ABC Poll: Candidates Neck and Neck (W50%, K47% - Job Approval 53%)

ABC News ^ | 10/18

[aft_lizard]

I like that breakdown, its probably a more realistic number for there to be 36% dims and 34% Republicansm, rather than the Gallup flavor of the week polls.

[Illinois Rep]

Except that 9% think Kerry is too conservative and 6% think Bush is too liberal. This just goes to show polls are WAY WAY off and litered with idiots. Do you really think the people who think Kerry is too conservatie and Bush too liberal will know how to find there way to the polling place?

[madison46]

INternals, internals, internals. Besides being at 50%, the internals are great if measuring where undecideds will break.

Nothing but good news in that write up.

[ken5050]

You ever notice, hopw they give a poll, say it's 52-48..MOE is +/- 3..therefore they always say it's within the margin or error..true, but it could just as easily therefore be 55-45

[MEG33]

Joe Lockhart said job approval means everything yesterday.

http://realclearpolitics.com/Presidential_04/bush_ja.html

Looks like that is also up!

[traderrob6]

No worries....the people who answered that foolishly will never vote,,,,,,Hopefully

[Illinois Rep]

I think those voters are the ones getting crack provided to them by the DNC for showing up to vote early (and often no doubt)

[stands2reason]

Most people here think Bush is too liberal. But we're still voting for him. :-)

[saigon]

"Neck and neck"

"slight edge"

Starting to sound like talking points to me.

[LS]

They STILL don't get it: "Another is the fact that terrorism, Bush's keystone issue, has slipped on the priority list as the candidates have focused on domestic matters."

Issue Now 9/26

Iraq 26 20

Terrorism 19 24

THIS IS THE SAME DAMN ISSUE. IN FACT, BUSH HAS GAINED A POINT IN THE TWO COMBINED ISSUES!!!!!!! AAAARRRRRGGGGGEEHHHHH.

[rushmom]

Bush leads 52-4l on handling of Iraq but on that issue Kerry leads. Explain that one.

[LS]

Trust me, as a history professor, I can tell you that most elections in U.S. history are quite close. Either the pop vote or the EC is usually close. FDR had an electoral blowout in, I think, 1940, but the popular vote was much closer than you would think. Three elections (1884, 1888, and 1892) were decided by a few electoral votes and a small pop vote margin.

[traderrob6]

He led on that one....before he didn't

[Illinois Rep]

I agree with you--yet history has NO way of predicting how elections will turn with late breaking news that is spread with the speed of light of the internet. Any late inning-October surprised could cause a landslide in this Presidential election cycle. The internet has finally grown out of it's infancy and is in full throttle. This election could well defy the historians predictions. Possibly?

[BigTime]

A theory on why the internals are kinder to Bush than the who would you vote for question: I think people are disappointed in how the leadup to Iraq created false impressions about WMD and they are mad about it.

How does that anger manifest itself? I think there is a segment of people who are saying they are going to vote for Kerry but in their hearts, they know Bush to be the better leader.

So they answer the internals with much higher praise than would seem appropriate given Bush's overall support number.

When it comes time to pull the trigger on voting day, these votes will either break for Bush or stay home.

Isn't the same the case for poll questions about taxes? When polled people say they don't favor tax cuts but when they vote they are overwhelmingly in favor of them.

I think the same pattern will emerge in this election.

A segment of the "I'm voting for Kerry" people are lodging a soft protest at this stage but many of them will not follow through.

That plus the libs running the polls are cooking their books.

[ambrose]

Bush leads 52-4l on handling of Iraq but on that issue Kerry leads. Explain that one.

The overall public trust Bush more than Kerry on Iraq, but people who are voting for Kerry consider Iraq their top issue.

[Atlas Sneezed]

Job approval is 53? I wonder if that is 52.5 or 53.4.

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MOE makes the decimal irrelevant.

[WOSG]

I makes perfect sense. Polls regularly understate Republican strength. FOr example the 1996 polls had CLinton up by 13 against Dole - he won by 8 ...
A Bush lead of 3 in the polls is no "neck and neck", his real performance could be 6-8 point victory.

JA of 53% translates into 53% voting for him -> 6-8 point victory.

JMHO.

[Atlas Sneezed]

Trust me, as a history professor, I can tell you that most elections in U.S. history are quite close. Either the pop vote or the EC is usually close. FDR had an electoral blowout in, I think, 1940, but the popular vote was much closer than you would think. Three elections (1884, 1888, and 1892) were decided by a few electoral votes and a small pop vote margin.

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Indeed. The very essence of the two-party system leads each to moderate to gain the middle, but not to compromise the core principles so much as to gain a needless excess majority.

[Petronski]

I know that.