Mack makes a prediction: he won't win majority but will win election

Forget those pesky poll numbers, at least one campaign in Florida is predicting it will win despite them.

Wait? You say that's not news? Well, take a look at the press release sent out by the Mack for Senate campaign. We think it's a rather loose link to his baseball heritage, a kind of Babe-Ruth-like called shot. (Maybe Mack's legendary great grandfather, Cornelius McGillicuddy, the former manager of the Philadelphia Athletics, passed down probability instincts of some sort.)  

MIAMI – With seven days left until Election Day, the Connie Mack for U.S. Senate campaign today predicted that Connie Mack will win the race for the U.S. Senate based on the ongoing internal polling and analysis conducted by the campaign.

Senate campaign: contest between the self-proclaimed 'mainstream conservative' & 'Florida moderate'

Rick Johnson, a financial advisor from Shalimar is worried.

“I know it’s a tough time in Washington, but another four years of deadlock is not going to move this country forward,’’ he told U.S. Rep. Connie Mack IV at a brief campaign stop last month in the military stronghold of Walton County in the Panhandle. “It’s a recipe for disaster.”

Mack didn’t hesitate with the answer. “We’re going to get this country back and that means more jobs, more security and more freedom,’ he said. “I appreciate you coming out.”

It doesn’t get more complicated than that for Mack, 45, a nine-year Republican congressman from Fort Myers who is challenging incumbent Democrat Bill Nelson for the U.S. Senate. Mack profile here.

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 On a clear October morning, Florida’s senior senator stood on the red clay soil near his grandfather’s grave and pointed to the cow pasture behind him.

“I remember my bare feet on that cold earth that had been turned up by the big plow,’’ he told friends and relatives at the church cemetery halfway between Pensacola and Tallahassee. “These are the pioneers that saw technology change our way of life.”

Four hours later, Nelson was in Tallahassee, pointing again — this time at the world’s largest magnet housed at the National Magnetic Field Laboratory at Florida State University.

“We are going to Mars,’’ he told the scientists. “We need to create a magnetic field around our astronauts so if there is a solar explosion, they won’t get fried. Can you do that?”

“Yes,’’ answered Greg Boebinger, the lab director. “It’s conceivable.”

It wasn’t much of a campaign day for Nelson in this low-key re-election campaign, but it was a lot like his political career: book-ended by a pilgrimage to his roots and an homage to Florida’s technological future.

After nearly 40 years in public office, Nelson has bridged the generations and the technological divide. He has watched its cow pastures transformed in the wake of the state’s population boom. He was a civilian crew member of the 1986 space shuttle Columbia and is now the lone Democrat to hold statewide office in the nation’s largest swing state. His centrist positions on fiscal and social issues, and his low-key demeanor have helped him remain in office even as political power in Florida has shifted from Democrat to Republican. He is arguably the last of Florida’s old-style Southern Democrats.

But if Republicans have their way, the state’s longest-serving Democrat will be ousted this year. Nelson profile here.

 

 

 

Mason-Dixon poll: Senate race tightens in crucial I-4 corridor

Start sweating, U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson.

The Democrat leads Republican rival Connie Mack by only three points, 47 percent to 44 percent, in Florida’s bellwether I-4 corridor, according to a new Tampa Bay Times/Bay News 9 poll.

Mack — who is within the poll’s margin of error — is gaining on the strength of Mitt Romney in Florida, the unpopularity of President Barack Obama’s policies and Nelson’s struggles to close the deal despite decades in public office.

But it may not be enough for Mack, said Brad Coker of Mason-Dixon Polling & Research, which conducted the poll. "At the end of the day, if Nelson hangs on, I think it’s going to be more about Mack losing it than Nelson winning," Coker said.

The I-4 corridor runs from Tampa Bay through Central Florida and is heavily concentrated with swing voters. Thus, it’s a good measure of how the statewide vote might go. Nelson, who lives in Orlando, is losing by 1 percentage point in Central Florida, which tends to lean more Republican than Tampa Bay, where Nelson has a 7 point advantage.

Nelson leads among independent voters, 48 percent to 40, but 9 percent are undecided, the poll shows. More on the poll here.  Profile of Nelson here. Profile of Mack here.

Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/2012/10/27/3070071/poll-riding-romneys-coattails.html#storylink=cpy

Connie Mack campaigns with Sen. John McCain

In his quest to unseat Florida's Democratic senator, GOP U.S. Rep. Connie Mack IV toured the state Tuesday with former presidential candidate John McCain, stopping in Tampa.

