It’s hard to know whether to feel confident or not

July 24, 2008

It’s July. Neither candidate has picked a running mate. We’re more than a month away from either party’s convention. The Democratic candidate didn’t lock down the nomination until last month. Election Day is 102 days away.

With that in mind, it just doesn’t make any sense to get too excited, in either direction, about what’s likely to happen in the presidential race. Too much can and will happen between now and November.

But for most of us — and I include myself in this equation — that’s not quite good enough. We want to know, at a minimum, whether to feel confident or insecure. Do we dare let our hopes get high, or do we expect the worst? Do we have faith in the electorate, or do heed Mencken’s advice and keep our money in our pocket?

My friend Kevin Drum — who just yesterday said John McCain “is pretty obviously doomed this year” — has an optimistic worldview. I hope he won’t mind if I quote him at length (and by “at length,” I mean, steal his whole post):

For some reason, there seems to be endless chatter among liberals right now who are worried about how Obama is doing against McCain. Why is the race tightening? Why hasn’t there been a bump from Obama’s overseas trip? Etc. etc.

Beats me. But the race sure doesn’t seem to be tightening to me. Different polls show different things, and different poll averages show different things, but the one I usually use (from RealClear Politics) showed Obama ahead by 4.8 points last week and ahead by…..4.9 points this week. So he’s doing fine.

As for the world tour, it’s gotten him a ton of coverage during a month that’s usually light on people paying attention to politics, and the coverage has mostly been very positive. That’s a good thing. It may not have given him an instantaneous bump, but honestly, we should all calm down over stuff like this. Not everything shows up in tracking polls within 24 hours. The trip is good for Obama, it increases his foreign policy cred, and once it’s out of the way he’ll be pretty well positioned to stay home and bear down on the campaign later this summer.

Long story short, I’m not really very worried. McCain will make progress here and there depending on where he spends money and what the issue of the hour happens to be, but overall he’s not making up any ground. My bet is that three months and $300 million from now, Obama’s going to pick up several more points in the polls and be ahead of McCain by eight or nine points. It ain’t over til it’s over, but right now it doesn’t look to me like there’s really anything much to fret about.

I really want to believe this, but there’s that little tinge of dread I find hard to suppress.

Kevin points to the RCP averages, which shows Obama up by about four, which is about where it’s been for a month now. Pollster.com has a rival chart with polling averages, which shows Obama’s lead down to less than three points, and shrinking slightly.

Rasmussen’s daily tracking poll has Obama up by four, and Gallup’s daily tracking poll has Obama up by two. Both haven’t changed much in a while.

Needless to say, it’s not a national race; it’s 50 state races. The national polls are interesting for trend lines, but they lack predictive value. The goal is 270 electoral votes; not 50% plus one.

But even some of the state polls leave Dems feeling antsy. Just today, new Quinnipiac numbers show big shifts in McCain’s direction in Colorado and Minnesota, both of which the Obama campaign are counting on.

What often goes overlooked is that the McCain campaign has been spending furiously in battleground states — and Obama hasn’t. The Republican has been spending to stay close; the Democrat has been keeping his powder dry, waiting to start spending in earnest until later. The polls are going to reflect this, and once Obama’s coffers open, I expect a shift in his direction.

So why am I still a nervous-nelly? Because Obama’s been running a nearly-flawless campaign in a cycle in which Americans are practically desperate to vote for a Democrat. McCain, burdened by gaffes, flip-flops, and surrogate scandals, has been a bumbling, incoherent candidate, who can’t seem to do anything right.

And Obama is just barely holding onto a national lead. I’d like to think Obama would be padding an enormous lead now, which would narrow as the race continues. That’s not happening at all.

If the 1980 model is sound, and I’m inclined to think it is, Obama still needs to prove himself. That’s fine; I’m confident he can. Once that happens — and it may not happen until October — things should turn out fine.

But right about now, I’m keeping my expectations in check.

It’s a good thing to keep your expectations in check, because Barack Hussein Obama will not be sworn in as President of the United States of January 20, 2009.

