state senate seat. And Hiram Monserrate lost his primary bid for an assembly seat; he had lost his state senate seat in a special election earlier this year.
burnspbesq
mistermix:
Not to single you out for this, but aren’t we trying to have it both ways here? Holding blogs sponsored by traditional media to standards that independent bloggers, by and large, refuse to be held by (and in many cases, don’t even acknowledge the existence of)?
That said, the only reason to pick up the daily news is for the sports section. The rest of it is fit only to wrap rotten fruit before taking it out to the trash.
Calvin Jones and the 13th Apostle
@PurpleGirl: Democrats were/are always more willing to throw out scumbags. Republicans, not so much. Shalimar is very much right. Republicans seem to revel in the sliminess of their candidates.
Legalize
All that really matters is that downstate voters come out in droves for Cuomo. If that happens, neither Palladino nor Lazio actually matters in any statewide race in NY.
lol
@themann1086:
It’s also the plot of Atlas Shrugged.
Yes, if all us conservatives go Galt, society will crumble and like a phoenix rising from the ashes with its own boot-straps, a libertarian paradise will be the OBVIOUS choice for a new society.
Nick
@PurpleGirl:
Monserrate wasn’t one of the four.
Two Senators lost; Espada and Bill Stachowski of Buffalo, whose seat is probably lost to begin with anyway
Two Assemblywomen lost; Ginny Fields of Long Island and Francine DelMonte of Niagara Falls.
Monserrate would make five, I guess. Ruben Diaz, who flat out said it’s ok for politicians to be corrupt, won 80%-20%.
Nick
@WereBear:
I’m not so sure these people are “otherwise intelligent”
Marc
People, you’re missing the plot here. Rasmussen didn’t bother to include a major candidate – one with a better chance of winning than the republican – in his poll. This is a credibility-killing move. We need to stomp on garbage posing as fact, and the People’s Front vs. Popular Front nonsense can wait. Attack Ras for this, mercilessly, and he’ll either have to pull back or lose his ability to invent headlines from biased polling.
Shawn
+1 for Liz Phair reference
PurpleGirl
@Nick: Yeah, Monserrate doesn’t count as an incumbent but he was part of Espada’s coup last year. He helped it succeed.
NY Jew
You know how big a skew Rasmussen has? Mosey over to Pollster.com, take a look a their overall congressional polling. After noting that the gap is smaller than it was a few weeks ago, go down to their tools and take out Rasmussen. Guess what — it’s looks like a tie!
Rasmussen may not be all wrong all the time, but for one pollster to have that big an impact, suggests that something’s off.
BTW, they’re the only ones that give Sarah Palin half-way decent favorabilities – 48% favorable in Ras, while the average is 37%.
jayackroyd
@Shawn:
Lyric, title AND refrain. +3 I say.
Karin
@steve duncan:
So true. Love your comment, steve.
Cacti
New York has a Cook PVI of D +10. Rasmussen has Paladino down by 16.
So, what’s the cause for alarm?
Wile E. Quixote
@Nick:
Why the fuck do people in NYC even put up with Albany? Jesus, NYC is the economic engine of New York State, without it the rest of the state would be Alabama with blizzards. If I lived in NYC I’d be pushing hard to secede from New York state and petition Congress to form a state consisting of the NYC metro area. I’d love to see the residents of New York city tell all the upstate conservatives “Fuck all, y’all, we’re going Galt”.
The BigotBasher
Well this is how Bloomberg read that same poll
So after the Summer of Hate, all the Muslim bashing, all the fuss over the not a mosque not on Ground Zero the Republicans are still nowhere near beating Cuomo.
Another Palin FAIL. So much FAIL it is no wonder PUMAs love her.