AZ-SEN Class 1: Kelli or not-Kelli?

[Attorney General & PPT Dwarven Dragon]

If it's Ward v. Sinema, as much as I hate to give my (symbolic) endorsement to an atheist, I have to go with Sinema. There are simply no circumstances where it is safe to let Chemtrail Kelli into the Senate.

[Attorney General & PPT Dwarven Dragon]

it appears ducey was the only one to stand by arpaio calling him "my friend" which is going to hurt him.

All at once, I stand corrected. We need to run Stanton for Governor and make Ducey pay for that one every opportunity we get.

What about the likely Class 3 special election in 2018 or 2020. Should Gallego run?

It's extraordinarily disrespectful to predict the death of a United States Senator. Enough said.

[Attorney General & PPT Dwarven Dragon]

it appears ducey was the only one to stand by arpaio calling him "my friend" which is going to hurt him.

All at once, I stand corrected. We need to run Stanton for Governor and make Ducey pay for that one every opportunity we get.

What about the likely Class 3 special election in 2018 or 2020. Should Gallego run?

It's extraordinarily disrespectful to predict the death of a United States Senator. Enough said.

I don't think so, and I say that as someone with a grudging respect for McCain. His situation is vastly different from, say, that of Steve Scalise. McCain's diagnosis was a tragedy, but the outcome of it is all but guaranteed, and I don't think we're doing anything particularly wrong by preparing for the future. You forget that there's also a distinct possibility that he vacates to focus on fighting the cancer.

Scalise had a notable chance of dying, just as McCain does. Scalise received massive prayers from all sides and even when he was in critical condition there was no speculation of who would replace him should he pass away. But now because it's McCain, whose seat would be potentially winnable, left and left-leaning people are almost begging him to die. It really shows how terribly polarized our country is.

[Attorney General & PPT Dwarven Dragon]

it appears ducey was the only one to stand by arpaio calling him "my friend" which is going to hurt him.

All at once, I stand corrected. We need to run Stanton for Governor and make Ducey pay for that one every opportunity we get.

What about the likely Class 3 special election in 2018 or 2020. Should Gallego run?

It's extraordinarily disrespectful to predict the death of a United States Senator. Enough said.

I don't think so, and I say that as someone with a grudging respect for McCain. His situation is vastly different from, say, that of Steve Scalise. McCain's diagnosis was a tragedy, but the outcome of it is all but guaranteed, and I don't think we're doing anything particularly wrong by preparing for the future. You forget that there's also a distinct possibility that he vacates to focus on fighting the cancer.

Scalise had a notable chance of dying, just as McCain does. Scalise received massive prayers from all sides and even when he was in critical condition there was no speculation of who would replace him should he pass away. But now because it's McCain, whose seat would be potentially winnable, left and left-leaning people are almost begging him to die. It really shows how terribly polarized our country is.

I want McCain to live. He's one of my favorite Senators. I haven't heard about anyone wanting McCain to die, except the alt-right. Have you? Resignation isn't rare for Senators with health problems.

Speculating about who will replace him is simply asking for his death, even if the word death is never actually used. Again, there was no replacement speculation for Scalise at any point. It should be the same way for McCain.

[Attorney General & PPT Dwarven Dragon]

Sheriff Joe Arpaio may be running for Senate!

Do republicans want Sinema to win?

[Attorney General & PPT Dwarven Dragon]

Arpaio fears his pardon will exacerbate the AZ GOP civil war.

Oh, I just feel terrible now.

I cant even believe this. Republicans are doing everything they can to gift us a Senate seat. It's unreal. If they screw up Alabama as well, we could have both Houses of Congress back in 2019. That's amazing.

Meh, even with Alabama, Nevada, and Arizona, you still have to get Claire McCaskill reelected (which is nearly impossible), unless there's a three way race in Utah. Of course, holding republicans to a 50-50 "Collins Majority" would also count as an excellent result given the map.

[Attorney General & PPT Dwarven Dragon]

Can Joe Arpaio PLEASE run for senate? It would be a slam dunk for Sinema.

Can Donald Trump PLEASE run for president? It would be a slam dunk for Hillary.

A Hillary slam dunk requires different state boundaries: http://tinyurl.com/y7ave3qk

[Attorney General & PPT Dwarven Dragon]

If the race is Flake vs. Sinema, does Flake get Blanched?

LOL NO

[Attorney General & PPT Dwarven Dragon]

I just thought I should shed light on what could take Stanton down big time in a statewide race.
Many of you believe Sinema is flawed because she is a former sjw, an atheist and bisexual.

But in Arizona standards(and in many places), the biggest scandal is wasteful spending.
Stanton has been involved in what has become the 2nd most wasteful spending event in Arizona history(Arpaio is 1st). To be honest I am shocked the GOP hasn't taken this story to town like they should hove, but I guarantee they will if Stanton Runs for any statewide office

The city of phoenix purchased the downtown Sheraton hotel, and it became a total loss of revenue. Now the city needs to sell it, at expense of tens of millions of dollars of tax payer money. On top of that the city plans on giving tax incentives to the company who decides to purchase it.

