05/12/2002 Archived Entry: "OR Governor & Senate"

Kulongoski, with a good ad, has gotten back in the groove, and has surged back into the lead on the Democratic side. A recent poll, paid for by The Oregonian and KATU, has Kulongoski & Saxton in the lead.

The same group that did the Gov primary polling asked the primary voters about a general election match-up, between Smith and Bradbury, showing Smith with a strong lead.

Replies: 2 comments

Hey, Mydd, do you think that Stein's negative ad backfired on her? That could be why Kulongoski is leading again. It looks like the Oregon Republicans, like you (and the article) said, will go down to the wire. I think that having the conservative Mannix win would give us the best chance of victory.

And as the Senate article said, bigger leads have been lost. I still think Bradbury can win-what about you?

Posted by Mr. Liberal @ 05/12/2002 05:14 PM PST

Yes, I think it did backfire on her. Oregon is one state where negative campaigning just does not work very well down the stretch. Her negatives are highest amongst all of the candidates, including Mannix. Well, that might underscore something entirely different though, which the Stein campaign has been saying-- that the poll included too many conservatives, and not enough liberals. Regardless, her negatives speak to something having occurred to incur bad vibes, and from what I've heard, it's been her negative ads gambit.

Still, this is the first time in OR that the primaries are closed to independents. So like CA earlier, the party activists have a larger say, and perhaps a lot of those polled answering the question of who they are going to vote for are Independents, who don't have a say in this closed primary (they just say they are Republican or Democrat, because that's the way the vote, or who the candidate they like--Kulongoski & Saxton). It wouldn't surprise me to find out that their support is over-inflated in these polls.

I will be interested to see how this poll stacks up to the results, as because it's mail-in, the majority of voting would have occurred at the same time as the poll was taken. So, I should be able to use the hard-copy numbers to tweak the Bradbury-Smith race to see how that stands (pretty accurately too I think).

Saxton is the big surprise, and as a non-politician, he doesn't have a record. If he wins, he could beat Kulongoski. I'd start it as slight lean Kulongoski.

Posted by myDD @ 05/12/2002 09:17 PM PST