Glassman gets the back of the hand from the Tucson Weekly's Tom Danehy
The alt-weekly columnist writes this week about how Democrats shouldn’t let Republicans get away with their frequently risible talking points.
Example:
Republican: “I’m a Reagan Republican.”
Us: “Is that the Reagan who ran up the highest deficits of any eight-year president in history to that point (only to be outdone later by George W. Bush) or the Reagan who presided over the largest tax increase in American history?”
It concludes with this kiss off:
Republican: “Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Rodney Glassman is a know-nothing, self-serving spoiled rich kid who has used the family fortune to buy his way into politics.”
Us: “OK, we’ll give you that one.”
8:39 AM
What in the hell is happening at the Rodney Glassman campaign?
Rodney, Rodney, Rodney.
You’re a nice Jewish boy from Tucson. You sing at your temple, you’re not unhandsome, and you’re rich to boot.
In the Democratic primary for John McCain’s senate seat, we’re voting for John Dougherty, him being an investigative reporter and all, but on paper you’d seem to be McCain’s sturdiest challenger.
But then we read Stephen Lemon’s Feathered Bastard post about how top advisors are leaving your campaign:
[S]everal confidential sources inform me that Glassman’s staffers left because they were not happy with the behavior of their candidate.
These sources relayed a litany of complaints about the Glassman campaign, from Glassman berating staffers and volunteers in public, even yelling at them, to Glassman’s having his brother Jeremy play a major role in the campaign (doing little or nothing, they say), and the fact that Glassman and his minions gave Democrats reason to believe he would sink millions into his bid for Senate.
The details:
My sources tell me that Glassman was, as one of them put it, “out of control in the worst possible way.” They say he was needlessly rude to staffers and volunteers alike, and described him throwing temper tantrums and yelling at stunned campaign workers.
They depicted Glassman as a spoiled rich kid with a frat boy sense of humor. One described an incident during a fundraiser where he asked if the host’s assistant was an illegal alien.
Worst of all is a story from the Arizona Daily Star, in which a Tucson City Council member says Glassman said to her, “"The toughest thing for me to do will be to sit next to an openly gay councilmember.”
Glassman, shown above, ironically enough, at PHoenix’s Pride Parade this summer, denies having said it.
9:08 AM
McCain pulls away from Hayworth
The latest Rasmussen poll sees Dumb increasing his lead over Dumber:
Read down to the other questions asked in the poll, however, and you have to be a little bit concerned about not just the level of the political debate here in Arizona, but the overall ability of residents to process basic information:
Has the new immigration law affected Arizona’s image positively or negatively?
60% Positively
26% Negatively
4% No impact
10% Not sure
or…
Will the new immigration legislation be good or bad for the Arizona economy?
64% Good
17% Bad
9% No impact
10% Not sure
and …
Are economic conditions in the country getting better or worse?
7% Better
72% Worse
18% Staying the same
4% Not sure
7:21 AM
The Washington Post says J.D. Hayworth might be a beneficiary of last night's election results
Writes Chris Cillizza, who does the paper’s blog The Fix:
Ken Buck/J.D. Hayworth/Sharron Angle: Buck, Hayworth and Angle — running in Republican Senate primaries in Colorado, Arizona and Nevada, respectively — are all making a direct pitch to supporters of the tea party movement. Ophthalmologist Rand Paul’s surprisingly strong victory on Tuesday night and his crediting of the tea party for that victory will almost certainly embolden those who see themselves as part of the cause in other parts of the country. The tea party to date has been somewhat haphazard in the primary races it chooses to target — yes to Florida Senate, no to Illinois Senate — and so it’s not likely that all of the trio mentioned above will benefit from the increased intensity. But, now that the tea party movement has the taste of winning in its collective mouth, there will almost certainly be a push to find the next Kentucky Senate race.
Meanwhile, the latest Rasmussen poll gives John McCain a 12-point lead over Hayworth.
Here’s Pollster.com’s trend map on the race:
4:34 PM
A new poll: Hayworth closing in on McCain
The new Daily Kos/Research 2000 poll has some interesting numbers.
They show plainly that, six months out, the Democrats' best chance for taking the Senate seat will be if J.D. Hayworth beats McCain in the GOP primary.
According to the poll, McCain beats the likely Democrat, Rodney Glassman, 48 to 35, with 17 percent undecided.
Between Hayworth and Glassman, the race is a real race… 43 for Hayworth, 42 for Glassman.
There’s a four percent margin of error in the poll.
But … can Hayworth actually beat McCain? It would seem a longshot.
McCain is unquestionably a bad senator, a bad person, and has squandered his dishonest-but-effectively-created image as a moderate and maverick by pandering to the vicious Arizona right
(For details, see PHXated’s “The Case Against John McCain,” a comprehensive look back at his career.)
