Daily Kos

Yesterday I showed how tiny the margin between victory and disaster really is—about three points. Politico notes that the large number of tossup Senate races is a recent record:

It’s the largest and most wide-open Senate battlefield in more than a decade: ten races, all neck-and-neck affairs headed into the final days of the campaign.

And it’s not only that there are more competitive races this time around; it’s how close they are that has made the 2014 midterms different from previous cycles. The 10 close contests this year are all separated by five points or less, according to RealClearPolitics polling averages as of Tuesday. Fewer races were that close right before recent midterms: eight in 2010 and five in 2006.

And in recent presidential cycles, there were eight in 2012, three in 2008 and five in 2004 that were equally tight.

These 10 races are all within the margin of turnout operations. GOTV is always important, but perhaps never as important as this year.

So what can you do? At this point, several things:

1) Make sure you talk to everyone in your social circle about voting: your friends, family, co-workers, acquaintances, girl at the checkout counter at the supermarket, neighbor you occasionally nod to when crossing paths, etc. Research is very clear—the best GOTV message is the one that comes from people they already know. And EVERYONE can do that, no matter how much time or money you have or don't have.

And not just people directly around you, either. But friends and family in other states, Facebook friends, even the ones who aren't actually friends, etc.

2) You can give that last $3 to help your favorite campaign GOTV. Today and tomorrow are the last days where money helps. So if you've held out this long, surrender already! There are lots of great campaigns around you who could use the help, or check out our own list of endorsed candidates. Might I recommend our secretary of state candidates page? Georgie is in the process of stealing 40,000 votes because the Republican SoS won't process new registrations. We need to elect Democrats to those positions.

3) Make calls! It only takes a couple of hours, and don't worry about being confrontational or talking to undecided voters. This is all about calling DEMOCRATS to make sure our own people have voted. In other words, a friendly audience.

This election is tight, with everything stacked against us. And yet here we are, within reach of breaking the GOP. It might happen if we all work hard and leave nothing on the road. It definitely won't happen if we sit on the sidelines as spectators.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell last Thursday, boasting about having worked with George W. Bush in a failed effort to create private Social Security accounts—and complaining that Democrats refused to help:

“After Bush was re-elected in 2004 he wanted us to try to fix Social Security,” said McConnell. “I spent a year trying to get any Democrat in the Senate — even those most reasonable Democrat of all, Joe Lieberman – to help us.”

When asked if he would try the same thing as Senate Majority Leader, McConnell refused to answer, but he was nonetheless proud of his effort. But now that the election is one week closer and he's faced with attacks about his support for Social Security privatization from his opponent Alison Lundergan Grimes and her Democratic allies, McConnell is denying the whole thing:

"That's just one of the many fictions the Grimes campaign has been spinning. Obviously, preserving and protecting Social Security is the most important thing any of us can do," said McConnell.

In just one week, McConnell has gone from bragging about his past efforts to privatize Social Security to pretending it never happened and claiming that his No. 1 priority is preserving and protecting Social Security.

So, which Mitch McConnell should we believe? The one who tried to privatize Social Security and bragged about it, or the Mitch McConnell who says it's a lie to accuse him of supporting privatization? Well, not even McConnell himself will answer that question because, in his words, if Republicans do win the majority: "I'm not announcing what the agenda would be in advance."

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Moral of the story: The only way Kentucky voters can be sure Mitch McConnell won't try to privatize Social Security is if they send him into an early retirement. Fortunately, on Tuesday they can do exactly that.

Probably no one has accused Wisconsin Sen. Ron Johnson of being the brightest bulb in the Republican conference, but his latest ramblings demonstrate just how dim—or phenomenally dishonest—he's capable of being. (Not that stupid and dishonest are mutually exclusive.)

Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI) appeared on NewsMax TV on Wednesday morning to complain about the "coercive" and "very destructive" consequences of the Affordable Care Act on Wisconsin residents.

