6 Days To Go - Keep Working It Everyone!

In polls this week Biden's approval remains steady, and support for Israel remains very high among Americans

Happy Wednesday everyone. Got a few things I’m thinking about today:

6 Days Left! Keep Working It Everyone - Know folks in the Hopium community are working hard on races across the US - thank you! If you haven’t signed up for a shift of calls or canvassing this weekend, or have a bit of money to donate, hope you will help us win Virginia. The polling is good there, new financial reports show our candidates are raising a lot of money and will be competitive down the stretch, but the early vote is still not where we want it to be and we need to close strong. It’s been a very good year for Democrats in elections across the country, and it’s important we head into 2024 with the momentum we need to get to 55 next year.

I talked about Ohio and Virginia and the national battle over reproductive rights on Joy Reid’s show last night. Here’s the clip:

Some Polling Insights

From the Economist/YouGov weekly track - Congressional Rs = 34-59 (-25). Congressional Ds = 44-51 (-7). These are terrible numbers for the terrible House Republican leadership.

A new Hagam Institute poll of Jews in Israel has the Bibi must resign at the end of the war now at 70% and climbing. I am working to get an English version of the poll for you to review.

A new Senate Republican poll in Arizona has Rep. Ruben Gallego with solid leads in both a 2 way race with Kari Lake and 3 way race with Senator Sinema. Always nice to see encouraging polls coming from GOP pollsters!

A new NewsNation poll has Biden job approval at 44-56, up 2 pts from September, and

• Biden approval on handling of Israel/Hamas: 52-48

• Approval of sending weapons/military aid to Israel: 70-30 and humanitarian aid to Gaza 73-27

So yes while a single poll last week showed Biden approval dropping, this result is not showing up in other polls this week, and support for Israel remains remarkably high in the US in all polling. Polling in OH, VA, MS and KY all remain encouraging, and also are not showing any kind of decline. In the 538 job approval tracker Biden is 1.3 pts higher than he was on October 6th. So chins up all, and keep working hard!

The Conflict - Hopium Paid Subscriber Carole R posted this comment last night:

In this together. I've just received a terrifying video from a friend outside of Tel Aviv as he ventured outside of his bomb shelter to take the video. Sirens blaring, iron dome intercepting, abandoned children's toys in the yard because at least 1x a day the children and their families are rushing down to a bomb shelter in their homes in hopes of staying alive. I'm 68 yrs old. Growing up we had a bomb shelter built in our basement in our home on Long Island, filled with non perishable food. We never had to use it thankfully. As a secular Jewish woman and now a senior citizen, I never thought that my faith or my home needed to be protected from attack here in my home country of the United States. I now have to worry with credible threats and warnings from the ADL of attacks of terrorists seeking homes with a mezuzah on the door pretending to be "trick or treating." My heart is heavy and I continue to be spending every hour of every day engaged in the work of saving our Democracy. So glad for this community doing the same.

Here’s new video of a Hamas leader saying 1) Israel must eliminated and the attacks on Israel will continue (and are as we see above) 2) Because they are victims everything they do is justified 3) the loss of civilians in Gaza is fine because “they are a nation of martyrs.” How does one negotiate with this? It’s a reminder that Russia is committing genocide right now in Ukraine, and both Iran and Hamas are committed to doing so in Israel.

Republicans Ongoing Betrayal Of The Country - While Russia, Iran and Hamas attack the modern world abroad, Republicans continue to attack it from within the United States as they:

• Block hundreds of Pentagon appointees, weakening our military. leaving Americans less safe

• Block over 60 State Department appointments, including 38 Ambassadorships and the Ambassadors to Egypt, Jordan and Lebanon. Makes is far harder to achieve diplomatic solutions to our global challenges

• Block critical cybersecurity legislation, turn off a DHS program called Chemical Facility Anti-Terrorism Standards (CFATS), and are now working to terminate DHS programs to counter use of drones by terrorists here in the US and the office which works to prevent the use of weapons of mass destruction against the American people. What possible justification is for any of this?

• Fight additional aid to Ukraine, once again appeasing Putin, enabling Ukrainian genocide; hold hostage aid to Israel

• Excuse Trump’s theft and wanton dissemination of America’s secrets, which is almost certainly the most significant national security breach in US history

• Elevate Insurrectionists including a man who was the one of the primary architects of the Republican Party’s effort to overturn the 2020 Presidential election and end American democracy to the Speaker’s Chair.

6 days to go - keep working hard all - Simon