Minnesota voter-panelists crave positive ads

10/26/2006

A check back with seven Minnesota voters interviewed in August shows only a few have changed their thinking and most have lost patience with political ads.

Conrad Defiebre,
Star Tribune
Last update: October 25, 2006 – 9:21 PM

They’ve been watching the ads, of course, and not much liking what they’ve been seeing.

They’ve also been talking to friends and neighbors, and a few have picked up reasons to keep pondering their choices.

One of them even met in the flesh a leading candidate she was considering, and decided on the spot that she wouldn’t be voting for him after all.

In August, the Star Tribune contacted eight varied Minnesota voters, drawn from respondents to the newspaper’s July poll, and published a sampling of their thoughts about the election. In recent weeks, we’ve checked back to see how the campaign is affecting their impressions, preferences and blood pressures. Here’s the latest they have to report:

(Attempts to re-contact one voter featured in August were unsuccessful. Nicole Mendele, 22, of Richfield, was a solid Tim Pawlenty and Mark Kennedy backer when last heard from.)

Lorri Summers, 52, St. Paul, home nursing aide, independent.

When last we checked, Summers was a disgruntled former Republican considering voting for either Mike Hatch or Peter Hutchison for governor. But Hutchinson, the IP nominee, dropped off her list—after she met him at the State Fair.

“When he said he supports a statewide smoking ban he lost any hope of getting my vote,” she said. A smoker, Summers abandoned Gov. Pawlenty last year when he enacted the 75-cents-a-pack “health impact fee” on cigarettes.

That leaves Hatch. “Right now he’s the best,” she said. “But I am afraid he’ll raise taxes. I don’t like being taxed to death.”

Meanwhile, she’s sticking behind Kennedy for the U.S. Senate—“the only Republican I will vote for,” she said. “I think he’s the most qualified to represent my views. [Democratic Senate candidate] Amy Klobuchar is too liberal, in my books.”

Quentin Bloomquist, 80, Virginia, retired accountant, Republican.

He’s keeping the faith with all the major GOP candidates, despite his disappointment with Kennedy’s TV ads attacking Klobuchar and his admiration for her response to them.

“I have to admit, she handled it well,” he said.

A lonely Republican on the DFL-dominated Iron Range, Bloomquist says he occasionally has voted for Democrats, but not this time.

“I’m all for Tim Pawlenty and Rod Grams,” Bloomquist said. Grams is the GOP challenger to Democratic U.S. Rep. Jim Oberstar.

“But it’s an uphill battle up here.”

Goldee Shear, 33, Plymouth, teacher at Lincoln Elementary School in north Minneapolis, DFLer.

Shear is firm in her support for DFLers Hatch and Klobucher, although “I don’t love them. I did love Paul Wellstone.”

She’s saving her passion these days for the Republicans. “I really don’t like Pawlenty,” Shear said. “It seems his campaign commercials have all white people. There’s no racial diversity.”

Shear deems Pawlenty’s “Q-Comp” merit pay initiative for outstanding teachers insulting to her entire profession. “I do the best job I can every single day,” she said. “If I get more money, I’d just use it to buy more supplies for my classes.”

Kennedy gets even lower marks from her. “He just seems like an idiot to me,” she said.

Ann Buffie, 51, Burnsville, business consultant, Republican.

Already leaning toward Klobuchar in August, Buffie said “some of the smear ads Kennedy is doing have pushed me further from him. I just wish people would debate the issues rather than slinging dirt.”

On the governor’s race, she said, “I’m still looking at anybody but Pawlenty” because of his “general mismanagement of our budget, higher taxes and fewer services.”

Plus, she said, “our roads stink,” a judgment reached on her daily 25-mile commutes over the “pothole farms we call freeways.”

In hopes of smoothing her ride, she said she plans to vote for a constitutional dedication of motor vehicle sales taxes to transportation.

As an alternative to Pawlenty, Buffie is leaning toward Hatch while still considering Hutchinson. “At least he has the courage of his convictions,” she said. “Integrity is really important to me. It seems that Pawlenty has changed the game after he got in office.”

Lisa Schmidtke, 34, Eden Prairie, Web designer, leans DFL.

She hasn’t budged from her ticket-splitting support of Pawlenty for governor and Klobuchar for Senate.

“I really don’t care for Mark Kennedy,” she said. “I would rather see candidates focus on what their beliefs are rather than put down their opponents.”

Thomas O’Dea, 68, Shoreview, semiretired electrical engineer, independent.

“I’ve been talking to a lot of people,” he said. “I’ve been sort of leaning to Pawlenty, although I like Mike Hatch, too, because he’s a feisty kind of guy. But I think Pawlenty is more focused on vision and fiscal responsibility. You can’t give everybody everything.”

O’Dea says he’s leaning, but less than before, to Kennedy for the Senate. “The burden is on him to say what he’s done in Congress, and I don’t think he has,” he said.

He said he discounts all the back-and-forth in political ads and wishes there were a special tax on them to discourage negative appeals.

Bottom line so far: “Klobuchar’s a nice lady,” O’Dea said. “Kennedy is a good guy. I have no doubt that both of those people would be pretty good congresspeople.”

Russell Allen, 41, Brooklyn Park, former janitor disabled by narcolepsy, DFLer.

He spent much of September and October out of the state, far from Minnesota’s political advertising blitz, and hasn’t changed his resolve to split his ballot between Klobuchar and Pawlenty. He supports the work of both in their current jobs. “I still have the same views,” he said.