LA and NC 2014 Congressional Races

[Miles]

NC-Sen: Here's a good, er, timeline of the often incohesive attacks lines Tillis has used against Hagan. At the start, the focus was on the ACA. After that lost its punch, it was on to the VA scandal and then ISIS. Finally, they're clinging onto this 4-year old stimulus 'scandal.'

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LA-05: Politico goes on the road with McAllister. Among other things, they confirm what Roll Call found in a similar article a few months ago: the 'kissing scandal' isn't really an issue anymore:

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[RogueBeaver]

NC-Sen: Horrifying: Leaflets depicting lynchings were left on congregants' cars in Cumberland Co., saying Obama would be impeached if Hagan doesn't win.

[KCDem]

NC-Sen: Horrifying: Leaflets depicting lynchings were left on congregants' cars in Cumberland Co., saying Obama would be impeached if Hagan doesn't win.

Excellent news!

[njwes]

NC-Sen: Horrifying: Leaflets depicting lynchings were left on congregants' cars in Cumberland Co., saying Obama would be impeached if Hagan doesn't win.

Excellent news!

Pretty sure that this will be a net negative to the Hagan campaign, if it's anything (and it probably won't be)

[Lief 🗽]

Politico runs a story on Tillis having momentum

Really pathetic how brazen that website is in pushing Republican candidates.

[Miles]

^ "Momentum"

[IceSpear]

^ "Momentum"

LOL

[RogueBeaver]

NC-Sen: Tillis flip-flops on Medexpansion.

[Miles]

NC-Sen: In a boost for Hagan, the LCV is spending $4.2M in NC, split between two ads and GOTV efforts.

The ads discuss the coal ash spill, which I honestly thought would be a bigger issue in this campaign; I don't think it was even brought up in any of the debates.

[RogueBeaver]

LA-Sen: Trende's deep psepho-dive, he says it's hard to see how Landrieu recreates a winning runoff coalition.

[Miles]

^ Trende doesn’t understand how the Katrina electoral/demographic dynamics worked.

One of his main arguments is that the population loss around New Orleans will cost her the election. Yes, in 2008, population of Orleans Parish was down to about 65% of its pre-Katrina population. He says that the loss there means she had no cushion elsewhere. Now, Orleans Parish has closer to 80% of its pre-storm population. He makes it sound like it had the same population as it did in 2008.

Orleans Parish is surrounded by a ring of Republican-leaning parishes. Most of which took at least some hit from the storm. Because of Landrieu’s efforts during the storm recovery, she got votes here from many ordinarily-GOP voters. When she lost ground from ’02-’08 in many rural parishes, her performance there offset it. It’s still a question of whether those same voters support her again, but spending a lot of time down there, I can say that Katrina is still very fresh in most people’s mind.

True, if, in 2008, every parish cast the same amount of votes it did in 2002, Landrieu would have beat Kennedy 54/44 instead of 52/46. She just wouldn't have had as much crossover support.

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Yes, rural black parishes/counties across the south are generally losing population. In LA, this really only encompasses a handful of parishes. The issue is that they're already fairly sparsely populated. I'd argue that the loss here is offest by pro-Democratic trends in the urban areas.
Of course, there are some such parishes that are actually growing. St. James and St. John the Baptist, two heavily-black river parishes, have gained population since the last census.

[Miles]

NC-Sen: Well, this is sneaky. The American Future Fund, a Koch front, is launching web ads targeted at young progressives which are designed to promote Haugh. The groups' slogan..."get Haugh, get high."

As NC is politically similar to VA I still thik Haugh is more of a liability to Tillis, all things considered.

LA-06: In some very ssad news, Dan Claitor's mother has died after a car accident. RIP.

[RogueBeaver]

LA-Sen: Atlantic on the race.

[Miles]

NC-Sen: The DSCC is attacking Tillis on his support for tholl roads. The very conservative faction NC GOP has never trusted Tillis; I thought that the SSM ruling would motivate them to turn out for him. However, between this and his flip on Medicaid expansion, I'm not sure he can count on that enthusiasm.  

LA-Sen: I have to say I'm mildly surprised here. Woody Jenkins, the guy that Landrieu beat by 6K votes to win her seat in the first place, endorsed Maness. Jenkins, though an unapologetic social conservative, has become something of a respected elder in the LA GOP, so I kinda excpected him to just go along with Cassidy.

[Miles]

Joni Ernst has nothin on this:

[Miles]

NC-Sen: I was expecting it to be more enthusiastic, but NC's largest paper, the Charlotte Observer, endorsed Hagan.

I think they're justification is pretty reasonable though: its a choice between a vanilla, innocuous Senator or a legislator who's actively worked against most North Carolinians during his career.

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[Senate Minority Leader Lord Voldemort]

Joni Ernst has nothin on this:

Seriously, between this, the keg stand, and telling the h8rs to "get a life," how is she not leading by 50 points...

[Lief 🗽]

NC early voting: Dems are at 91% of their total votes cast at this point of the 2010 cycle; Republicans are at 67%. Keep in mind that early voting started seven days later this year, because Republicans hate democracy. So pretty impressive from the Democrats. More info here (a great account to follow).

[Miles]

NC-Sen: Here's Hillary's full speech at a Hagan event from the weekend.

More NC-Sen: Though the race seems to be tightening, which is ostensibly good for Tillis. Still, Hagan's campaign has largely shifted from messaging to GOTV, where early results look promising.

[Miles]

LA-Sen: There's gonna be another debate tonight with two of the three candidates. Guess which one isn't showing.

It starts at 7 (CT) and streaming is at that link.

[Miles]

NC-Sen: Dammit, its bad enough I have to deal with this pontifical windbag in one of my states, but both of them? As if Louisiana hasn't had enough of Elbert Guillory's demagoguery, he'll be featured in an ad running, in of all places, North Carolina. As usual, he gives his usual erroneous platitudes about Democrats and the black community.

[moderatevoter]

So I have no idea who this guy is, but judging from your post, Miles, it seems he's from Louisiana. Why exactly is he in ads in North Carolina?

[Miles]

^ Here's basically the background on Guillory: He was a Republican most of his life. In 2007, he switched parties so he could run (and win) a heavily Democratic State Senate seat. Last year, he (very publicly) announced that he was switching parties. As you would expect, he got a lot of attention as a black Republican in the south.

His style also changed after he switched parties; it was like day and night. When he served as a Democrat, he was a pretty low-key Senator. He emphasized things like education, youth programs, etc. Since his switch to the Republicans, he's been a fire-breathing partisan. Thats why I doubt his sincerity.

Since his switch, he's been a pretty vocal attack dog for the state GOP. Last month, he made a similar video attacking Landrieu. Basically his message was that Landrieu somehow let down the black community during her career. Really? If she's been so detrimental to blacks, why wasn't Guillory sounding the alarm in 2008? Oh wait, he was a Democrat then!

I guess a conservative group in NC thought that his attacks would be good against Hagan, as well.

Basically, this guy is an opportunist of this most slippery sort. He found a niche as the LA GOP's token black and he seems to be running with it. Fortunately, I don't think he'll be in elected office after next year. There's no way he could be reelected in his (60% Obama) seat as a Republican. He announced earlier this year he's running for LG, but he's low on $ and other Republicans seem better positioned.

[Miles]

LA-Sen: Hillary will be in New Orleans for Landrieu this weekend.

LA-05: At a candidate forum recently, McAllister was asked about how he'd find money to combat ebola. His answer kinda stuck out at me, but others in the press seem to be picking it up:

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[Miles]

LA-05: In what may fall under the "too little, too late" catergory, Ted Cruz is endorsing Zack Dasher.