Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) and his primary challengers, former Rep. J.D. Hayworth and conservative activist Jim Deakin, will be holding two — count ’em, two — debates in as many days, starting tonight.
The first debate will be tonight, at 7 p.m. PT, on 3TV in Phoenix. The second debate will be at 7 p.m. PT the very next night, Saturday, on Arizona Public Media.
The TPM Poll Average gives McCain a lead over Hayworth of 52.3%-30.6%. (Not all polls have included Deakin.) McCain at first seemed vulnerable to some kind of anti-establishment challenge, and Hayworth has attempted to build up a Tea Party-style campaign targeting McCain for his past weaknesses on issues like immigration. However, McCain has noticeably veered right on issues like immigration, and cast himself as a staunch opponent of the Obama administration. And beyond that, Hayworth has stumbled thanks to public scrutiny over an infomercial he did in 2007 for a company offering shady seminars on how to receive “free money” from the government.
So let’s see how they do tonight — it should be fun, when you have candidates who openly hate each other as much as these two guys do.