  • I spent half of 2004 reading Emerging Democratic Majority and other blogs that said how dems had it all wrapped up and every major demographic was shifting left, etc. I’ll believe it on the day McCain concedes. I don’t care if Obama is up 30 points on the eve of the election, I’ll believe it when McCain concedes.

  • So why am I still a nervous-nelly?

    Because losing sucks.

    I feel better about the chances for election than I felt about Gore or Kerry.

  • If the 1980 model is sound….

    To be blunt, Jimmy Carter wasn’t running against a n*gger…

  • I feel better about the chances for election than I felt about Gore or Kerry too ; )

  • 13% of people still think he’s a Muslim. It’ll help when the uninformed actually learn something about him, or actually see him speak 10x more intelligently than McCain during the debates.

  • National polls mean nothing. I like Electoral-Vote because it shows you the polls state by state.

    As an aside, most Americans who are not already firmly behind one or the other of the candidates are not paying attention to politics at any great length right now. It’s summer and they are enjoying time outside, away from the media or are too busy working (trying to pay for gasoline, food, etc.) to pay attention to politics.

    Come Oct., it will be Obama in a Obamafest landslide.

  • So why am I still a nervous-nelly?

    Because negative campaigning works. And that’s all McCain has in his arsenal.

  • Franklin:

    There’s a still chance he IS a secret Muslim. Also, did you think that he spoke 10x more intelligently than Hillary during those debates? LOL!!!

  • Also, John McCain will never be sworn in as Senator. He’s just too liberal. But, Bob Novak? I’d hit that! Mann Coulter was doing me the other night, and (s)he agreed. I wish Novak grow a moustache so I could sit on it. I’m a great moustache waxer.

  • There’s a difference between feeling confident and simply not being terrified by every new poll number. It’s foolish to flatly say he will win; he can win; he’s just going to have to work for it. Which is what he is doing. It’s as bad to be demoralized as it is to be complacent.

    True, it’s bad to be complacent. But really, in ’04 everybody was convinced that Kerry’s support was substantially undercounted and he’d pick up undecideds. Obama has been narrowly but consistently ahead.

  • I’m feeling good about Obama’s chances because, unlike Dukakis, he shows no sign of coasting. I think the polls are close because people have NOT seen McCain very much. The more you see him, the less credible or appealing he becomes. For many folks, the word association game goes like this: “John McCain>War Hero>Maverick>President.” I think that the more people see of McCain, the more likely that the end links of this associative chain fall off.

  • Oh, and in case you’re too liberal to understand, gridlock, that would be you, of course. I’m with the white american majority: we hate negroes. All those watermelons make us nervous. The green outside, the commie-pinko inside. It’s the stuff of nightmares.

  • You know, I’ll repeat myself. I think it’s uncivil that someone is appropriating my name. This is really too harsh of you dirty hippies. Take a shower!

  • JakeD said: “It’s a good thing to keep your expectations in check, because Barack Hussein Obama will not be sworn in as President of the United States of January 20, 2009.”

    Not even if he is elected in November? Didn’t know you planned to start a Civil War.

    CB, there are a couple of grounds for worry.

    One, Americans could be lying to pollsters (Bradley effect) about their willingness to vote for a Black man. That could seriously be skewing the numbers.

    Two, Obama doesn’t seem to be breaking over 50% in more than a few states. Remember that in the primaries the late deciders constantly went against Obama. And every state is holding an election, none a convention, so more undecided people are going to the polls.

    and Three, JSMcC*nt has already telegraphed his “plot” to steal the election, try to keep close in the polls until November 1st, then supposedly pass Obama in the last few days. This will be acomplished by a blizzard of Republican’t false polling covering the use of Diebold cheating to win a few critical swing states.

    Note as Jake says, even if Obama is elected, he won’t be inagurated President.

    On the upside, the Obama campaign is full of a lot SMARTER people than their opponents, and I’m sure they won’t be making a mistake like thinking that California’s delegates all got to the primary winner. They are going to plan a 300 to 350 Electorial Vote victory and they willl know how to get there.

    And when the Civil War comes, this time we’ll have all the good generals.