"There is a clear choice in this election," Mack told a room full of supporters in a Mitt Romney Victory campaign office on Gandy Boulevard.

It was the final stop on a campaign tour that included Jacksonville and Pensacola and featured U.S. Sen. McCain of Arizona, the 2008 Republican presidential nominee.

With two weeks until Election Day, they drew a distinction between Mack and his opponent, U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson.

"Sen. Nelson has voted for higher taxes 150 times. I've got this litmus test: If you've voted for higher taxes 150 times, it's time for you to go," Mack said.

McCain championed Mack's record as a congressman — a record he said includes voting against the health care law known as Obamacare, the Dodd-Frank regulation on the banking industry, and the automatic budget cuts that would especially affect the military.

Story here.

Nelson kicks laid-back campaign into gear for closing weeks

U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson returned to his red clay roots on Tuesday and visited a modest cemetery behind the New Orange Baptist Church near the tiny Panhandle town of Chipley.

There, and in the cow pastures beyond it, five generations of Nelsons are buried, the offspring of Jens Nissen, Nelson’s great, great grandfather. The elder changed his name to John Nelson after arriving from Denmark to Port St. Joe 183 years ago in 1829.

“These folks are the salt of the earth. They lived a simple life and their children went on to have very successful careers,’’ Nelson said, pointing to the shiny gray tombstone of his uncle Donald, a veterinarian.

Nelson, 70, was greeted by cousins Catherine Nelson of Chipley and Margaret Ferguson of Tallahassee and joined by his son, Bill Nelson, Jr. The side trip to the cemetery was buffeted Monday and today by rallies in Pensacola, Panama City and Gainesville as Nelson barnstorms through the state in the most active two weeks of his campaign for a third term in the U.S. Senate. (Photo: Nelson and son, Bill Nelson Jr., at the family grave site in Chipley.)

Sen. John McCain to join Connie Mack in tour of military towns Tuesday

Arizona Sen. John McCain will join MIAMI- Senator John McCain will join Republican Senate nominee, Congressman Connie Mack IV on Tuesday with stops in the military-heavy towns of Jacksonville, Pensacola, and Tampa.

Here's the schedule:

Nelson sweeps newpaper endorsements over Mack

Democrat Bill Nelson has swept the endorsements of the top five major daily newspapers in Florida in the U.S. Senate race against Republican challenger Connie Mack IV. Nelson today picked up the backing of the Orlando Sentinel, Miami Herald, Tampa Tribune and Palm Beach Post. The Tampa Bay Times endorsed Nelson last week.

Here are the excerpts, as compiled by the Florida Democratic Party: 

PolitiFact rules Nelson's claim that Mack protected Chevron only half true

Democrat U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson’s new television ad hits Republican Connie Mack for "protecting Chevron oil from a multi-billion dollar lawsuit over pollution of rivers and rain forests."

Mack’s act of protection is a yet-to-be-heard congressional resolution listing the Chevron case as one of many reasons to withhold trade preferences with Ecuador. Resolutions are symbolic gestures, so it would take a law for Congress to take real action on Ecuadorian trade practices.

But, PolitiFact found, the Chevron case is complicated. Chevron says it did not get a fair trial in Ecuador and should not be held responsible. The resolution, however, appears to be designed to exert political pressure on the country in Chevron’s favor. PolitiFact Florida rates Nelson’s claim Half True. Read the ruling here.

Mack conversion: he's no longer debating the value of debates

U.S. Rep. Connie Mack IV, whose campaign assiduously avoided debating his opponents during the primary, has now found religion. In a letter that is more campaign tactic than invite, Mack's campaign manager Jeff Cohen tells Nelson's campaign manager Pete Mitchell how important the evening was last night and how they want to have more debates.

"The people saw a glimpse into a future in which a new generation of leaders in Washington stand with the people and for the people,'' Cohen wrote. Here's the letter:

Facts get pummeled in Nelson v. Mack debate

Democratic incumbent Sen. Bill Nelson held his own against challenger Republican U.S. Rep. Connie Mack IV and Mack showed he can spar like a contender in a vigorous debate between the two candidates in Davie Wednesday night.

While it was the most drama we'll see in the race for months, there were casualties. Facts.

The good news is, PolitiFact Florida had covered much of this territory before, since the candidates relied on most of the same attacks they have lobbed in television ads for the past two months. Here's a run-down: