{"id":189219,"date":"2010-05-04T12:07:00","date_gmt":"2010-05-04T17:07:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/2010\/05\/04\/sestak-specter-primary-battle-closes\/"},"modified":"2010-05-04T12:07:00","modified_gmt":"2010-05-04T17:07:00","slug":"sestak-specter-primary-battle-closes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/2010\/05\/04\/sestak-specter-primary-battle-closes\/","title":{"rendered":"Sestak-Specter Primary Battle Closes"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n\n\n\n\n
Date <\/td>\n5\/2 <\/td>\n5\/3 <\/td>\n5\/4 <\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Arlen Specter <\/td>\n48% <\/td>\n49% <\/td>\n46% <\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Joe Sestak <\/td>\n40% <\/td>\n40% <\/td>\n42% <\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Undecided <\/td>\n12% <\/td>\n11% <\/td>\n12% <\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

The latest tracking polls have the Arlen Specter Joe Sestak primary race too close to call<\/a>.<\/p>\n

If you use the rule of thumb that undecideds break against the incumbent by 2:1, Specter still appears to have the advantage, but it is a lot closer than it was a last, when Specter had a 20+% lead<\/a>, 53%-32%.<\/p>\n

I would be surprised if Specter wins by more than 3% when the primary is held in 2 weeks.<\/p>\n

Note that the polls here describe Specter’s popularity among Democrats<\/span>, and he is severely<\/span> damaged goods, so the general, against the antediluvian Pat Toomey, he will have a very<\/span> tough road to hoe.<\/p>\n

Basically, he switched parties because he wants to stay a senator, and everyone knows it, and it’s unseemly, and no one trusts him, though the Senate Incumbent Protection Program<\/del> Democratic Senate Campaign Committee (DSCC) is spending heavily on advertisements in his behalf<\/a>.<\/p>\n

This is yet another reason why I implore my readers not<\/span> to give to the DSCC the DCCC, or the DNC (Post Dean): they are first and foremost an incumbent protection program.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Date 5\/2 5\/3 5\/4 Arlen Specter 48% 49% 46% Joe Sestak 40% 40% 42% Undecided 12% 11% 12% The latest tracking polls have the Arlen Specter Joe Sestak primary race too close to call. If you use the rule of thumb that undecideds break against the incumbent by 2:1, Specter still appears to have the …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[998,1000,1091],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-189219","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-congress","category-elections","category-polls"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/189219"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=189219"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/189219\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=189219"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=189219"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=189219"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}