Diageo/Hotline drops a point off Obama, adds it to McCain, still an eight point lead, presumably typical statistical noise, a point too high yesterday, a point too low today, another day older and deeper in debt...
Gallup closes up two, to a seven-point margin, the tightest it's been in a week
GWU/Battleground sleeps in on Sundays
R2K opens up a further point for Obama, 53-40, more of the same, just a little more of it
Rasmussen looks like Hotline, down 1 for Obama today after being up 2 yesterday, further opens up party weighting, now 39.3% Democrat, 33.0% Republican
Reuters/CSPAN/Zogby has Obama moving outside the margin of error for the first time, independent voters leading the way
It looks like the movements of the last couple days have been pretty modest, either random statistical white noise or a slight reaction to things like the ugliness of the McCain campaign pushing people towards Obama and the potential change in tactic moving a few back. We'll know if something's changing if McCain takes a conciliatory tack at this Wednesday night's debate; it already looks like he's going to propose a new economic plan that sounds more like Obama's. Obama will probably point out that because of talks with a dictator, the US has just taken North Korea off the terrorism watch list and the North Koreans say they're going to start dismantling their nuclear facilities. That being said, today's movement is slightly away from Obama, with three of the polls moving tighter and two others opening up a bit. Go figure.
Hate to do it, but I'm going to talk about Zogby for a moment, because the 21 point Obama lead among independent voters is so big. Still feels like a bit of an outlier (though see Hotline below), although the Zogby lead for Obama is the smallest of any of the pollsters, I think that's because the poll is virtually unweighted by party ID. Zogby has a history of going against the grain, mostly, I think, for the sake of going against the grain, that maverick. People in general were leaning Democratic this year anyway, and the economy is only amplifying that tendency. Suggesting it's not true for the purpose of your poll is baffling. This poll, however, is following Rasmussen's lead in separating between "investors" and "non-investors." With investors, however they define it, McCain has a 49-44 lead, while non-investors Obama is up 53-38. One wonders, if 40% down in the markets is not enough to suggest to investors that something's wrong, just how accomplished these investors are.
Hotline confirms what I had written about yesterday, that opinions on the second debate seem to be solidifyng several days afterwards, rather than in the immediate aftermath. Their poll suggests that of the 71% of their polling sample who watched the debate, 53% believe Obama won, compared with just 14% for McCain, a far larger margin than the first debate. Honestly, I'm a little surprised than this, but the expectations game may be in play here--the town meeting type format of this debate was supposed to favor McCain, who has in the past performed extremely well in this sort of setting, while Obama can come off as a bit stiff. Instead, leaving the content of the debate aside and thinking only about style, McCain seemed on edge, and Obama calm and engaging. This poll also gives Obama a very large lead among independents, 16%, not as extreme as Zogby, but still a huge number--and as Hotline is now weighting less Democratic than Rasmussen (41 D 37 R 18 I), those independent votes, although probably themselves underweighted, are more important than ever.
The Really Important Stuff From Rasmussen
A separate Rasmussen poll states that 36% of voters surveyed believe the Boston Red Sox will beat the devil out of the Tampa Bay Rays and then win the World Series, and chose Albert Pujols for NL MVP and Boston's Dustin Pedroia in the AL. I'd probably go with Chase Utley in the NL myself, but Pedroia could be one of those sentimental favorite picks, though with the Sawx it's hard to pick Pedroia over Kevin Youkilis. However as only 21% in the poll chose Cliff Lee as AL Cy Young winner, 79% of respondents are mentally defective. Party ID weighting must be unfavorable to Tribe fans. The same voters also pick Johan Santana for NL Cy Young over Brandon Webb or Tim Lincecum. It's as true in baseball as politics that most people are only able to retain either the first or the last piece of data they receive.
Come Back Micheal Ray, All Is Forgiven, Pundit And Politician Dept.
Back in the 1980s, New York Knick Micheal Ray Richardson, when asked about the team's collapse, famously responded "The ship be sinking." Better still, when asked how far it could sink, he responded "sky's the limit." Yesterday, Indiana Rep. Mark Souder, representing a conservative district, wondered if McCain would win "seven states" and how the resulting tidal wave would hurt his own re-election chances (minimally, I'd guess). Writer Christopher Buckley, who has written speeches for McCain and this year wrote a supportive op-ed in the New York Times endorses Obama, saying for the first time in his life he is pulling the Democratic lever, and wonders in print if his father might not have been terribly upset about it (http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2008-10-10/the-conservative-case-for-obama ), as former National Review publisher and current McCain donor Wick Allison discovers that he is impressed by Barack Obama, saying "Nobody can read Obama’s books (which, it is worth noting, he wrote himself) or listen to him speak without realizing that this is a thoughtful, pragmatic, and prudent man. It gives me comfort just to think that after eight years of George W. Bush we will have a president who has actually read the Federalist Papers." Allison concludes that, because it now stands for big government and rampant interventionism and empire building, "as a cause, conservatism may be dead. But as a stance, as a way of making judgments in a complex and difficult world, I believe it is very much alive in the instincts and predispositions of a liberal named Barack Obama." I've just quoted half of it, but here's the rest: http://www.dmagazine.com/ME2/dirmod.asp?nm=Core+Pages&type=gen&mod=Core+Pages&tier=3&gid=B33A5C6E2CF04C9596A3EF81822D9F8E
Oh, and Florida Governor Charlie Crist is pulling a Norm Coleman. Crist, who was talked about as a potential running mate, though I didn't really see that happening, is declining to campaign with McCain to mind the state's economy instead. ''When I have time to help, I'll try to do that,'' Crist said last week, after he flew around the state with McCain running mate Sarah Palin. Saturday, he skipped a McCain football rally and instead went to Disney World. Do the math.
