Is it possible for a Presidential candidate to get a negative bump out of selecting a Veep and holding a coronation ceremony? Two new national polls out today show McCain making significant gains on Obama. Gallup puts McCain up 46-44.Rasmussen has the race tied at 44. Both polls do daily tracking, so it’ll be interesting [...]
- Aug22
NC Senate: Dole +3
U.S. Senator Elizabeth Dole’s lead has been cut to 3 points in the latest Civitas poll released today. This is down 6 points from out poll in July. Click here for full release. Obviously, the ads the DSCC have been running critical of Senator Dole are working. The lead that Dole built after the primary [...]
- Aug21
Fuzzy Math
I hate to call out an organization’s poll as being bad, but, the latest numbers put out by InsiderAdvantage are just plain wrong. InsiderAdvantage conducts their poll and then weights the respondents according to race, age and party affiliation (a common occurrence in the polling community with IVR polls — PPP and SurveyUSA both do [...]
- Aug20
NC Gov Poll: Perdue +2
On the heels of the first gubernatorial debate last night, here are the latest numbers in the Governor’s race. We have McCrory closing the gap slightly on Perdue (43-41). Full release here. It’s really interesting that through four months of polling since the primary, the race really hasn’t moved one bit.Perdue has been stuck on [...]
- 3Aug19
August Poll: McCain +6
Our August Presidential poll numbers are in and we have McCain widening his lead from 3 points to 6 points. Full press release here. The big swing this month is among unaffiliated voters who went from McCain +1 in July to McCain +18 this month. Obama still can’t seem to crack the low 40s here [...]
- Aug18
About that $20 million…
We give Goodyear $20 million to supposedly keep them in NC. They shut down the plant for two weeks due to economic conditions. Imagine that, incentives can’t control the global economy? Go figure. I just hope we haven’t CTC (cut the check) yet. [UPDATE: A spokesperson for the Dept. of Commerce says that no incentives [...]
- Aug15
Rasmussen/WRAL – McCain 46 Obama 42
The August poll from Rasmussen conducted for WRAL is out and has McCain leading by 4, 46-42. When they push undecided voters to lean one way or another McCain leads 50-44. The one aspect of the poll I found interesting was the Fav/Unfav ratings of both the candidates — a question we don’t ask in [...]
- Aug15
Were Incentives Needed?
The announcement today that Mack Trucks is relocating its headquarters from Allentown, PA to the Triad prompts an interesting question. We’re incentives needed for them to move? NC awarded the company $8.5 million in JDIG welfare for the relocation. But if you look at the statements from Mack Truck executives, it almost sounds like they [...]
- 3Aug13
SurveyUSA’s Latest NC Polls
SurveyUSA in conjunction with WTVD has released their latest round of NC polls. They have McCain leading 49-45; Dole ahead 46-41, and Perdue leading McCrory 47-44. The first thing that jumps out at me is the percentage of the vote they have the Libertarian candidates garnering in the Governor and Senate races. I don’t think [...]
- Aug12
City Taking Toys from Kids
Just go ahead and call the City of Raleigh, "The Grinch." At Roanoke Park in Raleigh, parents leave big play toys (big wheels, play kitchen sets, etc.) in the park so that all neighborhood kids can play with them. According to this NBC-17 report, the City of Raleigh has decided that this is "unsafe." Raleigh [...]
- Aug12
2010 Redistricting
Been wondering how all the population growth around North Carolina is going to affect 2010 redistricting efforts? Gerry Cohen, the head of Bill Drafting at the NCGA, has an excellent piece on his blog that takes an early look at the potential changes coming. Basically, the urban power will continue to grow. With Wake and [...]
- Aug12
Inside Clinton’s Campaign
If you’re a political junkie like me, then this article from The Atlantic’s Joshua Green is a must read. Green was able to obtain hundreds of internal emails and memos from inside the Hillary Clinton campaign — reconstructing her historic run and defeat for the Democratic nomination. Hillary Clinton’s campaign was undone by a clash [...]
- Aug11
Worker or Management?
How about worker and management? Is it possible to straddle both sides of the line? Well, it appears Wayne Goodwin is trying to do so. Goodwin, who is the Democratic nominee for Insurance Commissioner, recently joined as a member of SEIU Local 2008 (formerly SEANC) according to The Insider. If he’s elected, whose side will [...]
- Aug11
Obama/McCain Olympic Ads
Anyone seen the McCain and Obama tv ads running during the Olympics? Interesting post on one of my favorite websites (FiveThirtyEight.com) about the difference in the ad messages being shown during the Olympics, basically calling McCain a grinch who is stealing the Olympics. Here we have a worldwide event that is intended to celebrate the [...]
- Aug01
If You Own IBM Stock — Sell!
No, we’re not starting to make stock picks now, but you kind of have to question the critical thinking skills of the management of IBM. They decided to build a $350 million data center in Durham County and only received $750,000 in corporate welfare! Don’t they know the going rate for data centers is in [...]
- Jul31
MSM and the Edwards “Situation”
It’s been quite an amusing week to watch the Mainstream Media try to figure out how they are going to cover the National Enquirer’s accusations that former NC Sen. John Edwards visited his baby momma and child at a Beverly Hills hotel last week. Obviously everyone sees the smoke, but it’s almost been like the [...]
- Jul28
Business Climate Rankings
Every couple of months or so, some organization will put out some so-called rankings of business climate claiming that North Carolina is just a wonderful place to do business — with little discussion on the criteria used to determine those rankings. Today, a new set of rankings were released by the Development Counsellors International (DCI) [...]
- 3Jul28
SEIU Funding Elections
Looks like the SEIU is back to its old ways of using forcibly taken membership dues and converting them to PAC dollars — this time, using a little creative financing to apparently skirt campaign finance law. According to the WSJ: The union adopted a new amendment to its constitution at last month’s SEIU convention, requiring [...]
- Jul22
Poll: Dole 47 Hagan 38
And here are the US Senate numbers from this month. Dole maintains her comfortable lead. I think just about every poll over the past two months has her up somewhere in the 9-12 point range. Her initial TV boost after the primary worked to give her that little edge and break away. Should be interesting [...]
- Jul21
Poll: McCain 43 Obama 40
Our July poll results have McCain holding a 3 point lead over Obama 43-40. This is now inside the margin of error of our poll, so basically we have a dead heat. Full release here. One thing I will point out, we seemed to have gotten a funky sample from the 828 area code this [...]