Monday, May 24, 2010

Slip-sliding away

DougJ over at Balloon Juice can't help but gloat just a little bit over this poll finding:
When we polled Colorado in early March Michael Bennet and Jane Norton were tied. Last week we found Bennet with a 3 point lead. One of the biggest reasons for that shift? Bennet went from leading Norton by 12 points with Hispanic voters to a 21 point advantage. That large shift in a Democratic direction among Hispanics mirrors what we saw in our Arizona Senate polling last month- Rodney Glassman went from trailing John McCain by 17 points with them in September to now holding a 17 point lead.

Of course, I predicted this as well. The immigration issue, outside of perhaps the border states, is an asymmetric one. It will benefit the Democrats because Hispanics will get more worked up over it than white people will. It's helping Bennet in Colorado (who seemed like a sure goner on account of his lack of a power base in the state), it's helping Barbara Boxer and Jerry Brown in California, Glassman in Arizona, and who knows who else. I don't think it's an exaggeration to say that this could save the Democrats' majority in November.

The Man, The Myth, The Bio

East Bay, California, United States
Problem: I have lots of opinions on politics and culture that I need to vent. If I do not do this I will wind up muttering to myself, and that's only like one or two steps away from being a hobo. Solution: I write two blogs. A political blog that has some evident sympathies (pro-Obama, mostly liberal though I dissent on some issues, like guns and trade) and a culture blog that does, well, cultural essays in a more long-form manner. My particular thing is taking overrated things (movies, mostly, but other things too) down a peg and putting underrated things up a peg. I'm sort of the court of last resort, and I tend to focus on more obscure cultural phenomena.