I can already see the ads, Stanton wastes tens of millions of dollars on a failed mixed economy pan and then after that gives corporate welfare to the company that made the purchase.

A wasteful spending record is political suicide, especially in a state with a cook PVI of R+5

http://www.azcentral.com/story/news/local/phoenix/2017/07/12/city-owned-sheraton-grand-phoenix-downtown-hotel-sale/430314001/

Also, Mayors of phoenix always run for statewide office. It is a line of succession. But they never win. Terry Goddard was essentially the only person to win statewide after being the mayor of phoenix, and that was in 2002. Since he has failed 2 more statewide runs. after Goddard the next mayor of phoenix to succeed is decades further down the road.

To an extent. But if the two Senate elections were happening at the same time and if Sinema was lucky enough to be facing Ward or Flake, there's a good chance that the Sinema vs. whoever race would take up most of the attention and if it turned into a rout, there's a high chance that Stanton would be helped across the finish line. Kinda like how Fred Thompson helped Frist across the line in 1994. And Gillibrand and Schumer were within the same margin of each other in 2010. Lindsey Graham only lost support off of Tim Scott from conservatives.

The two senate races in Oklahoma '16 and California '92 also both went for the same party. A split would actually be rather odd given recent historical precedent.

[Attorney General & PPT Dwarven Dragon]

The problem many Dems in the legislature face, is when they run for higher office, their opposition asks what they go done in the legislature, and do to the trifecta in AZ which doesn't allow any Dem bills to pass, the answer is usually nothing causing them to be labeled as a do nothing.

I don't understand why that would be a unique problem to Arizona. There are plenty of states where Democrats don't have legislative power, yet still can win executive races. Same for Republicans (vice versa). The point would be to articulate why they have better ideas, and that the opposition's ideas and legislative experience is clearly not helping the state.

Not suggesting it is unique to Arizona, but out voter demographic is significantly older than most states. And in midterm elections that voter demographic just gets older. The older demographic tends to look at a candidates record, instead of their vision.

Hardly anyone looks at a candidate record.

"x's voting record" is actually a pretty common search engine entry in the runup to an election.

[Attorney General & PPT Dwarven Dragon]

Endorsed against Ward. Against Flake? Let's see how things play out over the next year.

[Attorney General & PPT Dwarven Dragon]

The Flake For Senate twitter page is the funniest thing on the internet tonight. You can tell they are really reeeaacching to label Sinema as out of touch and a socialist. Both will fail considering Sinema lived in an abandoned gas station while Flakes upbringing is nothing of the sort. Socialist label will fail bc Sinema has been endorsed by the chamber of commerce in the past.

It's starting to look like many of the traditional right wing attacks/talking points won't work on Sinema

Cant call her a Pelosi minion
Or a socialist
Or out of touch with the middle class

LOL. Sinema's a blue dog, a capitalist, and voted against Pelosi 3 times.

[Attorney General & PPT Dwarven Dragon]

So Flake set up this: http://www.socialistsinema.com

[Attorney General & PPT Dwarven Dragon]

52%. For comparison, I have Rosen at 55%.

[Attorney General & PPT Dwarven Dragon]

Outside the box question for people more in the know than me: if Ward beats Flake in the primary, is there any chance Flake pulls a Murkowski and runs in the general anyways as an Indy? Are there sore loser ballot restrictions in AZ that would prevent it?

Murkowski didn't run as an independent though, she ran as a write-in. There is a spot for a write-in on the Arizona ballot but I doubt Flake would be anywhere near as successful. He'd split the republican vote which would allow Sinema to win easily, especially since the democratic party is much stronger in Arizona than it is in Alaska.

Yeah, this. It worked for Murkowski because she was able to attract even moderate Ds to her candidacy. That would never happen with Flake.

[Attorney General & PPT Dwarven Dragon]

Here are the results of my GCS poll:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0Bynnt69uB-jIX2NUd290ZENHUVE/view?usp=sharing

As always, I cut, codified, weighted and analyzed the raw data using my own methodology, so I do hope this is more accurate and respectable than a run-of-the-mill GCS poll.

Caveat is that no undecided option was presented to respondents due to lack of space.

LOL @ Sinema getting 39% of Republicans. GCS continues to be a joke.

[Attorney General & PPT Dwarven Dragon]

Meanwhile, Jeff Flake is continuing to be amazingly unaware of his party's identity and is intent on going down in flames:

http://www.politico.com/story/2017/10/19/jeff-flake-trump-arizona-243925?lo=ap_a1

Funniest part of that story is how Democrats seem to think Flake has a better chance against Sinema than Ward. I think just the opposite, though I'd give Ward a 20% chance at beating Sinema whereas with Flake I'd give him zero chance.

Dems are using the Pre-Trump model, which suggests establishment republican is always more electable than the Tea Party/Radical/White Supremacist sect. Admittedly, it makes some sense to use that, as generic R would have done better in AZ in '16 than Trump did.

[Attorney General & PPT Dwarven Dragon]

Wow. Was not expecting that.

