"Massa Tidal Wave" NY-29th

[PATRICK]

That is how a local political expert, former campaign director and union activist Doc Warner characterized it this morning on the radio. Sort of a slip of the tongue that you won't see reflected in the polls right away.

The cause: enthusiastic and brilliant campaigning with crowds of traveling supporters that have intimidated and overwhelmed the anemic turnout for Kuhl and rattled him into two gaffes that are well worth watching on UTube. GOP discouraged and bleeding out of resources to bad neighbor Reynolds who was supposed to be so solid he was in charge of helping the other GOP house candidates. LOL. A great candidate versus a disappointment.

In phone banking one detects a mood that means more than polls. Anger and anti-Kuhl votes abound. GOP defections. Rarely anyone who says they are voting for Kuhl. People unaware of Massa looking positively his way at his website, etc. Angry or receptive Republicans.

At the last debate in his home area the Massa supporters overwhelmed(politely) the truculent Kuhl supporters. One comment from an admittedly far right Republican(he couldn't possibly know what that means these days) was that he was shocked to admit to himself this would be the first time he was going to vote for a Democrat. Massa scoops them up and momentum versus discouragement, a hard feat in the hinterlands means victory.

It's in the air and with enough boots on the ground I think we'll finally make some history here.

[Habibi]

1. My rep's Louise Slaughter

but I am so rooting for Massa!

[Oleladylib]

2. I DO hope you are right..Think Eric is great!!! n/t

[PATRICK]

3. Endorsement of major papers

race being moved into the 'blue' category and very winnable. Both Reynolds(vs. Davis) and Kuhl are trying to paint their adversaries as ones threatening social security- supposedly since this is the one thing they balked at on the Bush agenda in 2005. Reynolds also swinging out wildly in attacks against Davis. Since the tenor and style of all the brochures and spots SOUNDS similar, it leaves the voters with the intentionally false impression they are all the same and equal. It DOES work a bit and enough to re-tighten the debacle slide so far, but so early that the end result will likely fail and backfire.

Money and volunteers and high profile name and newspaper endorsements flow in. The total campaign has to be sustained to the end in this tough district. So far the great campaign matches the great candidate. I expect a solid win here. Expect- it sounds like such an odd word.

Fear itself. Still, we are under-rated by experts and polls nationwide. This tells me that MOST Dems nationwide are similarly underrated for all the usual reasons. This is dangerous in regions where this affects the perceptions and the fraud potential critically. It is not about aggressive boasting but positive confidence and REALITY. When the people decide and the great Dem candidate speaks out- we will win. Fearing we will be robbed and any caution derived from submissive humility of being "contenders" will create the potential of defeat. The party needs to shed this somehow without stupidly turning off voters by going the other way. I think the actual circumstances of our district show how this can be done because here it has to be done and our candidate is fearless.

[pscot]

4. Has there been any feedback about the Money Magazine

profile of Massa? While not political, it showed the Massa family in a very sympathetic light. I would think potential Republican cross-over voters might view that as the Goodhouskeeping seal of approval.

[PATRICK]

5. Kind of late to mention it

but I may pass the question on to the website if it is not referenced there. One person was concerned we were getting another DC establishment implant form the military industrial revolving door crowd and took a but a little common sense talking to turn around. Eric is between the rank and file veterans running and higher ranking officers like Wesley Clark who are connected more in this way, raising the usual suspicions.

What any phone banker or canvasser knows in these last days it is dealing with adverse reactions to TV ad slugfests, issue confusion by unbelievably brash GOP lies, and still the people who know absolutely nothing although they are regular voters. Also people want to know specific policy stances as it relates to them since they are getting serious about switching from LIFETIME GOP voting.

For example one small business owner couldn't get information about what Kuhl was going to do for small businesses from the GOP caller. Details, details. OUR subsequent caller didn't know specifics either but follow-through from the campaign on what specifically the combined efforts of the Dem wave, state and federal will mean for small business will net a bunch of votes. This is the point where people who will talk to you can be easily swayed by our superior candidate. They have not been polled, have not yet made the leap and are too unhappy with GOP choices to be counted in the Kuhl column.

