Best Case:
(I'm starting to think Iowa will go Obama no matter what)
Worst Case:
(I have very little faith that Obama could ever take OH, NH, or FL even in the worst case)
Posted on 05/21/2008 12:51:44 PM PDT by meandog
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Democrat Barack Obama has opened an 8-point national lead on Republican John McCain as the U.S. presidential rivals turn their focus to a general election race, according to a Reuters/Zogby poll released on Wednesday.
Obama, who was tied with McCain in a hypothetical head-to-head matchup last month, moved to a 48 percent to 40 percent lead over the Arizona senator in May as he took command of his grueling Democratic presidential duel with rival Hillary Clinton.
The Illinois senator has not yet secured the Democratic presidential nomination to run against McCain in November.
The poll also found Obama expanded his lead over Clinton in the Democratic race to 26 percentage points, doubling his advantage from mid-April as Democrats begin to coalesce around Obama and prepare for the general election battle with McCain.
"Obama has been very resilient, bouncing back from rough periods and doing very well with independent voters," pollster John Zogby said. "The race with McCain is going to be very competitive."
The poll was taken Thursday through Sunday during a period when Obama came under attack from President George W. Bush and McCain for his promise to talk to hostile foreign leaders without preconditions.
Obama's gains followed a month in which he was plagued with a series of campaign controversies and suffered two big losses to Clinton in Pennsylvania and West Virginia.
The poll was conducted after Obama denounced his former pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, who made a series of public appearances that rekindled a controversy over his inflammatory comments on race and religion.
Obama also survived a furor over his comments about "bitter" small-town residents who cling to guns and religion out of frustration over their economic concerns.
Obama edged closer to clinching the Democratic nomination on Tuesday when he split two nominating contests with Clinton, beating the New York senator in Oregon and losing in Kentucky to gain a majority of pledged delegates won in state-by-state nominating contests.
The results put him within easy range of the 2,026 delegates needed for the nomination. Just three Democratic nominating contests remain before voting concludes on June 3.
OBAMA BETTER ON ECONOMY
The poll found Obama was seen as a better steward of the economy than McCain, leading 48 percent to 39 percent. McCain led Obama by 3 points last month on an issue that is certain to be crucial in their campaign.
Obama led McCain among independents, 47 percent to 35 percent, and led among some groups of voters who have backed Clinton during their Democratic primary battle, including Catholics, Jews, union households and voters making less than $35,000 a year.
McCain led among whites, NASCAR fans, and elderly voters. McCain led with voters who believed the United States was on the right track, and Obama led with the much higher percentage of voters who believed it was on the wrong track.
"Clearly voters are looking for change. Every problem Obama has had in consolidating his base and reaching to the center, John McCain has the same sort of problem," Zogby said.
"It's McCain's lead among voters over the age of 65 that is keeping him within shouting distance of Obama," he said.
The poll found Clinton, who has shrugged off calls to quit the Democratic race, tied at 43 percent with McCain in the national poll. She led McCain by 47 percent to 40 percent on who would be the better manager of the economy.
Obama and Clinton have refrained from attacking each other in recent weeks as Obama has turned his focus to McCain.
But Zogby said the attacks on Obama by Bush and McCain, who have been critical of his willingness to talk to leaders of countries like Iran, did not appear to hurt Obama. If anything, he said, it reminded voters of McCain's ties to Bush, whose approval rating is still mired at record lows.
"The president is so unpopular. To inject himself into a presidential campaign does not help John McCain, particularly when McCain is tied to Bush," Zogby said.
The national survey of 516 likely Democratic primary voters had a margin of error of 4.4 percentage points. The poll of the national race between McCain and the two Democratic contenders surveyed 1,076 likely voters with a margin of error of 3 percentage points.
(Editing by Doina Chiacu)
(For more about the U.S. political campaign, visit Reuters "Tales from the Trail: 2008" online at blogs.reuters.com/trail08/)
Best Case:
(I'm starting to think Iowa will go Obama no matter what)
Worst Case:
(I have very little faith that Obama could ever take OH, NH, or FL even in the worst case)
After all, not only will the next president automatically have war-time Commander in Chief responsibilities, but this post (<-click), while addressing taxes, helps to explain why rookie government "leaders" like Obama are actually in contempt of the Constitution that they have sworn to defend, foolishly following in the footsteps of FDR's dirty federal spending politics.
In fact, the article referenced below shows that Obama is the #1 federal spending proposer in the Senate for '08; Clinton is #2.
Obama, a big-shot federal spenderAnd this post (<-click) exposes how corrupt justices then began using FDR's politically correct license to ignore the 10th A. to unlawfully stifle traditional family values, including the USSC's scandalous legalization of abortion in Roe v. Wade. Note that the post first references two non-abortion cases in order to show Roe v. Wade in a different, troubling perspective.
In fact, consider that the states have the constitutional power (10th A.) to authorize public schools to lead non-mandatory (14th A.) classroom discussions on the pros and cons of evolution, creationism and ID, as examples, regardless that atheists, separatists, pagan-minded judges and the MSM are misleading the people to think that doing such things in public schools is unconstitutional.