Unfortunately, though, none of these are actually detriments in the Republican primary in a state like Arizona.
But the new polls shows conclusively that his popularity is dropping even there.
48 to 36 is still a good advantage for McCain, but it's four points less than he was polling a month ago.
The survey did a comprehensive look at all Arizona politicians, too.
McCain’s unfavorable numbers statewide are now about 50 percent.
He’s more unpopular than Hayworth, which has to be considered something of an achievement.
Most particularly, he has very high unfavorables among Democrats and independents … 82 percent and 60 percent, respectively.
But of course, he’s be a much more formidable opponent in November than Hayworth, a buffoon who could be made mincemeat of if Glassman—at this point still a political cipher—was up to the task.
Here are the overall numbers for Arizona politicians:
8:11 AM
New Public Policy Poll: McCain over Hayworth by 11 points.
From Pollster.com:
Public Policy Polling (D)
4/23-25/10; 387 likely Republican primary voters, 5% margin of error
Mode: Automated phone
Arizona
2010 Senate: Republican Primary
46% McCain, 35% Hayworth, 7% Deakin
Note that automated phone polling is not ideal.
Meanwhile, the Republic has posted a local poll from Behavior Research Center:
McCain leads Hayworth 54 percent to 28 percent with another 18 percent undecided.
In a potential general election battle against former Tucson Vice Mayor Rodney Glassman, the leading Democratic Senate candidate, McCain is ahead 46 percent to 24 percent with a significant 30 percent “uncommitted,” the poll says.
Hayworth also leads Glassman, who is not very well-known around the state yet, by 37 percent to 30 percent with 33 percent “uncommitted.”
This poll has a 5.7 percent margin of error; the two margins of error combined mean that both could still be quote-unquote correct.
Here’s Pollster.com’s current chart on the race:
11:06 AM
A new poll: Glassman can beat Hayworth
A new poll shows the obvious: That J.D. Hayworth might be easy pickings for the Democrats in November:
2010 Senate
49% McCain ( R ), 33% Glassman ( D )
42% Glassman ( D ), 39% Hayworth ( R )
Note that Hayworth has an incredibly high unfavorable rating:
Favorable / Unfavorable
Rodney Glassman: 7 / 15
J.D. Hayworth: 23 / 50
The source is Public Policy Polling, out of North Carolina. Its release on the poll stresses this:
Raleigh, N.C. – John McCain might still beat Barack Obama handily were there a redo of the 2008 election in McCain’s home state, but the senator’s constituents now view Obama’s job performance more favorably than they do that of their longtime senator. 45% of Arizona voters like the job Obama is doing, to 51% who disapprove. While that may seem bad, only 34% approve of how McCain is handling his job to 55% who do not. Republicans only barely approve, 48-39, with independents down at 28-58.
Emphasis added. Doesn’t this lend support to PHXated’s pet theory, which is that Democrats need to adopt a carom strategy for the fall, helping Hayworth beat McCain, so they’ll have an easier target in November?
Pollster.com account here. One of the commenters says that the company will release numbers on specifically the GOP primary tomorrow.
11:29 AM
1Randy Parraz is announcing for the Dem senate primary
Politico reports that Randy Parraz is entering the Democratic primary for John McCain’s senate seat.
Parraz is a longtime activist against Sheriff Joe Arpaio.
From Politico:
An Arizona civil rights advocate jumped into the state’s Senate race Monday, pointing to the strict anti-illegal immigration law just signed by Republican Gov. Jan Brewer as a central theme of his campaign.
Randy Parraz joins a Democratic primary field that includes just one other candidate, businessman and Tucson City Councilman Rodney Glassman. And Christina Martinez, a spokeswoman for Parraz, said the new immigration law was a major factor driving his decision to run.
“This was the straw that broke the camel’s back,” she said. “For many of us, our spirit has become broken. People don’t have the will to take the lead and challenge these folks, so we’re relying on Randy to do it.
12:43 PM
A new poll: Hayworth closing in on McCain
The poll, by Rasmussen, puts Hayworth at 42 and McCain at 47, with a four percent margin of error. McCain has been leading in every poll taken thus far; it seems more likely that the error would be in McCain’s favor.
