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By BRIAN A. HOWEY
INDIANAPOLIS - If you’re looking at trendlines, there is little good news for Democrat Jill Long Thompson. While she’s up on TV, it’s not a statewide buy. It doens’t include South Bend and Fort Wayne markets. Thompson’s backers point out that Northern Indiana is her home base, but Gov. Mitch Daniels’ campaign manager Eric Holcomb observed, “She lost her last two elections in Northern Indiana.”
Indiana Republicans took apart the last Thompson TV ad. In it, an Indianapolis testimonial says: “Property taxes are sky high and home foreclosures are way up.” FACT: Gov. Daniels led the charge to cut property taxes and make the cuts permanent by placing them in the Constitution. Jill Long Thompson says the caps shouldn’t be made permanent. On average, property taxes for homeowners statewide are decreasing by a third. A Cambridge City Testimonial says: “Layoffs are soaring and our wages are falling” FACT: Jobs are coming to Cambridge City and the rest of the state in record numbers. In July 2006, Dot Foods announced 250 jobs in Cambridge City. In August 2007, Really Cool Foods announced 1,000 jobs in the city. And a Carmel Testimonial says: High school dropout rates are up. SAT scores are down. FACT: In Carmel, SAT scores are up 19 points from last year, and their 94.2% graduation rate is one of the best in the state.
“It’s clear that Jill Long Thompson is spending all of that out-of-state campaign cash on negative advertising,” Indiana Republican Party Chairman Murray Clark said. “While it’s good to see other states’ money spent in Indiana, the incorrect nature of the charges is disappointing and straight out of the Democratic Party playbook of all cynicism all the time.”
There was a $50,000 donation from EMILY’S List and another $100,000 from the ISTA, but while Daniels is preparing to purchase hundreds of thousands of gross rating points between Sept. 7 and Nov. 4, the Thompson campaign’s TV buys are actually scaling back.
She gets no tailwind from the veepstakes. A nomination for Sen. Evan Bayh would have given her access to Democratic Senatorial Committee money. That won’t happen now. And the polls have her down in double digits at a time when a campaign hopes to get to Labor Day within single digits. A SurveyUSA poll last week had Daniels leading 52-38 percent.
There is evidence that the Democratic Party is still splintered. CSO Architects hosted an Aug. 15 fundraiser for Gov. Daniels. Jim Schellinger wasn’t there, but his partners who contributed heavily to his losing campaign were. Daniels campaign sources tell HPI that the governor and Schellinger have had several friendly phone conversations. Another prominent Democrat, Alpha Blackburn, is having a fundraiser for Daniels. The Professional Firefighters Union of Indiana endorsed Daniels and donated $5,000. The IAFF unanimously endorsed Barack Obama for president. It’s worth noting that these fire union endorsmenets come as several cities such as Gary, South Bend, Kokomo and Muncie are poised to lay off firefighters as a result of the governor’s tax reforms - HB1001.
And many observers are still scratching their heads at the Thompson-Oxley campaign’s double-teaming most events this summer. Normally, the ticket splits up to hit twice as many areas, but Thompson and Dennie Oxley II have spent most of the summer campaigning together. They will split up for Labor Day parades this weekend.
Thompson is trying to feed off the fresh spate of plant closings around the state. She was in Richmond Wednesday commiserating with about 100 of the 275 Masterbrand Cabinets employees who showed up for work and found their jobs gone. “I came here today to listen to fellow Hoosiers and share with them my belief that Indiana can do better,” said Long Thompson. “These workers and their families are victims of the Bush-Daniels economy. Several years ago my own mother lost her factory job when the plant where she worked closed its doors. Businesses are failing and people are hurting, yet we have a governor who refuses to acknowledge that there is even a problem. We need a new approach and we need new leadership to make that happen.” Another session occurred up in Elkhart.
But as we’ve reported in the past, for every plant closing, the governor trots out a new business. In his current TV ad, Daniels acknowledges the job losses, but says that for every one lost, his administration is paving the way for two new ones.
Thompson simply hasn’t - to date - come close to pinning the blame on Daniels for the high gas prices that have greatly impacted the auto and RV industries.
Coming up: the release of the third Howey-Gauge Poll at 5 p.m. Thursday Sept. 4 at the Indianapolis Chamber’s Annual Hobnob, which will include fresh statewide numbers in the gubernatorial and presidential races. Status: Leans Daniels
Tags: Alpha Blackburn, Dennie Oxley II, Eric Holcomb, Jill Long Thompson, JIm Schellinger, Mitch Daniels
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This entry was written by and posted on August 29, 2008 at 1:04 pm and filed under HPI Weekly. Bookmark the permalink. Follow any comments here with the RSS feed for this post.
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