In the process of getting from third to home.

I hope some analysis is done nationwide about effective TV ads, etc. trying to offset incumbent advantages, preposterous GOP attack ads. People complain about both in one breath then ask if the Democrats are really going to hurt Social Security benefits. The Dems campaigns that foreswore negative ads and the dumbo GOP incumbents who went rabid over their prone bones have to be compared. Ultimately the people want an end to these "effective" media slime slick contests. I hope the experience of new candidates will spur them to true election and campaign financing reform. In TV land math, net gain for the truth has to offset the loss of turned off voters. Vote suppression and working their core is the sole goal of the GOP kicking and screaming crowd, who will not go legally into the Tuesday twilight. This is not acceptable for the health of our democracy.

[PATRICK]

6. Truthisall lists Massa as 100% shoe-in

I have no idea what polls he is using, but he lists this a safer voting area. Any hanky-panky of the traditional sort will be watched this time. No Diebold, no huge suppression scheme, no gaming of absentee ballots. So far it only Kuhl blowing wads of money on nasty attack ads of enormous Big Lies.

[Liberalynn]

7. I helped distribute campaign literature for Massa

I sure hope he wins. I really dislike Kuhl, a lot.

[Eurobabe]

8. Massa lost to Kuhl? WTF?

I can't believe this...so disappointing.

[wiley]

9. 80% counted? Massa can not lose!

[PATRICK]

10. Well this is closer

than last time but it is inexplicable to me how the top Democrats roll up huge wins and local GOPers turn out in droves to elect a local ham sandwich, picked up out of the mud and molding rapidly. But that kind of inertia, similar to trying to a roll a fat man uphill, works that way the lower down the ticket one gets. The GOP really turned out. The slime fest and robocalls were calculated to anger dem voters one way and feed the anger of GOP fans the other, both by margins to the benefit of KUhl with no real time to at least neutralize them.

The post Foley poll was a bounce poll for sure and we got nothing after that. I should have known that Truthisall was overstretched in appreciating the sickening rebound toward the GOP slimers, even were there fraud involved- which I have no idea. Well, it took ungodly long to rid ourselves of D'Amato and Pataki got away into the sunset unscathed except in his ludicrous presidential ambitions. The ham sandwiches who ran rotten campaigns and will remain rotten for two more years will not improve. The disheartening thing for local races is that they are intimate and expensive even if the negativity factor of the gerrymandered squatters grows and grows. I expect with another great effort the presidential election could sweep the last remnants of GOP trash(unworthy of most of their simple voters) into the dustbin. the one in frustration wonders what will they have then that was not obvious now, but that could be said about ALL the Dem chances up to this year.

A better media will speed the process of deceit inertia and GOP good fellowship. Most of the people I worked with were ex-Republicans, the split becoming a personal values divide so that the GOP is left increasingly with the ignorant and the spiteful or some pure intentioned zealots clinging to one banner cause and otherwise convinced that their team is the one with the white hats and all "liberal Dems" are Satanic. Nor is Dem turnout or GOTV good enough to reliably overcome the media disadvantage and the spurious campaign slime and the simple toss of money.

So I would not give up on this district quite yet. The beast is wounded and isolated, the GOP Rep supporters left with a hangover of powerless goons not worthy of anyone's support- and the party rolls bleed away in a steady trickle. And how could they gerrymander any more GOP advantage in these "safe" districts- now? Under Dean the relentless effort will be there, the targets fewer and refined, the results of the Dems matched against the floundering incompetence and monied elitism of Upstate survivalists.

I hope the absentee ballots change things, but we have seen hotly contested and fairly adjudicated races fall short in this area before. the ham sandwich always wins. It takes a great effort not to until the GOP itself withers away as it naturally must, bereft of all its old and present rationales and ideology and successes. But that must be accompanied by Dems not being discouraged, producing and standing up for real progress. If the folks in Indiana can wake up, eventually Upstate "Utah" can too.