Responding to a question about premium increases under the law, Johnson related his own experiences with voters. "I'm driving around Wisconsin, I'm talking to business owners and I'm talking to health care providers and insurance agents as well and they’re seeing that same kind of range [of premium increases for 2015], anywhere from 16 to 60 percent," he explained. "Kind of with an average of around 30 percent here just anecdotally in Wisconsin."

Johnson apparently has talked to very few people in Wisconsin. Or he misunderstood them. Or he's totally making shit up.

ThinkProgress does the math—something which they are capable of because they are not Ron Johnson—and figures out that he's inflated premium increases by 900 percent. Because in the real world, the premiums submitted by insurers to the Wisconsin Office of the Commissioner of Insurance (OCI) last month show an average increase of just three percent. And two of the insurers are decreasing premiums, Medica Health Plans by an average of 17 percent and Molina Healthcare by an average of 11 percent. They also point out that 91 percent of Wisconsinites who purchased plans through the exchange got subsidies to help with the costs. Oh, and competition has increased for 2015, as two new insurers are joining in.

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Stupid or evil? Probably both, in the case of Johnson. He might have the ability to grasp facts, but he sure isn't going to let them get in the way of the story he wants to tell.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell on Tuesday, endorsing a travel ban for people who have been in West African nations experiencing Ebola outbreaks:

During a Tuesday interview with Fox News' Neil Cavuto, McConnell said he thinks a travel ban "makes a lot of sense." Health experts and the White House routinely say travel bans would be counterproductive and may make the situation worse.

"I would like to see a travel ban," McConnell said. "I think it seems to me to make a lot of sense."

Endorsing travel bans probably make for decent politics, especially in conservative states like McConnell's Kentucky, but they make no sense on policy grounds, and not just because there are no direct flights to the U.S. from stricken countries, but also because a travel ban would create incentives for people to cover up their travel history, making it harder to track the movements of the very small number of infected individuals who might try to travel without actually preventing their entry. As none other than McConnell himself said two weeks ago:

"I think we ought to listen to what the [Centers for Disease Control and Prevention] thinks they need either in terms of financing or certainly they'll decide the procedures for travel and all the rest," McConnell told NBC News in an interview. "I think we need to follow the advice of the experts who know how to fight scourges like this."

So, what changed in the two weeks? Certainly not the risk posed by Ebola, which has yet to spread beyond the two nurses infected in late September—both of whom have recovered. The only explanation is politics: We're that much closer to election day, the polls in Kentucky are tightening, and Mitch sees an issue he can exploit to keep his job, so that's exactly what he's doing, because that's what he always does.

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Nurse Kaci Hickox, whose forced quarantine in New Jersey created a massive headache for a bumbling Gov. Chris Christie, is taking her fight for science to Maine. Republican Gov. Paul LePage is apparently catering to the worst fears exhibited by some of their residents (the school board who forced a teacher to go on leave just because she had traveled to Dallas, the university that wants to keep Hickox's boyfriend—a nursing student—from attending his classes) and is threatening to somehow force Hickox into home quarantine with "legal authority" and will take "appropriate action" if she doesn't comply.

On the Today Show Wednesday morning, Hickox once again made perfect sense and vowed to fight LePage as she fought Christie.

"I don't plan on sticking to the guidelines. I remain appalled by these home quarantine policies that have been forced upon me, even though I am in perfectly good health and feeling strong and have been this entire time completely symptom free," said Hickox, who wouldn’t emerge from Maine's 21-day voluntary quarantine until Nov. 10.

"I truly believe this policy is not scientifically nor constitutionally just, and so I'm not going to sit around and be bullied around by politicians and be forced to stay in my home when I am not a risk to the American public." […]

"If the restrictions placed on me by the state of Maine are not lifted by Thursday morning, I will go to court to fight for my freedom."

Hickox said that she is self-monitoring and is following the guidelines of Doctors without Borders, the organization she volunteered with in Africa, the organization that has been at the forefront in fighting this disease for years. Hickox also pointed out that top health officials stress that quarantine is only necessary for people who have developed symptoms of the disease, which she has not, and stressed that policies need to be based on evidence and sound public health policies as opposed to politics.

