Didn't we already see this race in NC ? Oh wait, it was here in NH! - Granite Grok

Didn’t we already see this race in NC ? Oh wait, it was here in NH!

From CNN (reformatted, emphasis mine):

In one of the most closely-watched Senate races of the year, incumbent Democratic Sen. Kay Hagan of North Carolina holds a narrow three-point advantage over her Republican challenger, according to a new CNN/ORC International survey. But the poll indicates that Thom Tillis, the GOP nominee, may be falling behind Hagan because a Libertarian candidate could be siphoning off Republican votes.  Hagan edges Tillis, 46%-43%, while Libertarian Sean Haugh has support from 7% likely voters, according to the poll.  The three-point gap between Tillis and Hagan, however, is well within the poll’s sampling error of plus or minus four percentage points among likely voters, meaning the candidates are about even.

… Hagan’s favorable rating is 46%, indicating that everyone who likes her is going to vote for her. But Tillis gets a 47% favorable rating among likely voters, yet only 43% of the vote. “That suggests that there are voters who would probably choose Tillis in a two-way race but aren’t going to vote for him in a three-way contest,” said CNN Polling

 Director Keating Holland.  While Haugh only has the backing of 7% of voters, his presence in the race could be hugely influential if Tillis ends up losing to Hagan by just a few percentage points.

We’ve already seen this here in NH – Carol Shea-Porter (D), Frank Guinta (R), and Brendan Kelly (L) and enough people voted for Kelly that Guinta lost.  And yes, there were a lot of Republicans grousing afterwards (and yes, I heard a lot of it).  Especially with the Establishment – they kept blaming the Libertarian Party for getting “in their way”.  They were not enthused when I intimated that it was Trust that had been lost and a diminishment of the message and its believability.  While there is a resurgence of Libertarianism here in NH, in 2012, many of the votes were protest ones.  They had seen that it was the more libertarian folks that actually were trying to accomplish “a smaller and limited government” whereas the Country Club / Inner Circle were fighting to maintain the status quo.

Actions speak louder than words and penetrate and stay in peoples’ memories longer – with very few exceptions, politicians running purely on BS will be found out eventually (or, at least I hope that’s the case; sometimes I do wonder).  Not connected to the NC contest other than what I see in the blogosphere.  It IS clear that with 7% polling, there is something that the Libertarian is offering to the electorate that is not by the Republican to be skimming that number of votes away.  While many Establishment Republicans scoff at some of the issues that Libertarians hold (heck, I don’t agree with them at times, but that’s why I am a Conservative with libertarian leanings instead being a Libertarian), the one shared bulwark issue is shrinking the size of Government – something, unfortunately, Republicans generally failed to accomplish that which they yak about the most.  Sadly, they’ve been only able to achieve “slower growth” (with the main exception being Bill O’Brien Speakership) – insufficient motivation, much talk, puny results.  The Libertarians will act – perhaps a lesson?

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