Posted on 10/27/2008 9:00:13 AM PDT by Brookhaven
Karl Rove made a statement in passing on Fox news got passed over, but as time has passed I've decided it is the unspoken key to this election. Paraphrased:
Whatever Sen. Obama is polling on election day is the percentage of votes he will receive. That's what happened in the primaries. It's important for him to be over 50%. In those states where he is under 50% he will be in trouble.
It took a while for it to sink it, but what he is saying is that the undecided vote will go almost 100% against Obama. When you look at polls, there is a tendency to assume the undecided vote will split for the candidates along the same lines as the decided voters (or that each candiate will get a big portion of the undecided vote. Rove deosn't seem to believe that to be true.
This does seem to make sense to me from one standpoint. Obama by rights should be running away with this race. He's not. The reason seems to be that Obama can't seal the deal with undecided voters. Their undecided because they are unsure about Obama (as opposed to liking both candidates but can't make up their mind about which one to vote for.)
Does anyone have any numbers on what Obama polled in the primary vs. actual votes to backup/disprove Rove's statement?
Like someone else on here says all the time “from your lips to Gods ears”
“Gore got 51% and lost so it’s possible. “
Not true. Go to http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/ for the 2000 results. Gore won by about 540,000 votes, but actually got 48.38% of the populare vote. Bush (of course) got more EVs with 47.87% of the popular vote.
Your point that it is possible to win the PV and lose the EV (and, therefore, the election) is taken and is correct. But please get the facts straight - it enhances your argument.
Since the Civil War, there have been three Democrats who have won the White House with over 50% of the popular vote: FDR, LBJ and Jimmy Carter. Every other time Democrats won, it was with under 50%.
Just based on history, the odds are that if Hussein wins, it will be with less than 50%.
In fact FL with a +6% poll still has him at 47%.
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I live in Florida and would be very surprised if Obama wins here.
*Gore got 51% and lost so it’s possible.*
No, he didn’t.
No one got over 50% of the national popular vote in 2000.
I share this view, the majority of people that are undecided at this point are people that have not been able to be persuaded to convince themselves to vote for Obama.
In the end they will vote for the ticket that is more comfortable and traditional. Undecideds at this stage of the election are not daring, let’s go for it and see whats on the other side!, type of people.
I’m in GA and I believe the same thing here. I think the solid south is alive and well. Despite what everyone else is saying. Come on VA, MO, and NC hold up your end of the deal!
IMHO, the polls are "screwy" for one reason, and one reason ONLY - a massive (Republican) voter suppression effort by the bought-and-paid-for media (which owns/runs the pollsters). There are a couple of decent polls out there, but every single one that far more heavily weights Dem voters vs. historical averages is off - so off as to be purposeful.
I have no data, nor am I a statistician. But I have some common sense. People don't switch party affiliation overnight - though they may suddenly like or not like a particular candidate. What held in '04 is probably going to hold, with a very small change, this cycle. Here are two factors NOT accounted for by the polls: 1) Almost all of the fraudulent ACORN registrations are undoubtedly Dem, thereby skewing the results; and 2) NONE of the polls takes into account the Operation Chaos effect - this is, people like me who registered Dem specifically in order to mess with their primary process (as they did with ours in SC and elsewhere). Me. I'm a registered Dem. Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! I already voted for McCain, even though I don't care very much for his politics - because I greatly FEAR Obama and Dem lock on 2 of the branches of the Fed.gov.
Get ready, folks: Among our group there will be great Schadenfreude next week; among the Dems, there will be great gnashing of teeth and far higher than usual psychologists' bills.
Just remember to vote, and encourage everyone you know who'll vote against Obama to do the same.
And Bill Clinton got 43% and won, so anything is possible. However my prediction still stands.
I saw someone post earlier that Operation Chaos is partly to blame for the pollsters changing the party weighting system.
There were a lot of Republicans that registered as Dems, plus the huge Acorn push, that is confusing the poll companies.
Well, if you believe that states that were +4 Republican turnout when we were getting our butts whooped in 2006 are going to all of a sudden be +7 Democrat turnout in 2008, then a lot of those polls would be useful for something.
undecided’s are 100% democrat who do NOT like Obama. If they’re undecided now, they will not vote for him. They’re just really struggling with voting R for the first time in their life or staying home.
Obama still has his 30 minut three network infomercial.
If this interview goes viral, it is going to force him to address his socialism in that infomercial.
He is still pushing the big lie about the 95% tax cut.
The infomercial is a preplanned 30 minute slick willie late night recording.
or just to be contrarian, it could just as easily be the people not wanting to admit the reverse.
I have a feeling Rove is right and think that perhaps the undecided’s are not really that way but would rather not tell the pollsters what they really think for fear of being called racist or worse having the Secret Service called on them like the one person did!
Well, I suppose. If you just to be contrarian. However, I am aware of none of the social pressures on our side that exist on their side. There are people who literally can’t sit in the same room with a McCain voter. The same kind of animus does not exist on the other side. If it does, it hasn’t shown itself in any meaningful way.
“If Obama gets 49% of the popular vote he will win.”
In your sceanrio, the EC count will be close, but I don’t think 0bama would win. If he underperforms his poll numbers in the popular vote, he will also underperform in the BG states, meaning all the tossups go to McCain
That said, 0bama is not really polling 49-50% nationally anyway. Those polls are under estimating the GOP turnout. 0bama is in the 46-47 range as IBD/TIPP shows. That is 0bama’s max. I expect McCain will win by ~5pts in the pop vote, and win the EC count by a comfortable margin.
If Obama gets 48 or 49% of the vote he will win.It's important for him to be over 50%. In those states where he is under 50% he will be in trouble.
If. And just because the "polls" say it doesn't necessarily mean it's true because of internal biases in the polls, and because answering an "if the election were today, how would you vote?" question to a stranger over the phone is not the same as going to the secret ballot on election day and actually voting.And even then, the Electoral College is structurally tilted toward the population of the smaller states whose two EV corresponding to their two senators is a significant portion of their total EV. And not too many of the low-EV states are "blue."
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