Mutually Assured Destruction, #NCSEN Style

During the Cold War, the United States and the Soviet Union sat for years with thousands of nuclear weapons pointed at each other.  The reason the Cold War stayed cold was that these warheads created a state of mutually assured destruction between the two super powers.

From Wikipiedia...

Mutual assured destruction, or mutually assured destruction (MAD), is a doctrine of military strategy and national security policy in which a full-scale use of high-yield weapons of mass destruction by two or more opposing sides would cause the complete annihilation of both the attacker and the defender.^[1] It is based on the theory of deterrence where the threat of using strong weapons against the enemy prevents the enemy's use of those same weapons. 

As the clock ticks down on the North Carolina US Senate race, the campaigns of Democrat Kay Hagan and Republican Thom Tillis seem to have settled into a similar faceoff.  For an race that could decide control of the Senate during the last two years of the Obama presidency, the race has remained decidedly timid.  Even with each side given opportunities to go on the attack over the past week, both sides have remained gun-shy.

First, at the beginning of last week this story broke on WCNC about fishy sounding connections between donations to the Thom Tillis campaign from folks who could benefit from the I-77 HOT Lanes project - a project that Thom Tillis long supported.  It's a 6 minute segment - an eternity for local news.  It also starts with something all but unprecedented.  WCNC reporter, Stuart Watson says right up front in the video that he got the tip for the story from "opposition research" - or in other words the Hagan campaign.

Usually, reporters protect their sources. Usually, a source like this would demand anonymity.  In this case however, the source wanted the Tillis campaign to know exactly where it originated.  This story didn't come from a single underpaid and overworked reporter at WCNC.  It originated from an organization with millions of dollars at its disposal and the single-minded purpose of beating Thom Tillis - an organization with the means and motivation to find more dirt if necessary.

The story was a deterrent.

By the end of last week it became clear why it was needed.

On Thursday, Politico broke this story about Kay Hagan's husband owning a company that directly benefited from some economic stimulus funds - $390,000 to be exact.  The story is bad, really bad.  That's evidenced by some more details added by the Washington Post the next day which show the Hagan team has brought in a fixer with connections all the way to the White House to help manage it.

Both of these stories could have attack adds that all but right themselves.  In both cases, if either contender was not afraid of their opponent's potential response, either of these stories could deal a knockout blow.  So far though, neither campaign has flooded the airwaves with commercials using these story lines.  The hard hitting commercials, the nuclear weapons of major political campaigns, have remained in their silos.

Without those commercials the only people who know about these stories are the political junkies and the partisans.

So, why have they remained silent? 

Mutually Assured Destruction based on the whiff of corruption.  Don't expose mine or I'll destroy you with yours is the message.  However, unlike during the Cold War where M.A.D ensured there was no winner or loser, in November one of these two candidates will be the next US Senator from North Carolina.

Tillis Campaign at the Tipping Point?

Back in July, we wrote about the NCSEN race possibly being off the critical path in the contest for a Republican majority in the US Senate.  National pundit Larry Sabato had said as much in his Crystal Ball newsletter when he failed to list North Carolina in his listing of the 6 most likely Republican pickups.

Much of Sabato's analysis had to do with the widening of the playing field to include Iowa.  State Senator Joni Earnst had made that an unexpected possibility for the GOP by running a spirited campaign as a conservative in that state's primary and winning handilly.

Over the last two months things have not improved for Team Tillis here in North Carolina and only gotten better for Team Earnst in Iowa.   A look at the recent polls for the two races at RealClearPolitics.com tells the whole story.  Tillis's numbers have been going the wrong way and Earnst is definitely gaining momentum.  This past week Sabato actually moved NC to leans Democrat.

Ouch!!!

The one thing that can turn this type of situation around is money and apparently that is now in short supply as well.  If you are on Republican email lists, you have no doubt recently received the panicky emails from the NRSC begging for money.

How may of those emails do you think received responses like #remebermississippi?  How much money has the NRSC's and Karl Rove's war conservatives this election cycle cost the party and individual candidates?

The number has to be in the many millions of dollars.

