Sen. Cory Booker has everything going for him in his re-election race against former Reagan speechwriter Jeff Bell.
Booker has a war chest of $2.9 million, against a mere $76,000 for Bell. Booker is a Democratic incumbent running in a mostly blue state where Democratic voters outnumber Republicans by 700,000. And according to a recent Rassmussen poll, 39 percent of New Jerseyans don’t even know who the heck Jeff Bell is.
All Bell has going for him is his conviction, which is that government is making it harder for working people to support their families.
In short, he’s a free-market, traditional values, pro-immigration conservative who thinks its high time someone took this message to the people of New Jersey.
So here’s the question: Despite all Booker’s advantages, why does the latest poll show his support at under 50 percent?
Rassmussen’s recent survey of likely voters puts Booker’s support at 48 percent, against 35 percent for Bell. That’s a 13 percentage-point difference, which is the same percentage who say they are undecided.
Bell, of course, remains a long shot in a state that hasn’t elected a Republican to the US Senate since 1972. Ironically, the Republican who won that seat was Clifford Case, the man Bell beat in the Republican primary back in 1978 — only to lose to Democrat Bill Bradley in the general election.
On issue after issue — from the Keystone Pipeline and monetary policy to taxes, ObamaCare and marriage, Bell’s Web site makes clear the sharp differences between himself and Booker.
Whatever New Jersey voters decide, they can’t say they weren’t given a clear choice.