GA-Rasmussen: Carter (D) leads Gov. Deal (R)

[Adam Griffin]

See sig.

[Adam Griffin]

Even though Hifly is an incorrigible little crap who's opinion of himself exudes from every post he makes, he is kind of right about this, Adam.

By all accounts and when you look at him on paper, FitzGerald should be down by 2-3 at worst. Two years ago, Kasich looked like he was in the same boat as Corbett. The combination of voting rights restrictions and union-busting legislation had him as one of the weakest Governors in the country. Yet...FitzGerald is behind by a laughable amount in the polls. His record is great, which makes it even worse when considering that, the natural political climate of Ohio and the natural climate of other states (like Georgia).

At the end of the day, though, you can't defend him by saying that he's a good candidate. He's obviously not. He may have the fundamentals to be a good candidate, or may be a good public official, but that doesn't make him a good candidate. What makes him a good candidate is performing at least where a Generic Democrat in Ohio should be performing (down by 3 at the most). Plenty of good people and strong elected officials have went down in flames because their campaigns sucked. FitzGerald is shaping up to be one of those, it appears.

And as far as the DGA and its involvement with OH/GA goes: I don't know what you think the DGA is doing here, but I can assure you that it's nowhere near what it usually does in battleground states like Ohio - at least not yet. They are running micro-targeted ad campaigns online and are helping to build a core group of on-the-ground field operatives in the state, but that's standard fare for a state like Ohio in every election. Carter isn't even running TV spots yet, to my knowledge.

You say that Carter has a built-in advantage because of DGA involvement here in 2014 and his name recognition; I say that Ohio itself has a built-in advantage due to millions upon millions of Democratic dollars being poured into it every two years. Georgia hasn't had the same political infrastructure put into place by Democrats as states like Ohio consistently enjoy - in fact, Georgia has had virtually zero dollars invested in it by national Democrats in the past ten years. Even with Carter's name recognition, he's still being outraised by Deal at the moment. That's what makes the GA/OH - Carter/FitzGerald discrepancy even more mind-boggling: a political neophyte is doing several points better in an Atlas-blue state that has had no prior Democratic investment, while a fairly well-established candidate that is running against a historically unpopular Governor in an Atlas purple-to-red state is getting trounced.