Sep 16 2008
Even More Evidence, At The State Level, McCain-Palin Wave Continues
Charles Franklin over at Pollster.com has done some excellent analysis showing how the McCain-Palin wave is washing across the nation, not just in red states as the Obama campaign is claiming (in a clear fit of denial):
Obama advisor David Axelrod is quoted in today’s Washington Post article by Dan Balz and Peter Slevin:   “I think one of the things driving the national polls is that the red states are redder,” said David Axelrod, one of Obama’s closest advisers. “In the battleground states, the race has held pretty firm.”Â
…
Among the strong Democratic states, the effect of the conventions is a tiny 2 point move in McCain’s direction, from an Obama lead of 12 points before to 10 points now.
But the rest of the states, rated lean or toss up, have also shown movement. These swing states had a 1.5 point Obama lead before the conventions, and that has now turned into a 3 point McCain lead, a 4.5 point shift.
Why the Obama camp wants to present a face of denial to the country, when the execution of his presidential campaign is the litmus test for his readiness to be president, is beyond me. But if they feel the emotional need to pretend they aren’t in trouble, as a McCain-Palin supporter I won’t argue with them too hard. Besides, I need a good laugh.
I don’t think they are really “denying” anything yet. What they are doing is playing it off like it is a post-convention bounce and waiting for the wave to pass. It seems they are shutting up a bit or that Palin has attracted enough of the spotlight that Obama isn’t the star media attraction anymore.
He is done, his campaign is over, he is toast. His own comment calling Sarah Palin nothing more than “lipstick” on the McCain campaign “pig” was what drove the stake into the heart of his campaign.
But it might just be a post convention bounce. From Rasmussen:
But wait, there’s more:
I am not a premium member so I can’t see the data in advance.
If the latest polls of several of the blue states – NJ, MN, NY, etc. are correct, shouldn’t McCain’s national poll lead have to be getting larger?
PMII,
Not necessarily. Pollster use voter models to extrapolate their sample base into a representation of the national electorate. If these are not being updated to reflect the changing voter preferences and party identification, the polls will squelch the effect, giving a false result.
Now if they can just get those working for the McCain campaign to keep their mouth shut, the lead will keep getting wider. The Dems will keep putting the bait out there for someone in McCains campaign to bite on.
Today, McCain invented the Blackberry and is being compared to Al Gore and the internet. The way this came about is rediculous,but someone took the bait.
And for the life of me, why is Carley Fiorina of all people out and about giving interviews about Palin qualifications when I seem to remember she was forced to resign from her throne at HP amid a scandal.
To this day, I am bitter with that woman for a speech she gave back on January 8, 2004 when she said – “there is no job that is America’s God-given right anymore.â€
I had just gotten laid off from a software company that was planning to outsource my job to India. To begin with, who said American’s had a God-given right to a job in the first place?
So before she opens her mouth again by saying that Palin is not qualified to run HP, someone should remind her that the position of VP to the United States can not be outsourced and in Palin’s case, “She does have a God-given right to be the VP!!
SBD
Part of what I thrown much analysis of this election off is so many have drawn conclusions from the exit poll data in the primary election.
The media loves to shout that from the roof tops but it is becoming more and more a false story line.
Nov 4th is no longer the election, it is the end of the election cycle.
Early voting and absentee ballots now on average count for over 60% of the total turn out. Fewer and fewer are at the polls on the day of the primary or general.
So with the smaller pool to draw from and demographics that keep moving toward low income / blue collar types being the ones who show up on election day, that is the reason the exit polls don’t properly predict the outcome of the general.
Yet the networks have ‘experts’ talking about election analysis and they just gloss over this fact.