A Note Of Decency?
It appears that the tone of the discourse may be concerning Sen. McCain. At McCain and Palin's rallies in the last week or two, supporters have made some fairly incendiary statements which the candidates have not gainsaid, and the crowds have been stoked to near fever pitch. Friday, on one occasion a man at a rally told McCain that she was afraid to raise a child in an Obama presidency (and think for a moment about the deeper subtext of that, in a "cats and dogs living together" sense, willya?) and the Senator stopped her and called his opponent "a decent person and a person you do not have to be scared of." At another, a woman called the son of an American and Kenyan an Arab, and again McCain stopped her and called Obama a decent man with whom he had some disagreements. Unfortunately, the crowds responded by booing. Yesterday, in Philadelphia, Sen. Obama thanked McCain publicly for both his service to the country and for his statements. The undertones of the McCain campaign have been getting uglier and uglier, and if Sen. McCain, who's always been a bit of a moral cipher (I have an issue with his having switched from the Episcopal Church to attending Baptist services at the exact moment he made his first run for president, in 2000) is personally appalled, that's entirely reasonable. If he's afraid that a deranged supporter will attempt some violence on his opponent, frankly, that's also reasonable considering how far this has been allowed to go. If he's afraid that he'd go down in history as the man who lit the fuse for that act, he's right. It would also be the end of the Republican Party as we know it.
Another other other McCain Economic Plan On The Way?
Hard quite to keep count, but see above. Because the mortgage buy-up plan was met with joy by the Socialist Workers' Party (I'm making that up, may just have been the CPUSA) and with howls of horror and disgust by ideological conservatives (other than those in foreclosure), Politico (http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1008/14493.html) reports that there will be a new McCain economic plan released some time this week, including (where have we heard this before) middle class tax cuts. My guess is that he uses the phrase middle class as often in the next debate as he said "my friends" (which is typically what he says when he's about to say something unfriendly) in the last one. He forgot to say "middle class" at all in the last one, so he's got some catching up to do. McCain advisors could not give specifics because, well, they didn't know, as over 30 plans had been presented to McCain and he hadn't chosen one yet. Senator, that's how you chose your running mate....
The City That Booed Santa Claus Meets Sarah Palin
Well, Philadelphia Flyers owner Ed Snider, a major Republican donor, turned the Governor into, well, a political hockey puck (Don Rickles reference accidental but emphasized all the same) by inviting her to drop the ceremonial first puck (say WHAT?) at the Flyers' opener last night. Gov. Palin, who had said to Fox News that she would
In CT, We Know From Free Houses For Governors
I try not to comment on rumor, and you won't hear it from me again until there's something more substantial but I'm mentioning this because there's a pretty good chance you'll hear more of this one very soon. Questions have arisen about the Palins' house (the one she gets the per diems to stay in). It's a perfectly reasonable house on a lake, not outrageous by any means in size for a large family. Todd Palin seems to be saying that he built it with the help of some contractor friends on nights, weekends, grade school half days, etc. Reporters have been asking questions about WHICH contractor friends he was referring to that volunteered their time, materials, workmen, as some of them may also have been the contractor friends that helped then Mayor Palin run Wasilla into debt by building the famed $12.5 million sports complex far from the center of town. The Village Voice, no friend to the GOP, claims to have a list of contractors on the sports complex and finds a tangled web (is there any other kind of web, srsly?) of connections and donations to the Palins, from campaign contributions to sponsorship of the First Gentleman's snowmobiling team. Coincidentally, as Mayor. Palin blocked an effort to mandate public filing of building permits. In local news, former Connecticut Governor John Rowland is out of jail. If there's anything to this, it's a bigger deal than Troopergate, because it's just good old fashioned graft.
I'm pretty sure I've run out of things to say until the debate, so there may just be a couple numbers and a muttered "y'all be cool" tomorrow!
John
Herbert Hoover Quote of the Day (TM):
I have... instituted systematic, voluntary measures of cooperation with the business institutions and with State and municipal authorities to make certain that fundamental businesses of the country shall continue as usual, that wages and therefore consuming power shall not be reduced, and that a special effort shall be made to expand construction work in order to assist in equalizing other deficits in employment... I am convinced that through these measures we have reestablished confidence. (State of the Union Message, December 3, 1929; the voluntary measures may not have worked too well.)
No comments:
Post a Comment