So now, the NRSC and it's establishment allies are facing a choice.  They can pour more money from their limited resources into a state like North Carolina in the hopes they can buy the general election for Thom Tillis like they did the Republican primary here, or they can use those limited resources to support a candidate like Earnst in Iowa - the type of candidate they have spent this whole election cycle trying to beat.

There is much to think about in the poetic justice of that choice.

#NCSEN Off the Critical Path to a Republican Majority?

A lot has been written in the past two weeks about the Republican infighting in Raleigh and the negative impacts it's having on Team Tillis's campaign for the US Senate.  The most current round of that fighting may be coming to an end with reports of a "framework" to end the budget stalemate between the more conservative State Senate and their more moderate counterparts in the Thom Tillis-led House and Governor McCrory's executive branch.

The impact of this infighting on the US Senate race may be overblown, and one can also reasonably discount the most recent polling from Public Policy Polling data showing Kay Hagan's lead increasing.  The mainstream media and the Democratic pollster both have vested interests in pushing the current incumbent.

But what happens if the NC Senate seat becomes less important overall to the national Republicans and their big money allies in their quest to gain control of the US Senate?

At least one leading analyst sees the North Carolina race dropping in importance to the Republicans capturing the Senate this November, and that's a sentiment that could not come at a worse time for Team Tillis.  The Tillis Senate campaign has fallen way behind Kay Hagan in direct fundraising.  If that kind of thinking takes hold among the big-money donors to the Tillis Campaign, the same donors who helped buy the Republican Primary, that could mean real trouble down the road.

Larry Sabato of the Center for Politics at the University of Virginia had this to say in his Crystal Ball post for last week regarding the current election cycle.  (Emphasis added.)

"Earlier in the cycle, we suggested that the winner of two of these three Democratic-held states would be in great shape to win the Senate: Alaska, Louisiana, and North Carolina, which we have long categorized as Toss-ups. But now that may not be the case: Democrats, in particular, could win two of these three and still narrowly lose the Senate. Of the seven states won by Mitt Romney in 2012 where Democrats are defending seats — Alaska, Arkansas, Louisiana, Montana, North Carolina, South Dakota, and West Virginia — it appears that the Democrats are doing best in Alaska and North Carolina. Sen. Mark Begich (D-AK) is running an excellent campaign, and the favored candidate of national Republicans, former state Attorney General Dan Sullivan, has been stuck in a long primary slog against Lt. Gov. Mead Treadwell (R) and 2010 GOP nominee Joe Miller (R). Sullivan is catching it from both Democrats and his fellow Republicans right now, and some Republicans are worried that he’ll be so damaged he won’t be able to catch Begich, assuming he wins the Aug. 19 primary.

Meanwhile, it appears Sen. Kay Hagan (D-NC) has taken a small lead on state House Speaker Thom Tillis (R), who may be losing points with voters because the unpopular state legislature’s session is in overtime. Hagan and Tillis both have weak numbers — so weak that a Libertarian with some amusing YouTube uploads, Sean Haugh, is polling in the mid-to-high single digits.

Both of these races remain Toss-ups, but Democrats look slightly better positioned in both at this point. Our “best two out of three” argument from earlier this cycle might be inoperative because Iowa is now so competitive. At this point, the most plausible path to a bare Republican majority of 51-49 looks like this: Beat incumbents in Arkansas, Louisiana, and Montana, and win open seats in Iowa, South Dakota, and West Virginia. Hence the Hawkeye State’s increased importance in the Senate landscape."

Notice, North Carolina does not make the cut in this list.

Last week there were also other events that do not bode well for the Tillis Campaign if either of these stories gain traction later in the election season.  First, by the Tuesday deadline, it appear three candidates made the official write-in list for the US Senate Race.  The DailyHaymaker blog has the details here.  Then on Thursday the I77 HOT Lanes story once again made the news.  This time raising the possibility of a lawsuit seeking an injunction against the project.  CorneliusNews.net has that story here.

In an extremely tight race either of these stories could sway things just enough to have an impact.

If that impact comes in the form of any reduction in dark money for Team Tillis in favor of a race perceived to be more winnable such as the one in Iowa, that could prove decisive.