Archive for October 19th, 2008

Another day, another WTHR poll that is barely believeable. WTHR announced another “poll” which shows Gov. Mitch Daniels with a “slight” lead. Meanwhile, they show Jill Longshot announcing “her poll’ which indiciated it’s a dead heat.

A bit over a week ago, WISH TV put out a poll on the AG race indicating a ten point Greg Zoeller lead over shady Democratic candidate Linda Pence. Coverage of the race has been relatively sparse, despite it supposedly going to be “one to watch” and one of the few seriously contested statewide races (the presidential race now takes that prize, and the gubernatorial race hasn’t exactly been exciting or captivating in a news reporting sense).

The extent of media advertising in the campaign has been that both candidates have each run a warm and fuzzy ad about how great they are. Zoeller’s ad has run statewide in every media market. Linda Pence’s ad has not; it is not running in Terre Haute, Evansville, or Louisville. That would seem to indicate that Pence is ceding the entire southern and southwestern regions of the state to Greg Zoeller.

WISH doesn’t provide crosstabs on its polling, so we don’t know the regional breakdowns, party identification numbers, ideological ratios, name identification numbers, or anything else. In the southern part of the state, Zoeller benefits from his famous last name, shared with a popular local golfer who happens to be his cousin. In the eastern part of the state, Linda Pence benefits from sharing the name of a popular conservative congressman who has absolutely nothing in common with her and probably finds her defense of shady characters and corrupt Democrats to be abhorent.

So what does a poll asking voters their preference tell us?

(Read more after the leap) (more…)

An Update on Indiana 9th District Chairman Larry Shickles’ request for a polygraph debate:

9th District Republican Party Chairman Larry Shickles delivered a letter today to Congressman Baron Hill seeking an answer to his earlier request made to 9th District Democrat Chairman Mike Jones. Shickles request to Jones was that they join together to organize a debate of the three candidates while having their answers monitored by lie detectors. While candidates Mike Sodrel and Eric Schansberg have agreed to the format Baron Hill has not officially responded and Shickles says he has received no communications directly from Jones. Shickles stated shortly after delivery of the letter that he was giving the request directly to Congressman Hill hoping that he will respond quickly. The contents of the letter delivered to Hills office today follows:

(Letter After The Leap)
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