Might the Romney campaign go on the air in Pa.? It’s a possibility – outside the expensive Philadelphia market.
Neither campaign nor any national groups have been on the air in Pa. since August.
Gone are the double-digit polling leads that President Obama enjoyed in Pa. in September. Now the race is within 5 points, according to the average by Real Clear Politics, and a bit more enticing to the Republican.
Reports Jonathan Martin of Politico:
Republicans are genuinely intrigued by the prospect of a strike in Pennsylvania and, POLITICO has learned, are considering going up on TV there outside the expensive Philadelphia market. But what Romney officials worry about, both in Pennsylvania and Michigan, is that if they put some cash down or use precious hours to send their candidate there Obama will respond by crushing their offensive with a big ad buy of his own.
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Romney doesn’t have long to decide if he wants to expand his TV presence into the two states. His aides think that they’ll have to decide by Halloween if the buy is to have much impact. They note that Pennsylvania doesn’t have early voting so all the ballots will be cast on Election Day.
As for Obama’s travel plans:
Pennsylvania and Michigan? They’re not worried and aren’t likely to send Obama there.
“Probably not, no,” said Obama deputy campaign manager Stephanie Cutter when asked if the president would rally supporters in the two traditionally Democratic electoral troves. “We have significant resources there. We are invested in those states at a much higher level than Gov. Romney is.”
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10 Responses
Considering the incredibly hard work SEPA Republicans are putting in, it would be a mistake for Romney Team to not put money in Philly Market. Two reasons, Tom Smith is within striking distance of Casey and can take him out with a Romney Team “Coattail” buy. Suburban Philly (Moderate Republicans, and Republicans who voted for Obama and want to come back) is also the Philly market, so you do the buy for no other reason than having some impact on the Senate races nationally. Second thing, the Obama Team would have to scramble big time, and there are a ton of D’s who are not happy and are looking for an excuse to dump him, in Philly. Why not, if no ad buy, send Ann Romney to do a big event either in the city or suburban Philly to snag some of those votes? I can not help but think of the huge effort that some Philly/SEPA Republicans have put in to make things interesting and not have air cover!! Many think that a substantial percentage number can be garnered from Philly and SEPA from these intense efforts, thus putting Philadelphia back on the map and competitive in the long run for Republicans.
Here’s an article, that explains how Romney is trying to fake momentum (including even this rumor of PA ads)
http://nymag.com/daily/intel/2012/10/romney-says-hes-winning-its-a-bluff.html
Actually 538 called 2010 as well which was a wave year for Republicans. They also called the Scott Walker recall and the Republican primaries in addition to everything in 2008. So that’s a wide array of elections from a Presidential Election to several Gubernatorial races to hundreds of House & Senate races and all of the Republican primaries this season. In total this has to be near a thousand races and 538 has accurately predicted almost 99% of them. So Nate Silver has credibility and a proven track record
I wonder when the Romney campaign is planning on running these ads…December?
538 uses actual math (correctly).
For example: The Real Clear Politics “average” of polls, will average polls of different sizes equally, rather than give the polls with more people a bigger weight. Also, Real Clear doesn’t adjust for the age of the polls, so polls three weeks old count the same as 3 days.
Finally, the BIGGEST thing that 538 does is calculate the pollsters history of accuracy/bias and adjust for it. Pollsters that tend to use landline over both land/cell or pollsters with automated rather than direct interview or pollsters that have highly partisan leanings.
538 applies all of this in their model. Then they “run” the election as a simulation a few hundred thousand times, taking into account that Obama +2 means the range is 95% chance of falling between Obama +5 and Obama -1.
So, when they “run” the election, 70% of the time Obama wins the electoral college, and 30% of the time Romney wins. Essentially, 538 captures the “margin of error” of the polls, and displays how much leeway there is.
538 correctly predicted one election (2008) and 2008 was a wave year for the Dems. Of course a dem leaning site would have many states correct in a dem wave election.
The fascination with 538 is the fact that they’re forecasts are accurate almost 99% of the time.
Whats with the left’s fascination with 538?
According to today’s 538, Romney has only a 7 percent chance of winning Pa, down from an 11 percent chance last week. So much for diminishing returns. Sayonara Mittens
I wouldn’t spend too much in PA if I were Romney.