# CT Dopers: What's the Lieberman-Lamont Debate Fallout Up Your Way?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ct-dopers-whats-the-lieberman-lamont-debate-fallout-up-your-way/363656
**Category:** Great Debates
**Created:** [July 8, 2006, 7:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ct-dopers-whats-the-lieberman-lamont-debate-fallout-up-your-way/363656 "2006-07-08T19:35:34Z")
**Posts on this page:** 11
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)
#### Post date: [July 8, 2006, 7:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ct-dopers-whats-the-lieberman-lamont-debate-fallout-up-your-way/363656/1 "2006-07-08T19:35:34Z")
I’d be interested in hearing how people in CT (including in-state press, TV, radio, etc.) are reacting to it, what’s your opinion of the candidates now that you’ve had time to reflect on it, and all that.
Also, feel free to continue non-Florida-related discussions here from the “[Lieberman May Bolt From Dems](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=378454)” thread.
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### Author:  [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)
#### Post date: [July 8, 2006, 8:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ct-dopers-whats-the-lieberman-lamont-debate-fallout-up-your-way/363656/2 "2006-07-08T20:48:21Z")
When was this debate? And can you link us to a report of it that does not require registration? (All I could find was NYT, which does.)
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### Author:  [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)
#### Post date: [July 8, 2006, 9:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ct-dopers-whats-the-lieberman-lamont-debate-fallout-up-your-way/363656/3 "2006-07-08T21:39:05Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#):
>
> When was this debate? And can you link us to a report of it that does not require registration? (All I could find was NYT, which does.)
Sorry about that. [Here’s yesterday morning’s Hartford Courant story](http://www.courant.com/news/politics/hc-sendebate0707.artjul07,0,1849076.story?coll=hc-headlines-politics-state), which was obviously written no more than a few hours after Thursday night’s debate. (I’m kinda interested in hearing about how it’s playing out, now that people in Connecticut have had a couple days to reflect on it.)
And PoliticsTV has the entire debate, available in one big download or as multiple tiny snippets, [on its main page](http://www.politicstv.com/blog/).
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### Author:  [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)
#### Post date: [July 8, 2006, 11:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ct-dopers-whats-the-lieberman-lamont-debate-fallout-up-your-way/363656/4 "2006-07-08T23:37:18Z")
> [@RTFirefly](#):
>
> [Here’s yesterday morning’s Hartford Courant story](http://www.courant.com/news/politics/hc-sendebate0707.artjul07,0,1849076.story?coll=hc-headlines-politics-state).
> [@](#):
>
> “Sen. Lieberman, if you won’t challenge President Bush and his failed agenda, I will,” Lamont replied.
If I were a . . . Connectican? Connecticutter? Connectic-- no, let’s not go **there**. . . that line alone would be reason enough for me to vote for Lamont in the primary.
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### Author:  [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)
#### Post date: [July 10, 2006, 7:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ct-dopers-whats-the-lieberman-lamont-debate-fallout-up-your-way/363656/5 "2006-07-10T19:34:33Z")
The linked [Survey USA poll](http://www.surveyusa.com/client/PollTrack.aspx?g=5b2ae37d-ddb3-43ce-9ef4-f463f260dbe9&x=751,2) shows Lieberman’s approval/disapproval ratings among Connecticut Democrats from 71-24 approve/disapprove in October 2005 to 46-50 last month. If that holds through the primary, he might need those petitions.
Over that same time, Lieberman’s a/d ratings among all CT adults have fallen from 69-27 to 55-41. He’s got plenty of time to have a net negative rating by November.
They seem to be doing this every month, so they should be polling again in a few days, and maybe they’ll have post-debate results up next week or the week after.
The MOE is about 4% for all CT adults, but much larger for subgroups, so don’t make a big deal about small changes, and remember that to get the MOE of a difference, you sum the squares of the individual MOEs, then take the square root of that sum.
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### Author:  [@KSO](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KSO)
#### Post date: [July 11, 2006, 1:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ct-dopers-whats-the-lieberman-lamont-debate-fallout-up-your-way/363656/6 "2006-07-11T13:24:20Z")
The Secretary of State was interviewed on a local radio station this morning. Lieberman has formed the “Connecticut for Lieberman” party in anticipation of losing the primary. A more dreadful name is difficult to imagine. She also said there has been a discernible number of unaffiliated voters switching to Democrat to vote in the primary and the towns are reporting lots of requests for absentee ballots. No idea of whether that means people who lean left are registering to vote for Lamont or whether people who lean right are registering to support Lieberman. I believe (no cite) that CT has more unaffiliated voters than either Democrat or Republican. I’ll see if I can dig up a cite for that.
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### Author:  [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)
#### Post date: [July 11, 2006, 2:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ct-dopers-whats-the-lieberman-lamont-debate-fallout-up-your-way/363656/7 "2006-07-11T14:10:34Z")
> [@KSO](#):
>
> The Secretary of State was interviewed on a local radio station this morning. Lieberman has formed the “Connecticut for Lieberman” party in anticipation of losing the primary. A more dreadful name is difficult to imagine.
