McCain up 10 in Ohio, but down in Florida? Doesn’t make any sense to me.
Their last poll had him up 7 or 8 in Florida.
Given that the Colorado and Minnesota results are par for the course and that the national polls have tightened, I think that Florida result is probably inaccurate.
Selective polling at best. Leading in Florida? Where did they poll, Miami?
When you look in side the Rasmussen polls and in fact all the media sponsored polls one thing becomes clear. They are surveying 39 percent Democrats, 27 percent Republicans, and 34 percent independents.
In his nation wide poll Rasmussen says that 88 percent of Republicans are for McCain while only 74 percent of Democrats are for Obama. Rasmussen also says McCain has a 9 point lead among independents over Obama. When you add in leaners McCain has a 23 percent lead over Obama in independents. And Obama has 77 percent of Democrats and McCain has 91 percent of Republicans.
Rasmussen also says nationally the race is a virtual tie with Obama having a slight lead. For that to be true 74 percent of Democrats has to be a larger number than 88 percent of Republicans plus 9 percent of independents.
HOW COULD McCain have 14 percent more support from his base than Obama does from his base and Obama be winning. If you add to that McCain has 9 percent more support among Independents than Obama, there is no way that Obama is in the lead nationally. But Rasmussen says he is.
Anyone who believes that thinks Obama won California just like Rasmussen said he would. The problem with that is when they counted the votes Hillary won California by 9 points.
The elections of 2000 and 2004 had the number of Democrat voters and Republican voters equal. And the number of independent voters were also equally split. That is why 400 votes in Florida determined the winner between Gore and Bush. And why 60 thousand votes in Ohio determined the winner between Bush and Kerry.
Rasmussen has to believe one of two things. That 5 percent of the voters that were Republicans have switched to the Democratic party to vote for Obama and 2 percent of Republicans have switched to be Independents to vote for McCain and 7 percent of independents that voted for Kerry are going to vote for MCcain... but Obama is going to win. The other option is that the Republican party has lost 1/3 of its members and none of them are going to vote for either candidate.
What we do know is that many Republicans are not McCain fans, but that they fear Obama far more than they dislike McCain.
This in many respects reminds me of 1948. The media was so certain that the New Yorker with the Hitler mustache was going to win ... they Broadcast and Printed nothing else.
But McCain does not face a large faction of his party walking out of the party convention to form a third party to defeat him as Truman did in 1948.
But a majority of Voters did not like Thomas Dewey and would not vote for him. There is a far larger number of voters that do not like Obama and will not vote for him. About 20 percent of those voters are Democrats. In 2000 there was a lot of talk about Republicans deserting the party to vote for Pat Buchanan and the Libertarian candidate. If you go back and look at FR from that period you would have sworn that Buchanan was going to get 20 percent of the vote on election day. Pat and the Libertarian combined did not get 3/4 of one percent of the vote.
We have polls showing that 65 percent of the voters said that Obama’s trip to the middle east did not make him more prepared to be president. Then they produce a major bump in the polls for Obama. That poll says that Repubicans and Independents think Obama was not helped by the trip and that Democrats think he was... WHOOOPEE!!
It seems to me that every white working class Democrat who can walk or crawl to the polls will vote for McCain. They are scared of Affirmative action under Obama. I think well over 90 percent of Republicans will vote for McCain and that 60 percent of independents will vote for McCain.
But one thing I do know is true. The girls get prettier at closing time and the polls get more accurate at voting time.
But this year they are less accurate at voting time than they were in past years. When they count the votes Obama does not do as well as the polls had predicted. And that is a very good sign for McCain.
I would remind you that in 1980 at this time of the year Carter had a 30 point lead over Reagan. At this time in 1972 McGovern has a 17 point lead over Nixon. Duckakis had a 17 point lead over Bush 41.
Seven out of the last 10 presidential races the leader in the polls in July lost the election. If you were playing the odds would you prefer your candidate to be ahead or behind in July?