Ye ole curmudgeon decided to level his sights on Sen. Barbara Boxer today and discuss her re-election chances. He starts out with this lede:
California's U.S. senators tend to fall into two categories - headline-grabbers and dependable workhorses for the state's interests.
Headline grabbers...hmm that would have to be Sen. Feinstein, who relishes her self-designated role of wise moderate woman, that determines what is or is not a deal.
Somehow, I think that Walters meant it the other way around. He references "quixotic political frays" that have "nothing to do with California". Then of course he never gives any examples, leaving the reader to either scratch their head, or trust the wise man of the column.
Walters then brings up the Rasmussen poll from a few weeks ago, which was unsurprising. Like most years Boxer looks vulnerable, tempting the Republicans to throw the kitchen sink to unseat her.
This year the national Republican hierarchy are excited about Carly Fiorina, who gets 41 to Boxer's 45 in the matchup. Of course she has to get past movement conservative Chuck DeVore in the primary. Fiorina's primary is not a shoe-in. It would not be all that surprising to see DeVore win the wingnut vote that dominates Republican primaries. Fiorina will have to dump a ton of cash into the primary to hold DeVore off.
Walters then does his best to weaken Boxer by providing only half of her favorability numbers.
The latest poll, true to form, found Boxer's overall job approval rating among California voters to be fairly low, with just 21 percent holding a "very favorable" view, down six points from March.
When one normally writes about favorability numbers you add up the very favorable and somewhat favorable results to come up with an overall favorability number. In this case, according to this Rasmussen poll, she has a 21% very favorable and a 36% somewhat favorable, for an overall 57% favorabilty rating, which while not great isn't nearly as bad as Walters tries to make it seem.
If Fiorina wins the primary then Boxer will likely have a tougher race in 2010, certainly compared to 2004. We need to be prepared to defend her with all guns blazing. Fiorina certainly comes with a lot of baggage that would be great fodder for blog posts and attack ads.
There are no huge alarm bells ringing right now, no matter what Walters has written, but we need to be on alert and watch closely as we move into election season. Early cash is better than late cash. Give via ActBlue. |
