ABC/WaPo posts really late in the day, so we'll just be a day behind with this one because I don't want to send this out in the evening
Diageo/Hotline continues to wobble, because I think it's put together a little wobbly
Gallup widens slightly in both likely voter scenarios, lead tracks economic viewpoint
GWU/Battleground is now a one point Obama lead, which is truly bizarre but this one can bounce 5 points in a day due to small daily samples and 5 day tracking, which argues people are probably taking them too seriously--watch for a similar swing back by the weekend
Rasmussen stays flat, though Obama now ahead of McCain by a six point margin on leadership, significant in a GOP leaning poll
R2K stays flat, no surprises
Reuters/C-SPAN/Zogby has managed to go from a 2.7% lead two days ago to 5.4% yesterday to 7.9% today; at this rate Obama will win by approximately 50 points
Just a quick note now that there are eight of these things. I tend to like Rasmussen the best, despite a 1-2 point GOP lean (so at least I'm not going with my personal preference, or all you'd ever hear about is R2K). He's got the best track record of the dailies and publishes decent info, though not detailed internals. Zogby, Battleground, and TIPP are worthless, which you can see in retrospect from how jumpy they are, which implies design flaws, which I strongly believe abound. I'm not even going to talk about IBD/TIPP because I have too much respect for you. R2K seems above-average, though with a similar or greater Democratic lean to Rasmussen's towards the Republicans. Gallup and Hotline are mediocre and should not be used to settle bets.
There's actually a bit of information in Zogby today worth mentioning because it speaks to a larger point I've avoided discussing, so when i've picked myself up and sat back down on the chair I fell off, I'll give it to you. A great many states are engaging in early voting this year, to avoid inconvenience on Election Day, provide a more orderly process and at least partially because it's a lot less embarrassing than having Castro offer to send Cuban election monitors to ensure free elections every four years. I mention this because it appears to be largely groups that claimed to be disenfranchised in 2000 and 2004, primarily minorities, that are taking advantage of early voting this year. Zogby shows a 21 point Obama lead among people who have already voted in the first few days of early voting. This shows at the very least that an awful lot of minority voters and voters in heavily Democratic districts in general feel their votes were stolen, whether they were or not, and are doing what they can to redress a real or perceived injustice. The system may just be stronger than the folk trying to game it after all.
CBS Re-Interviews Respondents From Before The First Debate; Apparently They Prefer Being Talked To Over Being Harangued. Who Knew?
CBS went back and re-interviewed 476 likely voters they'd surveyed before the first debate to see how their views had changed after three and a half debates and a bitter campaign. They had. In short, people feel they now know and trust Barack Obama, while they were surprised and a little distressed by John McCain, which is a gigantic swing from early in the cycle. Before the first debate, these voters favored Barack Obama 48-43; today, that has expanded to 54-41. Obama has held on to nearly all his original voters (98%), while McCain has had a little more difficulty--while 88% sounds like a lot, it means that 12% of his support has eroded in under a month. Undecided voters have mostly fallen off the fence, with Obama taking 52% of the, 36% going for McCain, and 12% undecided. Independents go to Obama by 50-43, more or less in line with what seems to be the nation as a whole at present; however, that's a significant shift from a month ago, when they actually favored McCain/Palin by a 46-40 margin. Overall favorables of Obama have improved significantly during the campaign and through the debates in particular, while these debate-watchers have actually lowered their opinion of McCain significantly; Obama now has a +20 net favorable, while McCain is at -9 (53/33 vs 36/45). Obama wins on the issues, with slightly more people thinking McCain will raise their taxes than Obama, and the Democrat wins on the economy and crisis management, meaning that Obama's explanations are working better than McCain's attacks, which is the big takeaway from this survey. Obama's performance in the debates, the perception by an overwhelming margin that he is running a more positive campaign, and the idea that he spends more time explaining his positions while McCain spends more time just attacking his opponent all contributed to this striking shift in opinion. Oh, and people like Biden and don't much care for Palin. Big whoop.
State Of The States, And A Lot Of 'Em
So what do we see in the states? Rasmussen has a bunch of battleground state polls, which are almost all good for the Democrat: Colorado +5, Missouri +5 (though Suffolk, historically not nearly as accurate as Rasmussen, has McCain +1), North Carolina +3 (PPP has it Obama +7--a serious Obama victory in NC and this race could not possibly be more over, but there's going to be a stomach-churning load of variability in states like these), Ohio McCain +2 (but again Suffolk somehow makes it Obama +9, so I'd trust Rasmussen) and a full 10 point Obama lead in Virginia, which would be another sign that you can spend the evening watching The West Wing on DVD instead. North Carolina is interesting because McCain is slightly more highly regarded than Obama, but the Democrat wins on the economy and the question of "bringing real change to Washington," crucially important in this 1976-like year. Missouri works out pretty similarly, though the favorables are the same for the two. SUSA also has a few state polls out, showing a tighter-than-expected six point Obama lead in Minnesota, six in Virginia, and eight in Wisconsin. SUSA, remember, was the most accurate pollster in 2004 and did, I believe, a better job than anyone else predicting primaries this year. PPP, typically with a Democratic lean, has a two point Obama lead in Indiana. I think as things stand now, it p robably turns McCain's way, but a blue Indiana will be a blue day for the Republicans in general. Note that an awful lot of this note is talking about Obama leads in states that should have been Republican layups. Something weird is going to have to happen for a GOP win here, but weird things happen.....