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Hickox is smart, well-spoken, and determined to teach politicians a direct lesson about science and about public health. She's a strong voice of reason in the midst of Republican-induced Ebola panic, and has already made a fool of Christie. LePage should think twice before taking her on.

Eliot Cutler, the independent candidate who finished second in 2010 as Paul LePage was elected governor of Maine with just 38 percent of the vote, held a press conference Wednesday morning to announce that he was not dropping out of the race. Cutler told his supporters to vote their conscience—which, if their consciences led them to another candidate could mean a significant boost for Democratic Rep. Mike Michaud, who is currently tied with LePage—but also said that despite trailing by up to 20 points in recent polls, he could still win. His message was more than a little muddled, in short. One group of Cutler supporters, though, held their own press conference directly after the candidate's to announce that they were endorsing Michaud.

Cutler's press conference may have been prompted by the fact that Tuesday, as it was becoming clear that he was drawing support much more from Michaud than from LePage, the Republican Governors Association unveiled an ad trying to sway potential Michaud voters to Cutler, seeking to win the race not by boosting LePage but by boosting Cutler.

Cutler had more or less stopped airing ads in recent weeks. But Maine's extended early voting period means that many Cutler supporters may have already voted. This isn't the first time Cutler had suggested that his supporters could consider his chances before voting:

In May, Cutler told Portland Press Herald columnist Bill Nemitz that he was prepared to tell supporters, “If on the day before the election, or the morning you have to go vote, if you don’t think I can win, vote for someone else.”

The moment when Cutler looked like he could win passed by some time ago—again, he's trailing by 20 points in recent polls. If his supporters' consciences want someone other than Paul LePage as governor, that means voting for Mike Michaud.

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Another four years of Paul LePage would be a disaster for Maine. It's time for a final all-out push to elect Mike Michaud.

Iowa Republican Joni Ernst has finally offered an explanation for why she refused to do an endorsement meeting with the Des Moines Register: She didn't think it would endorse her, so why bother?

Republican Joni Ernst defended Tuesday her decision to abruptly cancel a meeting with the Des Moines Register Editorial Board last week, telling CNN "it didn't make sense" because she knew they would back her Democratic opponent.

"It was quite evident where they stood in this race and they were going to endorse my opponent," Ernst said in an interview at a campaign stop in Oskaloosa.

Not talking to people you think will disagree with you—what a great approach for a candidate seeking to represent the entire state! What an advertisement for how Ernst would conduct herself in the Senate!

Does that explanation also apply to the other Iowa media outlets Ernst blew off? Like the Cedar Rapids Gazette and the Dubuque Telegraph-Herald and KMEG News? I mean, KMEG News wanted an interview with her they were going to air for voters to see and assess for themselves. And KMEG is in a Republican area of the state.

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Ernst has given her (unsatisfactory) explanation for blowing off the Des Moines Register. But she's still got some explaining to do.

Marriage equality is now the law in North Carolina, but the sore losers at the National Organization for Marriage are spending $125,000 in the state anyway:

The group, which opposes same-sex couples’ marriage rights, spent $117,000 in postcard mailers distributed on Monday in support of Republican North Carolina House Speaker Thom Tillis or in opposition to Democratic Sen. Kay Hagan. The information was reported in a filing with the Federal Election Commission.
Tillis, in his role as speaker, has attempted to fight lawsuits that resulted in bringing marriage equality to North Carolina earlier this month.

Additionally, NOM will be running a television ad in support of “traditional marriage” during the 6 p.m. news broadcast in Charlotte, North Carolina. The ad will run three times, at a cost of $8,400.

I guess even if you can't prevent people from getting married, you can still try to mobilize people upset about those marriages out to vote for a bigot politician like Thom Tillis.

Hilariously, NOM is specifically attacking Hagan for voting—back in 2011—to confirm the federal district judge who overturned North Carolina's marriage ban in 2014. The kicker? The confirmation vote was 96-0, "including North Carolina's other senator, Republican Richard Burr, who helped lead the effort to usher Cogburn through the nomination process."