Here are the poll’s favorable/unfavorable rankings of Tweedlecreep, Tweedlebuffoon and Rodney Glassman, the likely Democratic opponent in November:
Favorable / Unfavorable
John McCain: 52 / 46
Rodney Glassman: 32 / 34
J.D. Hayworth: 43 / 49
Those are apparently the findings for likely voters; note that on the Pollster.com page for the poll, a commenter named “jmartin4s” says:
I looked at the internals of the primary poll and I think the McCain/Hayworth primary could go either way. According to the poll Hayworth has a 58% favorability among R primary voters and McCain has 57%. [This makes sense, given that all voters would have a higher favorable impression of McCain than Hayworth.] In addition, Hayworth represented a part of Maricopa county for a while and has gotten the endorsement of Sheriff Joe Arpaio. The fact that McCain an a four-term incumbent is ahead of Hayworth by only 5 is amazing. In addition, the primary is in September [actually, it’s Aug. 25] so there is a huge amount of time for McCain to continue to bleed votes to Hayworth.
Emphases added.
Talking Point Memo’s piece on the poll contains this comment from one “david46”:
A couple of months ago, I had a long conversation with a long time Arizona Democratic political operative about what was gooing on in AZ. He said that McCain was in trouble and do not pay any attention to the disorganized and chaotic Hayworth campaign. The Hensley family (i.e., Cindy McCain) no longer had the dominent position it once had in the AZ Republican Party.
The party organization hates McCain and was looking to take him out because he was a liberal in their thinking and that he would not take care of their financial interests. (McCain was burned badly in the S&L scandals and pretty much stopped looking after individual, parachial financial interests and AZ is a state with heavy Federal involvement in its economy.) He said that the several very wealthy folks who control the AZ party wanted to get rid of McCain and replace him with someone who would do their bidding. They were prepared to let the seat go Democratic in the event the buffoon Hayworth lost in a general election because they would be able to talk to a Democrat about parochial AZ interests which they cannot with McCain and then hope to put in a Republican in six years.
Terry Goddard at this point looks good to win the Governor’s seat, but he does have a history of snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. The Hispanic vote continues to grow. The problem is that there is not a first tier Democratic candidate for the Senate seat because Democrats such as Gifford thought it was too much of a long shot that Hayworth would defeat McCain—and they were probably correct. That said, the Dems do have respectable folks in the race and if Hayworth does win, then expect resources to pour into AZ.
The latest fundraising news
Mike Dan Nowicki in the Arizona Republic has this, which suggests that Hayworth isn’t going to have it easy:
Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., and his primary challenger J.D. Hayworth released their final fundraising numbers for the first three months of 2010. Hayworth, a former congressman who officially entered the race on Feb. 15, reported raising an impressive $1.07 million, though he only has $681,478 left on hand. McCain, however, collected $2.3 million and still has $4.6 million ready to spend.
(Apologies to Dan Nowicki for getting his name wrong originally in this post.)
7:17 PM
Glassman running for Senate
Rodney Glassman, a Democrat, is a Tucson city councilman. He is not well known statewide but may become the de facto challenger to either John McCain or J.D. Hayworth in November if better-known Dems like Bruce Babbit or Gabrielle Giffords don’t chance the race.
Glassman slammed McCain for not being responsive to requests for federal help for local projects and accused him of neglecting the state. McCain has a national reputation for fighting earmarks and pork spending.
“Where has he been the past 28 years?” Glassman said. “We have a U.S. senator who’s more interested in visiting Kabul than visiting Casa Grande.”
The Tucson Sentinel:
Glassman’s bid surprised virtually no one. He told TucsonSentinel.com: "I’ll be the first elected official in 20 years to take on John McCain for U.S. Senate. I’ll also be the first candidate endorsed by dozens and dozens of Democratic leaders throughout the state.”
While he’s had an official “exploratory committee” for months, Glassman put off a formal announcement until Tuesday. In February, he explained his delayed decision by saying he wanted to concentrate on helping the city navigate its budget difficulties.
A Daily Kos poll from last Friday showed clearly that J.D. Hayworth was a slightly more vulnerable figure in the general than McCain.
The poll had Bruce Babbitt tied with Hayworth and six points behind McCain. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords was thirteen points behind Hayworth and twenty behind McCain.
In both cases, interestingly, Glassman’s showing was almost identical with Giffords’.
The headline on the Daily Kos poll was that Hayworth is currently running fifteen points behind McCain:
Despite the conventional wisdom that McCain could be vulnerable to an intra-party challenge, we find that McCain has a fairly solid level of favorability among Republicans. His current favorability among GOP voters stands at 76%, with only 19% expressing disapproval.
Hayworth, meanwhile, may well have some upside in the GOP primary, as he is still unknown to about a quarter of the electorate. And it is worth noting that among Republicans, he is well liked (a 61/16 favorability spread).
However, his upside might be limited to a GOP primary. In a general election, he is clearly a greater liability for the GOP. Hayworth is much less popular among both Democratic and Independent voters, and sports an net negative favorability (34/42) among all voters, joining only President Obama (41/55) and incumbent GOP Governor Jan Brewer (39/54) in minus territory.
Full report on the poll here.
7:46 AM