If he loses the primary but wins the general, instead of being Sen. Lieberman (D-CT) (or even (I-CT), he’ll be Sen. Lieberman (Lieberman-CT)! 😃
> [@](#):
>
> She also said there has been a discernible number of unaffiliated voters switching to Democrat to vote in the primary and the towns are reporting lots of requests for absentee ballots. No idea of whether that means people who lean left are registering to vote for Lamont or whether people who lean right are registering to support Lieberman.
That’s interesting - I guess we’ll find out what it means by Aug. 9.
> [@](#):
>
> I believe (no cite) that CT has more unaffiliated voters than either Democrat or Republican. I’ll see if I can dig up a cite for that.
Looking at the MOEs for the D/R/I breakdowns in the poll I linked to, the MOEs for D’s and I’s are about the same, and the MOEs for R’s are a bit bigger. Which means they polled about as many D’s as I’s, and somewhat fewer R’s. Theoretically, that _should_ reflect the party distribution of Connecticut residents, but I’d classify this data point as being suggestive but hardly definitive.
Still, I’ve heard from other sources besides you that Connecticut has an unusually high proportion of independent/unaffiliated voters, and if you folks have a 3-way race in the general, they’ll clearly be the swing bloc.
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### Author:  [@Larry\_Borgia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Larry_Borgia)
#### Post date: [July 11, 2006, 4:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ct-dopers-whats-the-lieberman-lamont-debate-fallout-up-your-way/363656/8 "2006-07-11T16:26:43Z")
It’s all a smoke screen to distract you from the testing of the Illuminati supervirus near Hartford, man. Wake up and smell the coffee, sheeple, it’s in Revelations!
Oh, you meant _Connecticut_ dopers. Never mind.
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### Author:  [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)
#### Post date: [July 11, 2006, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ct-dopers-whats-the-lieberman-lamont-debate-fallout-up-your-way/363656/9 "2006-07-11T20:28:52Z")
Seems Lieberman displayed a supposed Lamont bumper sticker in an ad of his. The bumper sticker read “No More Joe,” [but apparently the bumpersticker is the product of the Lieberman campaign](http://www.connpost.com/news/ci_4035526).
Apparently support for Lieberman is plummeting so rapidly that even Lieberman’s own people are creating “No More Joe” bumper stickers! I’m thinking of calling up the Lieberman campaign and trying to order a few.
The bumpersticker even displayed a URL - [www.nomorejoe.com](http://www.nomorejoe.com) - that also turned out to have nothing to do with Lamont. The website is currently not in use; the URL belongs to a couple of Arizona Republicans who used it in a local race in Arizona in 2004.
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### Author:  [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)
#### Post date: [July 12, 2006, 9:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ct-dopers-whats-the-lieberman-lamont-debate-fallout-up-your-way/363656/10 "2006-07-12T09:49:01Z")
> [@KSO](#):
>
> I believe (no cite) that CT has more unaffiliated voters than either Democrat or Republican. I’ll see if I can dig up a cite for that.
And, thanks to the [Mystery Pollster](http://www.mysterypollster.com/main/2006/07/connecticut_pri.html), here’s the (PDF) [CT voter affiliation stats](http://www.sots.ct.gov/ElectionsServices/lists/2005OctRegEnrollStats.pdf), and you’re right.
As of last October, Connecticut listed 1,952,648 ‘active’ voters, plus another 134K inactives on its rolls. The actives were divided up 653,055 Dem, 427,803 GOP, 4,029 minor parties, and 867,761 unaffiliated.
Check out the “Mystery Pollster” link for a brief discussion of what little pollsters have been able to tell us about this race.
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### Author:  [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)
#### Post date: [July 20, 2006, 2:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ct-dopers-whats-the-lieberman-lamont-debate-fallout-up-your-way/363656/11 "2006-07-20T14:13:12Z")
A [new poll from Quinnipiac](http://www.quinnipiac.edu/x11362.xml?ReleaseID=940):
> [@](#):
>
> TREND: (If registered democrat) If the 2006 Democratic primary for United States Senator were being held today and the candidates were Joseph Lieberman and Ned Lamont, for whom would you vote? (If undecided) As of today, do you lean more toward Lieberman or Lamont? \*Includes voters leaning toward a candidate.
```auto
LIKELY DEM PRIMARY VOTERS
Jul 20 Jun 8
2006 2006
Lieberman 47 55
Lamont 51 40
SMONE ELSE(VOL) - -
WLDN'T VOTE(VOL) - -
DK/NA 2 4
```
> [@](#):
>
> TREND: If the 2006 election for senator were being held today and the candidates were Ned Lamont the Democrat, Alan Schlesinger the Republican, and Joseph Lieberman running as an independent candidate, for whom would you vote?
```auto
Jul 20 Jun 8 May 2
2006 2006 2006
Lamont 27 18 13
Schlesinger 9 8 10
Lieberman 51 56 56
SMONE ELSE(VOL) 1 1 1
WLDN'T VOTE(VOL) 1 2 2
DK/NA 12 16 18
```
As you can see, Lamont’s gaining. He’s in a statistical tie with Lieberman for the August 8 primary (MOE 3.8% for 653 likely Dem primary voters, and 2% for 2,502 registered CT voters), but still a ways behind for the general election, which fortunately for Lamont is 3.5 months away.
IF Lamont wins the primary, it’ll be interesting to see what sort of bounce he gets from that in the three-way heat. I’d bet it’ll reduce the gap between him and Lieberman by at least 10 points.