Posted on 08/10/2002 12:08:44 PM PDT by Carl/NewsMax
You may have noticed that there's something missing from the recent spate of reports predicting that California Republican Bill Simon doesn't stand a chance against incumbent Democrat Governor Gray Davis.
That something would be any actual polling data to support the conclusion.
In fact, though one media wag after another has stepped forward in recent days to pronounce Simon a political dead duck, the California conservative actually leads his left-wing opponent in the only survey released within the last two weeks.
That's right. Though the California press has buried the news so thoroughly that most of the state's voters are unaware of it, a Survey USA poll commissioned by several California network TV affiliates has Simon leading Davis 46 percent to 45 percent.
Not bad for a guy whose campaign is supposed to be toast.
Still, the good news didn't do much to quell critics, who inexplicably maintain that Simon doesn't have a prayer. Here's how the San Francisco Chronicle's Debra Saunders reacted after the Republican's lead was reported in the Washington Times.
"Bill Simon should just give up. He's a lousy candidate. He should admit it, bow out of the race, then endorse a good Republican - Secretary of State Bill Jones - who has a shot at beating the otherwise-vulnerable Gray Davis."
Surely, with all the pessimism on Simon's chances, there must be other polls showing Davis trouncing him.
Well, try as we might, we can't find any.
And apparently, neither could the Simon-doom-and-gloomers at the New York Times, who admitted on Saturday that an earlier survey by California's best-known polling operation, Mervyn Field, showed the GOP candidate chopping Davis' lead in half within the last four months.
And that's not all.
In June, a survey by the Public Policy Institute showed Davis with a sky-high negative job approval ratings of 52 percent. Only 39 percent, noted the Times, approved of Davis' performance in office.
(Buried in a July 28 Los Angeles Times report on the California governor's poll numbers, the paper noted that only 30 percent gave him a favorable job approval rating, putting Davis in the same polling territory as Richard Nixon just before he was forced to resign over Watergate.)
So, how did the New York Times headline all this good news for the Simon campaign?
Try this: "California GOP Leaders Pessimistic on Top Race."
That report paralleled a story in Friday's Washington Times, which revealed that the Bush White House was considering yanking its support from what it described as Simon's "troubled campaign."
Quoting an unnamed White House source, the paper said the Bush White House would consider the results of an upcoming private survey by the Republican National Committee before deciding whether the president would publicly campaign for Simon when he visits California in late August.
"The president will have access to the poll by the first of next week and will know whether Simon's candidacy is still viable," the Times' source said, adding, "If not, I expect Bush to walk after Labor Day."
Nowhere did the Times story mention, however, that every recent survey shows Simon either trending up or actually leading his opponent.
What has the GOP spooked is the July 31 verdict by a California jury that found a company with ties to the Simon family guilty of fraud. Predictably, the story received saturation coverage by state media and has been featured prominently in every national report on Simon's bid to retake the Golden State for the GOP - not to mention a tsunami of Davis TV ads.
But overlooked by the White House and other weak-kneed GOP'ers is this: Davis' last attempt to gin up a so-called "Simon scandal" failed royally.
For months the Davis campaign had been trying to make an issue out of Simon's decision not to release his tax returns. Then, to force the issue, the Bush IRS, which is inexplicably still run by Clinton appointees, enlisted itself in the Davis campaign by releasing confidential information from Simon's personal IRS filing.
Davis deployed his $30 million campaign war chest and hit the airwaves with a series of blistering TV ads painting Simon as someone who "won't release his tax returns to show he's paying his fair share."
Not only did Davis' scandal campaign not work - it backfired, and in spades - as evidenced by Simon's lead in Survey USA poll, which was released after he took a month of pummeling on the tax issue.
So, what do more recent polls show since news of the so-called devastating Simon jury verdict broke 10 days ago?
We wish we knew. For some mysterious reason, California pollsters have suddenly fallen silent, leaving some suspicious that numbers showing Simon weathering the storm simply aren't being reported.
Instead of wondering whether it should embrace the Republican front-runner in the nation's largest and most politically important state, maybe the Bush White House ought to see to it that the Justice Department does its job by opening a criminal probe into the suspicious release of Simon's tax files.
Simon Bump!
Ditto for this conservative. I've been a Simon supporter since the beginning, and I'm going to do anything and everything I can to help him.
Go Simon!
I'm sure that a lot of Red Davis's campaign chest is paying off any polsters to delay their work product as long as possible. The Gray one is slime of the highest order in negative campaigning, cutthroat politics, inuendo, and lolling in bed with a Marxist press. Methinks I detect the faint aroma of flop-sweat wafting from the already maloderous Davis camp....
Debra J. Saunders said it all on KSFO last week... "We Republicans hold our candidates to a higher standard." The minute ANYTHING the least bit unexpected happens that can be connected either directly, or indirectly to put the slightest question in anybody's mind about one of our candidates... You can hear a collective Repellican Party "Oh Sh*t!"
It's the exact opposite of what happens with Demonicrats. Remember how they gathered around the epitome of "Depravitas" after he was impeached and faced trial in the Senate?
All you third party Liberaltarians, etc., there's your ultimate proof of the night & day difference between the two dominant political parties!!! Republicans just die in the face of even phony adversity. Democrats never say die!!!
Republicans would rather switch than fight like Tom Sullivan on KFBK Friday. Democrats close ranks and fight attacks on their candidates, like Demonicrats!!! Republicans kill the greater good in search of perfection.
Ever since Nixon and his "Checkers Speech" and his subsequent resignation in disgrace, Republican get filled with dread (even worse than fear) over the slightest possible situation that would cause them to have to close ranks and properly defend any candidate that failed to disclose ANY unimaginable possible outcome of anything even faintly related to their candidate.
The closest I've ever seen the Repellicans ever come to holding up for their candidate was in fighting off the attempted theft of the 2000 election and that was a fine thing to finally see, indeed!!! I loved finally seeing them circling the Crapitol in the biggest demonstration seen since the Anti-War protestors during Vietnam!!!
Normally, however, they imagine themselves "too nice" to take the white gloves off and hit back against the smell of a deliberate "set-up" like this phony-baloney verdict that is sure to be over-turned on appeal.
Missed his show, was he 'switching' or 'fighting'? Not clear.
Saying that anyone with an ounce of political sense knows you get ALL this stuff out right up front! That's why he (Tom) never ran for office when asked because there are some things that probably wouldn't play well with the media shark-pool! It was not fair to President Bush or anyone in the Party to have held this back and that he shoulda done like "W" did about the drinking problem... yada... yada... yada!!!
Just like Deborah K. Saunders in the SFO rag, he was stupidly showing his lack of political acumen by saying that Simon should just step aside now and let some other standard bearer take over. Tom should "stick to business" because as was pointed out on this thread earlier... we've had the primary and write-in campaigns NEVER work!!!
He was sounding so emotional and ignorant that he was embarrassing to a higher degree than anything Simon has done, or not done. The hard part is... I really like Tom and listen to him regularly, even his Saturday replays!!!
One would hope it is one campaign promise he has no intention of keeping.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.