If I lived in Nevada and were polled today on the state’s marquee U.S. Senate race, I would probably indicate that I was undecided, leaning toward voting for “None of the These Candidates,” an option the Silver State allows. Yet, much as I dislike Sharron Angle’s stand on a variety of gay issues, I realize that she is the only candidate who has a serious chance of removing Harry Reid from the United States Senate.
And this politician has spent his years as Democratic Leader, obstructing the Republican agenda when in the minority and pushing Obama’s big-government agenda when in the majority. No wonder Rasmussen polls this race as a tie, but when they include leaners, Angle edges ahead. People just don’t like Harry. For all the money he’s poured into the race, he can barely muster a narrow lead (in the best polls) while holding only one-third of independent voters.
Indeed, “If Sharron Angle truly is as cuckoo as Harry Reid says she is,” Las Vegas Sun columnist Jon Ralston writes, “and as her own words occasionally indicate, why isn’t the Senate majority leader, arguably the most powerful Nevadan in history, running away from her in the polls?”
But here’s the rub: People hate Reid. I tell my daughter never to use that verb, but it’s the only word for it. It seethes, blinds, sputters.
I am asked all the time for the provenance of such animus. I still believe it is a combination: Anger at the Obama-Reid-Pelosi agenda that folks blame for their economic lot, Reid’s four decades in politics, his general mien and, of course, his intemperate remarks (war is lost, taxes are voluntary, tourists smell).
But it is profoundly irrational, too, much of the time, and thus impossible to change with a “She’s from Crazytown” campaign. And that’s what keeps the Reid folks up at night, knowing no matter how skillful they are — and he has the best campaign team Nevada has seen — the Reid-haters will not listen. They may be able to scare a small percentage to stay home or vote for “none of these candidates” — and that may be enough — but Team Reid can’t be sure, no matter what the next Angle revelation is.
Profoundly irrational, Mr. Ralston? Hardly. By the way, Mr. Ralston, in the early years of this century, did you call Bush-haters irrational?
They don’t like Harry Reid, hate him even, first because of his lock-step devotion to the Democrats’ obstructionist policies (his numbers started to slip soon after his 2004 reelection) and his slavish devotion to the Democrats’ big government policies. And that’s why I think he’ll lose. In the end, Nevadans will realize that their Senator has pushed some of the legislation which they most strongly oppose while standing in the way of the reforms they truly want.
They may think Angle is from Crazytown, but, well, she hasn’t been around Washington for the better part of the three decades nor does she embody the worst of the political class. Nevadans’ll pinch their noses and vote for the outsider, flawed though she may be.
Serenity will be arriving to defend Reid in 3….2….1….
Senator Harry Reid is the meek, small-voiced, tiny man in the King of Hearts; whereas, Rep. Nancy Pelosi is his mad Queen of Hearts looking for fresh decapitations (see her previous response about wanting to investigate NY mosque critics). The pair is really needed back in Alice in Wonderland with the Walrus, Henry Waxman.
I think that any NV voters who enter the booth in Nov not sure….will finally vote against Harry.
He’s not liked by his voters. In the end, they’ll switch to the new gal.
Todays polls look amazing for Republicans.
In every marginal Senate race, Republicans are moving ahead…
KY, PA, OH, FLA, MO, AK. In WI it looks like Feingold hit his high watermark and now is trailing as well. Who would have guessed. Republican victories in WI, ILL, IND, KY, PA,OH, FLA, MO, ND, DE are virtually guaranteed!!Here in PA my man Toomey has opened up an 8 point lead over the bribed Sestak. New Republican govenors in PA, MI, and OH…I can’t wait for November 2 and 3. First to vote then to celebrate, with my DON’T TREAD ON ME flag.
The liberals are having to defend, WA and CA!!! You gotta love this.
This election is going to be as close to TERM LIMITS as we will probably get. I first thought of that when Bennet lost the (R) primary in ID.
You mean UT.
I am not counting those unhatched chickens, yet. (Although, honestly, I don’t see what’s so radical about Angle’s policy positions. Maybe to an entrenched establishment pol like Reid, the thought of shrinking Government is scarey, but in the words of Mitch Daniels, “You’d really be surprised how much Government you’d never miss.”)
I’d be very happy if Reid and Senator Ma’am were retired this November. Don’t wish them ill, just unemployment.
I wish I could get as excited about this as everyone else. I’m so worried I’ll wake up Nov 3rd and find out it was all a dream and the joke is on us.
People like Sharron Angle just need to focus on what’s important. Hopefully she has learned from her missteps and is done sharing unusual positions. If any voter really thinks about it, they will realize that it isn’t the offbeat positions of a handful of senators that is ruining our country, but rather it is the awful positions of a majority of our current senators. Even if we decide that some of her ideas might be ill-advised, she won’t ever be in a position to implement them. On the other hand, Harry Reid has found enough allies to screw up our country plenty these last several months.
Sharron Angle isn’t my cup of tea the way Pat Toomey or Marco Rubio are, but I certainly hope she wins. I’m tired of paying Harry Reid’s salary.
#3 I dunno, Gene. The creepy Ooompa Loompa’s still up there.
I take that back. Mason-Dixon and Rasmussen has Rubio +5 while the St. Pete Slimes has The Orange One +4. SPT would be the ones to breathlessly report Fidel Castro +99.
I’m not optimistic about Angle’s chances, but watching that pompous ass Reid lose to someone he denigrated as extreme would not only be sweet… it would send the progs into a tizzy.
Good news for the Repubs
Horrible news for the country as Thursdays unemployment
shows 500,000 signed up this past week for unemployment benefits. “Unexpectedly” higher than projections. This group of liberal Democrats really doesn’t know what to do to goose the economy. I for one don’t think the govt has much control, except to get the hell out of the way…. but liberal Dems don’t think that way.
As a business man with 250 employees, I’m not spending, hoping for better times and a better attitude out of Washington DC. Until then, I’ve turned off the spiggot. We are finding ways to automate, and do things with less people. That way our future taxes and healthcare costs aren’t increasing to levels we can’t pay.
Yeah, turns out I had better things to do yesterday. I’m also loathe to defend Reid, the problem being that he gets attacked from both the left (who think he folded too quickly as majority leader under Bush, and failed to push healthcare reform hard enough under Obama) and from the right (because he’s the Democratic senate majority leader, no other reason is required).
The thing I keep pointing out here is the small miracle that the Tea Party has somehow managed to find the only politician in the entire United States who is as unpopular as Harry Reid.