Rating moves from Toss-Up to Lean D, though I'll reconsider if an alternative establishment candidate enters, and my endorsement remains up for grabs. Arizona's senate primary isn't until August '18.

[Attorney General & PPT Dwarven Dragon]

Wow. Was not expecting that.

Rating moves from Toss-Up to Lean D, though I'll reconsider if an alternative establishment candidate enters, and my endorsement remains up for grabs. Arizona's senate primary isn't until August '18.

That may be premature. It was getting to the point that Flake was almost the worse GE candidate, and the guarantee of a brutal Republican primary was part of what gave Sinema such a good chance. Now, unless a credible establishment Republican jumps in, Ward is going to sail to the GE just as easily as Sinema and end up in better shape for it (at least relatively; I don't think Kelli F**king Ward will ever actually be in good shape in this state).

I am treating the race as Sinema vs. Ward, which is a Lean D race, unless and until someone establishment jumps in.

[Attorney General & PPT Dwarven Dragon]

Jeff DeWit seems to know he's wanted. Probably the best shot at keeping the seat now, TBH.

https://twitter.com/JeffDeWitAZ/status/922906754723192832

If he gets in, I'll move the race back to Toss-Up. But I won't be surprised if he defers to Ward.

[Attorney General & PPT Dwarven Dragon]

Overall she's OK though. Better than Flake.

How could you say that as a Republican? She would block the President's agenda if elected.

What do you think Flake has been doing?

Honestly at this point I dislike RINOs so much I'd prefer Democrats.

McCain to me is worse than Schumer and Warren for example.

My 2 biggest problems with her from what I can tell is her stance on illegal immigration (she uses the "make them pay back taxes" meme) and gun control. But Flake is also bad on those positions anyway.

If I am going to get stabbed might as well be from the front rather than the back know what I mean?

Voting with the President 95% of the time? Are you an idiot?

He just said what he cares about is illegal immigration and guns - Which Flake doesn't agree with him on.

[Attorney General & PPT Dwarven Dragon]

I never thought I could get so annoyed by reading the posts of someone else who would call themselves "far-right" and then I read the posts in this thread!  Who cares about immigration and populism when there are actual fiscal and social issues to worry about?  My worry isn't who wants to build a wall the most, but who wants to stop abortion the most and cut taxes the most!

A lot of people who have a pro-life litmus test have it in a "necessary but not sufficient" category - they won't vote for a pro-choicer, but they'd rather stay home or vote third party over voting for someone who is say, pro-amnesty despite being pro-life. This is nothing new.

[Attorney General & PPT Dwarven Dragon]

Congratulations Senator Kirkpatrick.

?

[Attorney General & PPT Dwarven Dragon]

Just like Flake, whose lack of a competitive race in the heavily Republican AZ-06 (old lines) during the 2000's, proved to be a hindrance in the 2012 general election.


I never said Democrats cannot win in AZ. I said that Democrats have struggled statewide and have not gotten above ~45% or so in any race for President or Senate in the past 20 years. Even in 2016, with Donald Trump as the Republican candidate, and a massive pro-Democratic Trend in AZ-07 (urban hispanics and young voters), and the defection of close to 8% of the traditional vote to third party candidates or to Clinton in the heavily Republican AZ-06 (current lines), still did not get Clinton above 44% of the vote statewide. The exact same percentage that Obama got against Mitt Romney, who I would point out was a far better fit for AZ then Trump.

There have been times where Democrats have broken through. Clinton in the 1990's and Napolitano in 2002, which were the result of vote splits with third party candidates. In local races yes, including the most prominent one for sheriff, where the Republican was under indictment I would point out. Winning a county wide race is one thing were local issues matter more, but that is a different matter than putting a Democrat in the US Senate. Could it happen? Certainly! I would just say that it is not a certainty.

Clinton got 46% (rounded) in 2016....

[Attorney General & PPT Dwarven Dragon]

Just like Flake, whose lack of a competitive race in the heavily Republican AZ-06 (old lines) during the 2000's, proved to be a hindrance in the 2012 general election.


I never said Democrats cannot win in AZ. I said that Democrats have struggled statewide and have not gotten above ~45% or so in any race for President or Senate in the past 20 years. Even in 2016, with Donald Trump as the Republican candidate, and a massive pro-Democratic Trend in AZ-07 (urban hispanics and young voters), and the defection of close to 8% of the traditional vote to third party candidates or to Clinton in the heavily Republican AZ-06 (current lines), still did not get Clinton above 44% of the vote statewide. The exact same percentage that Obama got against Mitt Romney, who I would point out was a far better fit for AZ then Trump.

There have been times where Democrats have broken through. Clinton in the 1990's and Napolitano in 2002, which were the result of vote splits with third party candidates. In local races yes, including the most prominent one for sheriff, where the Republican was under indictment I would point out. Winning a county wide race is one thing were local issues matter more, but that is a different matter than putting a Democrat in the US Senate. Could it happen? Certainly! I would just say that it is not a certainty.

Clinton got 46% (rounded) in 2016....

When you insert ~ before a number, it means "about".

Carmona got 46% against Flake as well.

I was referring to this part:

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