Interest high in election (10/15/05)

Here’s a bold prediction: George W. Bush will win Indiana’s electoral votes in the November election.

Okay, so it’s not very bold. Four years ago, as we recall, Indiana was one of the first states in the country projected to go for Bush in his race against Al Gore.

But we’d go on to predict that John Kerry and John Edwards will perform better at the polls in Indiana than the Gore-Lieberman ticket of 2000.

Our rationale for that prediction is completely unscientific, but it may prove to be entirely accurate. What’s leading us to the conclusion Kerry-Edwards will bring out the Democrats is the number of yard signs in their behalf that have sprouted up on Hoosier lawns over the past several months.

Ask yourself how many Gore-Lieberman signs you saw four years ago. Not very many. Ask yourself how many Clinton-Gore signs you saw. A few. Ask yourself how many Dukakis signs you saw years ago. Any?

This year’s different, and we suspect it points to two factors.

The first is a better comfort level among Hoosier Democrats with the national ticket than they’ve had in awhile. The second is a strong aversion to George W. Bush among rank and file Democrats that motivates support for any alternative.

Party officials say they can’t keep up with the demand for Kerry-Edwards yard signs in the Sixth Congressional District, which is usually pretty safe GOP territory.

And some of those requests, Democrats insist, have come from Republicans suffering from “W fatigue.”

So what’s the impact of all this? That’s hard to say.

But it may well be that the Bush coattails aren’t anything to brag about, and that could have implications for the governor’s race and even further down the ballot. — J.R.[[In-content Ad]]