I don’t want to sound like a Pollyana, which is why I spend so much time analyzing all these polls and comparing them to actual exit poll and turnout data from actual electoins. Yes, I have a dog in the fight (to be more precise, a certain pit bull with lipstick), but I want to get this election right, no matter what the right answer is.
I am convinced that McCain is playing possum. He knows he isn’t behind by six points. I think he knows what I think I have figured out: that the race right now is razor close, but most of the remaining undecideds are voters who voted for Bush in 2004 and will ultimately break mostly for McCain. He knows that turnout is going to be much more like 2004 (around 53-56% of voting age population) and that if that happens, he wins.
I think the Obama campaign knows it too. They are doing what the Bush campaign did eight years ago. They are trying to convey the notion that their victory is inevitable, perhaps because they see victory starting to slip away as all those remaining voters in mostly Bush demographics are now beginning to make their decisions.
To win, Obama needs either to drive turnout up to 60% with all those yoots and newly registered minority voters, or alternatively they need to drive turnout down to around 50% or lower the 1996 and 2000 levels) by trying to discourage McCain supporters from voting at 2004 levels. They know that the “new voters” will not turn out, so I think they are resorting to the later strategy. It’s the exact same strategy that the Bush campaign resorted to in the last week of the 2000 campaign, when they were in a very similar position as Obama is today — having to rely upon yoots and new voters as well as large likely turnout by the opposition.
I remember 2000 all too well. Bush had been trailing Gore through September, and then overtook him in October by hefty margins. In the final week, Bush was campaigning in California and New Jersey. Gore was campaigning nonstop 24/7 like a madman. His final rally brought him to Iowa at 4am in the snow and rain.
I went through the TIPP website through archive.org and they have this interesting write-up on the closing days. Sadly, the graphs no longer work:
http://web.archive.org/web/20010203001500/tipponline.com/elect/other/trends.htm