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Chris Cole rocks--with 7% he's suddenly a hot topic in North Carolina

Yesterday I noted that Libertarian Chris Cole had scored 7% in the North Carolina Senate race, and suddenly his numbers are a very hot topic in the Tarheel State....

From Poll Tracker

Republican Sen. Elizabeth Dole's leads Democratic challenger Kay Hagan 46 percent to 41 percent with Libertarian Chris Cole drawing 7 percent and 5 percent undecided in a SurveyUSA poll conducted Aug. 9-11. This is the first time SurveyUSA included Cole in its poll, and it observed: "Hagan is flat, Dole is down. Cole gets 11% of male votes today, siphoning key votes Dole needs to win. Cole gets 12% of young votes today, siphoning key votes Hagan needs to win. Cole gets 9% of the white vote today, cutting Dole's lead from 30-plus points to 20 points." SurveyUSA had Dole 12 points ahead in a mid-July poll without Cole.


From the Raleigh News & Observer:

Advertising is having a huge effect in the Senate race.

With Democratic candidate Kay Hagan on the air during the May primary, her numbers improved against U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Dole.

Dole then got a bump from her own ads, but another round of ads attacking Dole has narrowed the gap again. The entrance of Libertarian Chris Cole to the race also complicated things.


From Piedmont Triad:

Meck Deck takes note of poll gains by Libertarian Chris Cole in the Senate race, saying “the indy vote is an even bigger indictment of Hagan’s campaign which has lurched around trying to pin a target on Dole rather than go flat out and sell Hagan.” Cone has Hagan’s latest TV ad, which he says does just that.

Back to Cole, who got a fair amount of print in the recent discussion on energy policy. I suspect that voters are wising up to the fact neither Democrats or Republicans are doing anything about energy policy and there’s little hope for the future with the mainstream candidates we have now.


From Campaign Diaries:

In North Carolina’s Senate race (polling history), SUSA shows Elizabeth Dole back under 50%, leading Kay Hagan 46% to 41%. Dole led by 12% last month, but the difference might come from the presence in SUSA’s question of a libertarian candidate, Chris Cole, who gets 7%.


From Meck Deck:

Don’t look now but Liddy Dole is leaking votes to Chris Cole, the Libertarian Party nominee from Huntersville. That’s the conclusion of SurveyUSA poll conducted last week for WTVD.

The poll had a margin of error of 4% and found Dole leading Democrat Kay Hagan 46-41 with Cole at 7%. But voters are not smitten with their duopoly party choice....

To me the indy vote is an even bigger indictment of Hagan’s campaign which has lurched around trying to pin a target on Dole rather than go flat out and sell Hagan. Then again, there is not much to sell in a machine Demo candidate from a corrupt state party. If Cole had any money at all, he could hit 10% against this crew.


Good question, that last. Why doesn't Chris Cole have any money? I can think of two reasons, one being that the necessity of raising $200,000 for ballot access for the LPNC sucked most of the dough out of NC Libertarian activists. The other is that the national Libertarian Party has completely ignored Cole's rise in the polls, and doesn't devote any money to State and local candidates, anyway.

Keep it up, Chris. Maybe ideas get you through times with no money better than money gets you through times with no ideas.

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