The people need to reconnect with the Founder's division of federal and state government powers. The people then need to wise up to the major problems that, since the days of FDR's dirty politics, Congress has not only not been operating within the restraints of the federal Constitution, particularly where constitutionally unauthorized federal spending is concerned, but the USSC has wrongly been ignoring the 10th A. protected power of the states to address religious issues.
The bottom line is that the people need to get in the faces of judges, demanding that judges uphold their oaths to defend the 10th A. protected powers of the states to address religious issues - or get off the bench. The people also need to send big-shot, Constitution-ignoring federal spenders like Obama home as opposed to trying to send people like him to the Oval Office. The people need to get in the faces of members of Congress, demanding a stop to constitutionally unauthorized federal spending while appropriately lowering federal taxes - or get out of DC.
Lincoln put it this way.
"We the People are the rightful master of both congress and the courts - not to overthrow the Constitution, but to overthrow the men who pervert the Constitution." --Abraham Lincoln, Political debates between Lincoln and Douglas, 1858.
Indiana Democratic Primary
Polling Data
Final Results Clinton +1.4
RCP Average Clinton +5.0
Zogby Tracking Obama +2.0
Is anyone concerned that Obama is actually running to be dictator of the United States? Does the hatred for McCain run so deep that we would put a Marxist in the WH. The gulags can’t be far behind. One of the first things he will command to happen is to ban conservative radio. The internet will be next. Can you say Hugo Obama?
"On Election Day, Zogby predicted that Kerry would win 311 electoral votes. For much of that afternoon, he also rated the state of Virginia as too close to call. Not only did President Bush end up winning Virginia by 9 percentage points over Kerry, he won 286 electoral votes, over 3.3 million popular vote more than Kerry and, of course, re-election."
http://www.cnsnews.com//ViewPolitics.asp?Page=\Politics\archive\200412\POL20041209a.html
There can be no good news in this election--unless a replacement candidate were to appear for McCain.
Instead, it is inevitable. What part of the message that "McCain is unacceptable," as posted on this website for the last 8 years, did the GOP not understand? Instead, they chose to go with the arrogant Karl Rove message of "Where else will they go?" Stupid is as stupid does!
Don't dis those who won't vote for McCain. Criticize the candidate, his handlers, and the PTB at the RNC that trotted out on stage at the 2004 Convention a set of clearly unacceptable new "leaders" (Giuliani, McCain, Schwarzenegger) who now want to tell us that the "brand" is no good unless we accept their leftist views.
If I wanted to vote for a Democrat platform, I'd be a Democrat!
I remember that. The election looked very bleak then. It turned around after the Rebublican convention.
A little Obama information...Obama visited Oregon a day or two before the election, on a weekend, and it was reported by the MSM that 75,000 showed up to hear what he had to say. What WASN’T reported was that 55,000 free tickets were given out to a rock concent that just happened right before Obama was to show. What a way to herd the sheeple into a voting booth!!! Oregon happens to have lots of young people, students in the I5 corridor, both from Portland and Eugene, where the University and colleges are. The numbers were in the fish wrapper (The PDX Oregonian) the next day. The DEMS really know how to play the game.
bum for later
Any poll that has people saying tax-hiking spend-happy pro-amnesty crypto-marxist pro-racial-greivances Obama is better on the economy is a cr*ppy pollaganda poll or a poll of morons.
Your best case is so highly unlikely to be absurd.
McCain will be outspent, outorganized, outcampaign and out-hustled by Obama and the Democrats.
He’s gotten more rich Liberal money than any candidate in history.
Worst case Obama could pick up VA, MO, OH and NH.
FL is unlikely, I agree.
Its also possible for Obama to lose the south solidly yet still win. scary.
Trust me. Indiana will NOT be in play for Obama.
Your "conservative ideal" is currently in the White House serving out his last 8 months of "Mission Accomplished" success with an approval rating hovering around 20 percent and a legacy of $6/gallon gasoline. If hard-right conservatives are bitter about the current state of affairs for the GOP they should be pointing a finger at the Bush-Cheney cabal that resulted in an abysmal initial approach to Iraqi Freedom; (due to an incompetent SECDEF that folks around Freeper land still hail as Dwight D. Eisenhower when he actually was KarlDon Von RumsteadRumsfeld) and an equally failing foreign policy that cannot seem to face up to the fact that Iran will eventually get the "big potato" unless we pull the rug out from under that odious regime. If I wanted to vote for a Democrat platform, I'd be a Democrat!
I trust you. (I don’t really trust Mr. Zogby)
Sorry. That in no way is my "conservative ideal." Nor is the McCain platform: Global warming, amnesty, LOST, etc. And btw, I am not "hard right" either, nor am I "bitter."
What I am is disgusted with are the fools at the RNC that think we need to "rebrand" the GOP in the image of Schwarzneggarianism and hire incompetent "leaders" like Carly Fiorina to show us "the way"... third way, I presume. No thanks.
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