Oct 16 2012
Obama Keeps Sliding Into “Lame Duckness”
Major Update 2: A 2nd body-blow poll out from Gallup:
Romney 50%, Obama 46%, and that means certain defeat if it holds.
Major Update 1: A body-blow poll out from KOS:
The candidates for President are Democrat Barack Obama and Republican Mitt Romney. If the election was today, who would you vote for?Obama 46 (47)
Romney 50 (49)At a time when other polls are moving back in the president’s direction, our own weekly poll by Public Policy Polling saw the opposite—a two-point Romney gain. Per day:
Friday (38%) Obama 47, Romney 49
Saturday (39%) Obama 49, Romney 47
Sunday (24%) Obama 43, Romney 55That Sunday sample, about a quarter of the total, was entirely responsible for Romney’s favorable numbers.
Ouch! As I have said since Saturday, if Obama is at 45-46% and Romney is at 49-50% this race is over barring some miracle. There will be a great discussion on this at Hot Air, no doubt. – end update
Bad polls for team Obama popping everywhere. Yesterday I noted this brutal swing state poll from USA Today/Gallup
With Romney at 50% and Obama at 46%, that spells defeat is the most likely outcome in these key states, which in turn would lead to an Electoral College win for the GOP.
Here is another poll from NPR with bad news:
The random cellphone and land line poll of 600 likely rural voters in nine battleground states Oct. 9-11 has Romney at 59 percent among the survey’s respondents. Obama’s support is now down to 37 percent among rural battleground voters, a plunge of 10 points from the actual rural vote in those states four years ago.
No surprise here. Rural area economies are built on family farms and businesses. Small business owners turning on Obama? Whodathunkit!
And this poll indicates Romney is trending towards a win in PA:
Gov. Mitt Romney has narrowed a 12-point gap with President Barack Obama and now trails the president 50 – 46 percent among Pennsylvania likely voters, according to a Quinnipiac University poll released today.
This compares to a 54 – 42 percent Obama lead in a September 26 survey by the independent Quinnipiac (KWIN-uh-pe-ack) University.
Poll trends are very important now, and all show a bad November for Democrats. If PA has moved 8 points towards Romney in a month, with 4 point left in the gap, then a month from now PA could easily be in play.
People are already talking about preference cascade and “Bradley Effect”. One indicated that we may have gone way past the bradley effect by now.
I expect Romney to hit a solid 50 this week and continue to stay above 50 more consistently over the next few weeks.
Intrade still shows Obama 62 Romney 38.
I do not expect Obama to turn things around after tonight’s debate.
AJ,
See this, the map at the link is a killer —
http://thepage.time.com/2012/10/15/the-romney-scenario/#ixzz29V3A3iyG
The Romney Scenario
By Mark Halperin | October 15, 2012
Here’s why some Democrats are worried tonight. If Romney wins the three Southern battlegrounds (FL, NC, and VA) and OH, he is at 266 electoral votes. Leaving the other five battlegrounds unallocated, that means Obama would be at 237 and Romney would only need to win one of the remaining five states to get to 270+. See the map above.
One senior Democratic official expressed real concern tonight unlike I have heard before about Ohio potentially slipping away from Obama (the state has been trending Republican in statewide races, Rob Portman has become a force, religious and gun groups are flooding the state with voter contacts, two of Romney’s top strategists have recently won a statewide race there, etc).
This doesn’t mean Romney has the upper hand right now. But it is no longer at all implausible that he could take the three Southern battlegrounds and Ohio. If he does that, he sure as heck would have the upper hand. And that leaves at least some Democrats with the shakes.
You have a great site. Thanks
Oldsarg,
Many thanks, glad to be of some service….