Got a few others also. Democratic pollster GQR, which bent over backwards to put together a McCain leaning focus group of independents after last week's debate, has a survey in Georgia which is either dead wrong or explains why Gov. Palin began her 2012 presidential run last week. With, to be sure, a far too high undecided component, it's just a two point McCain lead, 46-44. If this works out this way, it'll be because of a reverse Bradley (which we are considering calling the yeldarB from henceforth) in a state with 29% African-American population and an awful lot of white folk who, in Sen. McCain's phrase are "angry and hurting" but may not want their neighbors to know they're voting for the black guy. You're now seeing rallies in the south with white people wearing Confederate flags and Obama t-shirts. This also means our ideas of what racism means need dramatic adjustment. All of us. Really.
And finally, Grove Insight, who I've never heard of (but which means nothing), has a 13 point Obama margin in Oregon, which is an interesting state in that it's both deep blue and deep red at the same time. The daily Morning Call poll in Pennsylvania has a 12 point Obama lead in the Keystone State, pretty static, while Susquehanna makes it eight. A couple other notes from the Morning Call web site include a profile of Rays' manager (and Hazelton PA native) Joe Maddon and news that a multiple vehicle accident on Route 22 is backing up traffic for miles around Exit 145, so if that's how you get to work, and I'm pretty sure that's how everyone on this list gets to work, you're pretty much hosed today, so stay home. Research 2000 has a 7 point Obama margin in New Hampshire; the lead has expanded since both Obama and Palin were there within a day of each other last week. The differences were striking, Obama talking about the economy, jobs, and how the Granite State taught him not to take anything for granted. The Gov seemed to talk about moose. Well, she did go on about how much NH was like Alaska. I'm pretty sure moose entered into it.
Minnesota Does Not Heart McCarthyism
So after Rep. Michele Bachmann's weirdly unhinged rant on Hardball last week calling for an investigation of anti-American sentiment (thought police?) in Congress, her opponent, the still curiously named Elwyn Tinklenberg (and I'm mostly just writing this so I can say "Elwyn Tinklenberg" a few more times. Elwyn Tinklenberg.) raised over $600,000 in a week, roughly ten times his average fundraising, and the race is now close. Elwyn Tinklenberg is using the money to go on a TV ad blitz in the greater Saint Cloud area (less expensive than NYC, incidentally). Nice ad, pointing out he's an ex-pastor, former Mayor of Blaine, MN, where he built a sports complex without throwing the city's economy into massive debt (ahem), and built roads and light rail as the State Transportation Commissioner. And never accused anyone of thought crimes, which was even unconstitutional in the USSR. It's a highly GOP district, but oh my, they're embarrassed. You betcha. Elwyn Tinklenberg. Elwyn Tinklenberg.
Hasn't Anyone Told Her What The VP Does, YET?
OK, so we know Gov. Palin asked what the heck the VP does before she was tapped as McCain's running mate. And she seemed to think that the VP was the CEO of the Senate in the debate. But you'd really think someone might have clued her in by now. APparently not. In an interview with KUSA in Colorado, Palin responds to the following question:
Q: Brandon Garcia wants to know, "What does the Vice President do?" PALIN: That’s something that Piper would ask me! ... [T]hey’re in charge of the U.S. Senate so if they want to they can really get in there with the senators and make a lot of good policy changes that will make life better for Brandon and his family and his classroom.
So the VP defines policy for the Senate and helps grade-schoolers. If you don't believe it, and honest to God you shouldn't, watch it here: http://www.9news.com/video/default.aspx?aid=63586
London Calling, And It's Obama's Line That's Ringing
Boris Johnson, the always-amusing Tory mayor of London, has a piece in the Telegraph today http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml?xml=/opinion/2008/10/21/do2101.xml explaining why, even in conservative-ish overseas eyes, Barack Obama is a sensible choice for President. Perhaps able to look at the candidates without the partisanship of an American voter, Johnson not only gets serious for a moment and notes that Obama "visibly incarnates both change and hope," which we knew, is "highly intelligent" with "an air of courtesy and sincerity" and, in a swipelet of the current occupant of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, "has no difficulty in orally extemporising a series of grammatical English sentences, each containing a main verb," which is totally irrelevant to my point, but fun to mention. Most importantly, he notes a difference in gravitas between Obama and McCain, and that he could not find a single scrap of evidence that Obama is anything like any of the bad bad bad bad bad things the McCain campaign has tried to pin on him, calling it no more than guilt by association. He also notes the racial angle, and how the election of Obama could actually mark the end of race-based politics, which "will have re-established Americas' claim to be the last, best hope of Earth." A truly moving piece.
And the headline of the piece by the Conservative ex-MP/columnist/editor of The Spectator/current Mayor of London in the most resolutely Tory paper in Britain? "Barack Obama: Why I believe he should be the next President."
OK, tons of data, as promised, some of it contradictory, some of it full of puffery, some of it actually meaningful. On balance, a good day for Obama, and we'll see if it holds over the next few as he steps back to go to Hawaii and the McCain people do as they promise and plumb new depths of scabrousness.
A demain,
John
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