Iowa. This morning the city of Davenport exists, for a brief period, at the very nexus of the race for president, as both candidates make appearances only a few blocks away from each other. (John Kerry meets with business and labor leaders in the River Center at 10:00 a.m. and George W. Bush leads a rally in LeClaire Park at 10:40 a.m.) Kerry was last in Iowa eleven days ago. Bush has been slacking; he hasn't stopped by since July 19.
They're putting as much time as they can in the state because Iowa's poll numbers haven't budged in ages. Last week's American Research Group poll of 600 likely voters gives Bush and Kerry 46 points apiece and Nader two points; in a head-to-head match-up, they earn 47 points apiece. (The undecided figure was 6 percent in both equations.) Those numbers are virtually identical to two polls taken a week earlier. There are some morsels of potentially troubling news for the president amidst all this, including a 56 percent disapproval rating for his handling of Iraq in the latest Selzer & Co. Inc. poll for The Des Moines Register, taken July 17-21. Iraq remains a top-ranked issue for definite voters in the state.
As we predicted, Kerry's choice of John Edwards over Governor Tom Vilsack for vice president doesn't seem to have ticked off too many Iowans. Nearly three-fourths of those polled in mid-July by Selzer & Co. Inc. said Edwards was the right call, compared with only 9 percent preferring their governor. (Tough crowd.) Meanwhile, Vilsack's wife, Christie, who made a very prescient decision in endorsing Kerry before the caucus back in January, got her reward last Tuesday: a primetime speaking slot at the Convention, with the Iowa delegation cheering her on from their primo front-row location.
Minnesota. Kerry took a hit among urban voters in Minneapolis/St. Paul this week after St. Paul Mayor Randy Kelly rebelliously endorsed Bush's reelection campaign. A conservative Democrat, Kelly is facing rebukes throughout the local political arena, from a former police chief to the Steamfitters Pipefitters Union, who withdrew their Kelly support. The Kerry campaign's spokeswoman Stacie Paxton criticized Kelly's move in a Star Tribune article saying “it isn't surprising, given Randy Kelly's longstanding flirtation with the Republican Party and will have little, if any, impact on the campaign.”
Iowa Senator Tom Harkin came home to drum up support for Kerry, visiting a farm north of Rochester where about 50 people met to discuss agricultural and rural farming issues. Harkin also visited Minneapolis for a roundtable discussion on health care and hit a Kerry/Edwards tailgate before a St. Paul Saints game where fans voted for their favorite candidate in an election that had Kerry prevailing.
The competition continues as Bush makes another visit Wednesday, Aug. 4, to Mankato, a key outer-ring suburb that is part of the traditionally most socially conservative regions in the state. A local TV station is preempting Friends to bring Bush's remarks live to about 500,000 multi-state viewers.
New Hampshire. There's a whiff of scandal in the air. Last Wednesday, former New Hampshire Republican Party executive director Chuck McGee pled guilty to felony charges of election improprieties. McGee, who resigned from his position as head of the state chapter of Citizens for a Sound Economy in March, allegedly orchestrated a plot to jam the phones of Democratic Party campaign offices to disrupt their get-out-the-vote efforts on election day 2002. McGee hired a GOP-affiliated telemarketing firm in Alexandria, Virginia, to blitz Democratic offices' phone lines for over 90 minutes on election day. Facing hefty fines and a five-year prison sentence, McGee has apparently decided to name names; he claims that higher-ups in the state GOP authorized his plan and helped him to carry it out.
Meanwhile, at long last, one victim of this insidious plot -- former Governor Jeanne Shaheen, who lost a senate race to John Sununu by less than 5 percent in2002 -- seems to be getting her comeuppance. Shaheen now chairs Kerry'snational campaign; recent polls suggest that Kerry might edge out a victory in the Granite State. A University of New Hampshire/WMUR poll released in late July puts Kerry ahead of Bush by more than the margin of error. Deeper still, this poll reveals that Kerry enjoys a huge lead among New Hampshire's intensely coveted independent voters. Of the independents surveyed in this poll, 53% plan on voting for Kerry against a paltry 35% opting for Bush.
Wisconsin. Reminiscent of his grand convention entrance, Kerry ferried into cheese country Monday on the fourth day of his post-convention swing-state tour. Staging a large rally along the Milwaukee River, Kerry was met by crowds of supporters -- as well as vocal opponents who blew air horns during Teresa Heinz Kerry's intro and Kerry's speech. Heinz Kerry continued her feisty brand of commentary, calling herself “sassy” and rebuking the protestors, saying, “They want four more years of hell.” Kerry wasn't shaken either; he responded in kind with, “I want to thank George Bush for sending the goons here tonight to excite us to do a little more work!”
Kerry focused his criticisms of the Bush administration on security, which he called the “one thing they do worst.” Honing in on the much-needed undecided vote, Kerry implored supporters to take his case to them. Kerry was joined on stage by Senators Russ Feingold and Herb Kohl. Frontman Dave Grohl of the Foo Fighters performed as well, in an attempt to woo the youth vote.
West Virginia. Well, it's not often my dear old home state makes The New York Times, so it's worth a comment when it happens. Elisabeth Rosenthal's August 4 piece from Berkeley Springs was, no doubt, a dispiriting read to the forces of progress, what with one local after another pledging their troth to God, family, guns, and all the rest, and the one man attesting that the Republicans could put Khrushchev on the ballot and still carry the county.
Undoubtedly true of Berkeley County, in the eastern panhandle. Butthe eastern panhandle doesn't really represent the state. The gentlyrolling hills of the panhandle were blessed with a God-given advantage:There's no coal underneath them. Hence, there were never many unionsover there. So the panhandle never had any Democratic traditions tospeak of, and though I don't know it for a fact, I'd bet that evenFranklin Roosevelt never (or rarely) carried Berkeley County.
I'm not saying the rest of the state is Greenwich Village. But it isa state in which Democrats still maintain an almost two-to-oneenrollment advantage. And they aren't in the eastern panhandle.
Compiled by the Prospect staff. Click here to read last week's “Purple People Watch.”
