The Result: Polarization

I clicked, up popped a long list of newspaper headlines on Twitter: Hate Crimes Against Asian Americans… Transgender athletes banned… Matt Gaetz accused of sex trafficking … Marjorie Taylor Greene calls Rep. David Cicilline, ‘Rep. Mussolini…’ Rep. Cicilline tells Greene ‘get lost…’ Biden stumbles three times… Trump rules the GOP… Howls rolled on. People cheered,…

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A Backfire…

I woke up this morning, turned on the TV, and there was an ad from Mitch McConnell’s Senate Leadership Fund basically calling Cal Cunningham a no good low-life scumbag – it was immediately followed by an ad for Cal Cunningham with Cunningham in it talking sweet and grinning, saying he disagreed with Thom Tillis about…

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Is Tillis Losing the ‘Base?’

I got a call from a reporter who’d read a poll: Biden and Cal Cunningham each had 47% of the vote in North Carolina; Trump had 47% (tied with Biden) but Thom Tillis only had 40%, seven points behind Cunningham – the reporter asked, There’re a lot of people, a lot of Republicans, voting for…

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A Bad Sign?

In a political campaign signs can tell you who’s up or who’s down: A tremor in a candidate’s voice, an evasive campaign manager, and polls (though these days a lot of polls are silly). When one campaign cuts back its media buys, as the other ramps up, that’s another sign. I read a story in…

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Last Respects

Thirty-five years ago, the morning George Crile – a producer at 60 Minutes who later wrote the book Charlie Wilson’s War – called I thought, An interview with 60 Minutes – what’s the difference between that and sticking your head in a lion’s mouth? I said: ‘I reckon you know the chances of Tom Ellis…

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What a Poll Missed

During Ronald Reagan’s 1976 primary Tom Ellis and I sat in a room listening to Arthur Finkelstein explain his first poll for Reagan in North Carolina – forty years later, sitting in my office across the table from Arthur, I listened to him explain his polls for George Holding. Sadly, a year later, Arthur passed…

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Dan versus Roy: Every Lost Second

Dan Forest is a good, decent man and he’s the most conservative candidate on the ballot for statewide office this fall but he’s running against an incumbent Governor who has a fine-tuned political machine with its eyes locked on beating Dan Forest. We’re a swing state and, before the coronavirus epidemic upended the world, Roy…

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The Election: How Vanity Bred a Mistake

At his rallies Donald Trump roars about the might of his base – in his eyes it’s the key to his defeating Joe Biden. So he tweets (to his base) how he has the highest approval rating among Republicans of any President, even Lincoln – but Trump’s calculation may boomerang: If every Republican Trumpster in…

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Tucker Versus Tillis

‘Tillis Tanking, Tucker Rising Among Primary Voters,’ the headline read. The  poll by Public Policy Polling showed Garland Tucker had gained on Thom Tillis again, now trailing Tillis by just 7 points in the Republican Primary. (Tillis 38%, Tucker 31%, Undecided 31%). Worse for Tillis, his popularity with Republicans had plummeted for the second time…

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Democrats and Republicans find common ground

Apparently, we all agree on one thing: Washington is corrupt. That’s the central message from two challengers to Senator Thom Tillis, one a Democrat and one a Republican. In his announcement video this week, Democratic challenger Cal Cunningham says we must “reform the corrupt system in Washington.” He says, “the corruption in D.C. and politicians…

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