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NOM is also spending in Arkansas, California, Massachusetts, and Oregon—in California and Massachusetts they are, as promised, opposing Republican House candidates Carl DeMaio and Richard Tisei because they're gay. (Please, guys, do create the storyline that if DeMaio and Tisei lose it's because Republicans can't deal with gay candidates. Keep building that case for Democrats to win younger voters for another generation.)

Reposted from Comics by Barbara Morrill

Greg Sargent on relatively quiet, last-minute effort by Alison Lundergan Grimes her campaign allies to make Social Security an issue in the Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell's reelection campaign:

When reporter Joe Sonka asked whether a GOP Senate majority would pursue privatization, McConnell replied: “I’m not announcing what the agenda would be in advance,” though his spokesman clarified that he wasn’t interested “in reviving the 2005 debate.” Meanwhile, according to one local report, McConnell today “evaded questions” on the topic.

The Grimes campaign, by contrast, is pushing the topic hard. When McConnell brought Bobby Jindal to Kentucky to campaign for him the other day, the Grimes camp quickly pointed out that Jindal had supported the 2005 privatization push, too. And on the stump, Grimes has repeatedly floated variations of the idea that unlike McConnell, she would never gamble away her grandmother’s Social Security on the stock market.

The Senate Majority PAC, a Democratic PAC focused on Senate races, is running a withering ad (embedded above) going after McConnell not just for privatization, but also for having "rearranged" his financial portfolio before the 2008 stock market crash after talking with the Secretary of the Treasury. The message: McConnell not only wants to use his position in the Senate to take a wrecking ball to Social Security, but he also wants to use it to benefit himself. "What good is clout," the ad asks, "if McConnell sells us out?"

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It's hard-hitting ad and McConnell has tried, unsuccessfully, to have it removed from the airwaves, so he's scared of it. It's a powerful message, but it's also a message that perhaps should have been used earlier in the campaign. Still, if it does manage to break through the noise in the final days of the campaign, it could be one of the key things that helps put Grimes over the top.

Reposted from Daily Kos Elections by Jeff Singer

Leading Off:

• NE-02: It's been a long time since things have looked good for Republican Rep. Lee Terry. He came close to losing his seat in 2012 to an underfunded opponent even as Romney was winning it 53-46, he made national headlines for all the wrong reasons during the shutdown, and he only narrowly beat a no-named primary challenger in May. Democrats have also posted great numbers in the early vote, and Terry's own party has privately conceded that he's losing.

Terry and his allies at the NRCC know he's in real trouble and have been running a series of ads against Democrat Brad Ashford, accusing him of making it easier for murderers to go free. While Terry has been harshly criticized at home for the spots, it's been an open question how individual voters are responding. DFM Research, on behalf of the union SMART, gives us our first poll in a long time and the results are not good news for Terry: They find Ashford ahead 46-41.

DFM also asked about the Senate and gubernatorial contests and find realistic Republican leads here, so it doesn't look like the sample is too blue. Instead, it's easy to explain why Terry's trailing: Voters utterly hate him. Terry posts a 34-54 favorable rating while Ashford is above water at 40-34. This is just one poll and we'll see if Terry or his allies respond with a better one. The NRCC just aired another spot for the congressman (see our Ads & Independent Expenditures section) so it doesn't look like his party has given up on him. However, given all of Terry's many travails over the fast few years, it's not at all hard to believe that Omaha has finally had enough of him.

Reposted from Daily Kos Elections by David Nir

Bookmark this handy map of poll closing times for the Nov. 4, 2014 general elections so that you can know when to start checking returns in each state on election night. Note that all times are Eastern, not local. You can click the map for a larger version:

And if maps like this are your thing, sign up here to receive the Daily Kos Elections Morning Digest. You'll get our widely praised roundup of all the key election news each weekday morning in your inbox—all for free. Sign up today!

(Special thanks to Miles Kurland.)