#ncpol: Polling, press releases & pabulum. N&O laziness extends from NC-02 over to NC-07.
Young Mr. Campbell has apparently learned well from Jedi master Rob. *Why bother making calls and digging when someone has already pretty much written the story for you?*
“Rep. Rouzer: Poll shows GOP opponent doesn’t have much support” is the headline that screams at us from the N&O web site. (*I am willing to bet that part after the colon is the word-for-word title on the release sent over from the Rouzer campaign.*) Here’s young Colin’s, um. “analysis*:
Congressman David Rouzer released results Wednesday from an opinion poll his campaign ordered for his Smithfield-to-Wilmington district.
Rouzer’s poll, conducted by Public Opinion Strategies, found that the Republican opponent leads GOP challenger Mark Otto by 83 percent to 5 percent. Of the 300 likely Republican primary voters surveyed, 66 percent said they had a favorable opinion of Rouzer while 9 percent viewed him unfavorably.[…]
Okay, let’s translate this part. The 83 per cent lead is all about name ID. The district includes Rouzer’s old state Senate district. He was the GOP nominee for the district in 
2012 AND 2014. He ought to be known.
Mark Otto is a different story. Otto has kept a low political profile. He doesn’t have much of a Google trail. But I DID find this Facebook post from Otto when he was 2nd district GOP chairman. Apparently, he was a leader in the effort to get Renee Ellmers past Bob Etheridge in the 2010 general election AND during the ensuing recount. (The 2010 redistricting, which went into effect in 2012, moved Otto’s Johnston County home from the 2nd to the 7th.) Otto has said this current campaign was an end-product of his frustration over the recently approved Omnibus spending bill — which Rouzer voted for after telling constituents he WOULD NOT. The Omnibus bill fully-funded amnesty for illegals, sanctuary cities, ObamaCare, AND Planned Parenthood.
A more telling number is the 66 percent approval for Rouzer. Eighty-three percent of likely Republican voters KNOW him, b
ut only 66 percent APPROVE of him. Not very impressive for someone who has represented ALL or part of the district in the state Senate or Congress for years. Otto’s mission is to take that 9 percent unfavorable for Rouzer and make that number bigger. (And, of course, make that 66 percent figure SMALLER.)
I’ve had a few statistics classes, and looked at more than a few polls over the years. Isn’t that a rather small sample for the poll? What were the exact questions, and the margin of error?
This release from Rouzer is all about damage control. Kind of like Renee Ellmers’s campaign putting up all those “[Primary Candidate’s Name Here] is Lying” ads on Google. (FYI — Ellmers and Rouzer have even had joint campaign fundraising operations.) When your opponents are laying down intense fire in your direction, you need to unload a few bunker-busters yourself in their direction. The fact that Rouzer felt the need to even acknowledge his underdog challenger speaks volumes.
Campbell had MORE: 
Otto is a former 2nd Congressional District Republican Party chairman who lives in Johnston County’s Cleveland community. He’s issued a series of news releases in recent weeks criticizing Rouzer. This week, he’s blasting Rouzer for initially supporting a proposed CSX rail hub in Johnston County. Otto says he opposes the use of eminent domain to secure farmland for the project; Rouzer later voiced similar concerns.
Rouzer’s campaign said the poll results show most GOP voters are backing their congressman.
“Bottom line: Congressman Rouzer has cemented a strong following among Republican voters in a relatively short period of time, a credit to his tireless work ethic, dedication to the district, and conservative representation in Congress,” said the news release, which was sent by Danielle Adams.
Adams is the Rouzer’s communications director for his government office; she did not use her government email to send the campaign release.
Interesting. The N&O has time to quote extensively from Rouzer’s press release, but not the plethora of releases Otto has been sending out.
There is a little more to the CSX story than ol’ Colin is telling us. CSX and the McCrory administration got together on a land grab in the name of “economic development.” Rouzer trumpeted his approval like a good sycophant. The homeowners didn’t take it sitting down. Some drivebys covered the story, and the conservative blogosphere picked it up and ran with it from there.
Like a good politician, Rouzer began to recognize he might take some heat for his position and ran like hell from it. All references to CSX were scrubbed from his official web site.
Prior to the Tea Party revolt of 2010, The N&O was notorious for protecting the Democrat machine holding power in the state. Jim Hunt, et. al., were thoroughly and effectively protected from the rabble outside the beltline. Now that the GOPe has the reins of power, it appears the newsroom has found a new set of, um, “friends.”
I — like most other Americans — am not interested in protecting politicians. TRUTH is the name of the game. Get the truth out there, and let the people make up their minds.
At the risk of being called “establishment” when I’m just trying to be honest, Rouzer will win the primary in a landslide. I know folks hate to hear the truth and love to bring up Eric Cantor, but Dave Brat was a actually a great candidate, unlike Otto.
Did you know Rouzer sends his deputy district director Chance Lambeth to local GOP meetings to campaign for him? Does it all the time. So, on taxpayer dime, we get a public employee working on Rouzer’s campaign. Is that just unethical or is it also unlawful? Both probably.
That is not good and certainly unethical.
Well, I will at least be voting Otto in the primary. When it comes to Rouzer or Dem candidate X…I will take X. Rouzer will likely get re-elected with the heavy Republican district it is…but I prefer to make the protest vote against his cozying up to the GOPe.
Sounds like the Rouzer campaign using Congressional staff to campaign could be a huge FEC violation. I have also heard from people present in the room, that Rouzer does have his deputy district director campaigning at GOP meetings while hiding behind bringing up a district issue or two. As for Mark Otto, I respect him for standing up to run against big odds. I won’t count his chances out as we see Rouzer scrambling in a huge way to do damage control on his Omnibus vote and CSX crony land grab support among other things. As Brant points out, why would Rouzer run and publish a poll (if he actually did) unless he’s vulnerable? Is there a way to certify that this poll was actually conducted and then to verify the results? Anyone can say anything about polls and the results.
Rouzer has been in major damage control mode for the past month. It’s hilarious to watch. What’s even more interesting are the amount of NC7 voters who are actually paying attention. Lying directly to constituents faces, making promises and then breaking them, voting to fund Obama’s entire destructive agenda, supporting land grabs via eminent domain, oh my.
One year in and David is proving to be the political elitist we all knew he would be.
Mark Otto has my vote.