Lynn Sweet: Bush on his way to Illinois for Topinka
Sweet writes there were no hard feelings over Topinka's cracks a few months ago,
Democratic blue state Illinois is flashing onto the radar of the Bush White House, with the governorship up for grabs and two high-profile House seats.Maybe the all the protestors a visit like this brings out serves to pump up those conservatives thinking of sitting out November? (Gay Activists demanding a right to marriage they would disdain exercising themselves, linked arm-in-arm with angry Kossaks crying no war for oil with Ahmadinejad's Iran. Think of the image.)
The Sun-Times has learned President Bush is coming to Chicago July 7 for a fund-raiser for Judy Baar Topinka.
The White House political operation, run by Karl Rove -- who helped convince Topinka to run against Gov. Blagojevich -- is also closely monitoring two of the most-watched House races in the country, in the west and Northwest Suburban 6th and 8th congressional districts.
Illinois, Michigan and Wisconsin are seen by the White House as having very serious potential to pick off a Democratic governor, notwithstanding low approval ratings for Bush and Congress.
Also heard Rick Pearson on WGN radio yesterday morning talk about Blagojvich's TV ads. For a guy with a pile of money, they're kind of cheesy commercials. The quality seems poor. Pearson said without a key issue that could knock off Topinka early, they're a waste of money; and they're clearly not hitting he with an issue that will crush her early.
I wish he'd bring out a Ryan-Topinka polka commercial. That would at least hold my attention.
11 comments:
This does wonders for the credibility of Tom Roeser and the wizards of Carpentersville.
Come on Rod, Bring out the Polka Dancing Commercials! In all my 19 years, that had to have been one of the funniest political commercials I have ever seen.
It would have been great during the Super Bowl!
They were great commercials. I'd call me wife into the room to watch them.
I don't know how much damage they did to Topinka but we sure got a kick out of them.
There is a rumor that Ibendahl and Santos will wear sandwich boards outside of the Bush-Topinia event, asserting that the President, Dick Cheney, Karl Rove, and entire White House Staff are secretly conspiring with Bob Kjellander, Bill Brady, and Topinka to hold back "reform", in order to deny Ibendahl the rightful power and control that Destiny has appointed for him in the Illinois GOP. Any truth to that?
Perhaps Topinka is actually calling in her favors.
Bill,
I'll bet the commercials are very effective.
1. They are short, fast, & numerous.
2. They aren't designed to do anything but sow seeds of negativity in an already negative patch of weeds.
3. All the consultant-speak about no one "paying attention" in summer is a load of hooey.
If you have the $$, defining your opponent before they even run an ad defining themselves simply makes their post-labor day sell that much harder.
Clinton won re-election with the ads run from the shutdown through the spring of 1996.
It was over by the first primary.
4. Insiders like Pearson (& the blogosphere) like to preen in front of an audience, handicapping ads and telling us all how smart they are.
Millions more will watch 10 of those ads than will ever hear (or read) Pearson's preening.
5. BTW, given Bush's popularity here in IL, her numbers will likely go down after the IL media uses each candidate to excoriate the other. Bush's #'s will probably drop here too.
Fact is, she probably knows she's getting killed by those ads, and needs Bush$$ more than the 2-5 points his appearance will cost her. If she doesn't get some ads up soon, she's even toastier than the toast she is now.
6. The ONLY thing Topinka has going for her is that she's not Rod. Given that she's Topinka, that probably isn't going to be enough.
7. See how smart I am? ;-)
Hmmm,
http://www.surveyusa.com/50State2006/50StatePres060515State.htm
Bush is polling at 31% in Illinois, and this is supposed to HELP Topinka?
I admit that I am not smart enough to understand this one.
Ollie,
It's the money. She needs the cash more than she needs the 2-5 points Bush costs her.
That Rove! He's a genius.
If the National Repubs start taking an interest in the Illinois gov race that is very bad news for the incumbant. He has so much baggage there heads must be spinning about where to start attacking.
Blago ads are very weak and have no shelf life and they do look cheesy. What are they thinking?
When the challenger starts her attack ads the message will resonate unless they hire an even worse producer than Blago's.
ollie,
What an interesting way of looking at things.
BTW, how did you come up with the handle "ollie"? I'm sure there must be an interesting story behind it.
Do tell!
Post a Comment