  • I’ll give you a shower you Fake JakeD hippy! When I find out who you are I’m going to have you banned from Greenpeace and have the FBI trace your phone calls!

  • Dear Steve, lots people aren’t even paying attention yet. Mostly they’re worried about getting through their days without losing everything. Come November they’ll pull the lever as an expression of that suffering.

    We’re going to do this. Keep up the good work.

  • I think Obama set himself back with the FISA vote and he’s just now really convincing all the Democrats he’s okay. I’m convinced now but I wavered during that period. (Although of course he’s the only acceptable choice.) I think he should go ahead and choose his veep so the Hillary supporters can get off the fence too.

  • JakeD said: “There’s a still chance he IS a secret Muslim.

    Damn, now I can’t tell if this is the Real Troll/Fake American JakeD.

    But once again, I’m surprised that he expresses the notion that Islam is a greater religion than Christianity, and that Islamic law, which states that religious identity derives from the male parent (Judism says religious identity derives from the female parent) trumps Christian law that says BAPTISM defines religious identity.

    There being no secret that Obama is baptized a Christian.

  • …why am I still a nervous-nelly? Because Obama’s been running a nearly-flawless campaign in a cycle in which Americans are practically desperate to vote for a Democrat. McCain, burdened by gaffes, flip-flops, and surrogate scandals, has been a bumbling, incoherent candidate, who can’t seem to do anything right.

    I know that we keep beating this dead horse, but current polls, it appears, are largely a reflection of how poorly the traditional media is performing in covering these campaigns. The gaffes, flip-flops, bumbling and incoherence on McCain’s part have largely been masked (or edited out) by the traditional media, while they have, simultaneously, reported non-existent Obama flip-flops.

    Adding insult to injury, the media has reported one side of the debate on drilling in environmentally-sensitive areas (hardly mentioning existing leases of millions of acres that the oil companies are not utilizing), and as a result, overnight it seems, most of the public suddenly supports more drilling…global warming, dying links in our food chain and shrinking water supplies be damned.

    The problem isn’t our candidate. The problem is the networks and newspapers.

    I’m nervous too.

  • JakeD You are the most inept troll I have come across. Better go back to Free Republic and work on your talking points. All you are doing here is providing kicks and giggles.

  • That’s right, Rick, because every other post of mine has always included “I wish Novak would grow a moustache so I could sit on it.” Really, I think Scotland Yard is looking for a detective just like you …

  • I am the wittiest Republican ever!!!

    You librulls don’t stand a chance against witty and intelligent Republicans such as me. Look back over the past seven years and see all that we Republicans have done for this country.

    Peace and prosperity? Check!
    Balanced budget? Check!
    Social Security secured? Check!
    Restored integrity to the White House? Check!
    Corruption rooted out at all levels of government? Check!
    The constitution and the rule of law protected from all threats, internal and external? Check!
    Captured Bin Laden as promised? Check!
    Won the war in Iraq? Check!
    Won the war in Afghanistan? Check!
    Published a book by Jenna Bush? Check!

  • tiredofgreed:

    Don’t worry. I’m working on an anti-Fake JakeD “script” as we type.

  • ..and the JakeD’s are cloning! To the JakeD at #23. Love it…hey – how did you manage to get the smiley into the post.

    Me, its beyond my skills ! Grin

  • MsMuddled said:
    We’re going to do this. Keep up the good work.

    Right, be of good cheer.. What would you do differently, CB? Write 15 posts a day. 🙂

  • Someone on the First Read blog made a good point that I had missed:

    Ira, Freehold, NJ wrote:

    There is one more John McCain gaffe that the media missed from the now famous CBS interview with Katie Couric.
    This is the same interview in which McCain claimed the surge led to the Anbar Awakening, which is demonstrably false. But watch below for another gaffe when McCain says Iraq was the first major conflict after 9/11.
    Was Afghanistan not major enough for him? It almost reminds you of when Don Rumsfeld was not impressed with invading Afghanistan because it did not provide a rich enough target environment. He needed something more major.
    ………………………………………………………………………………………………

    I hadn’t noticed this point – has anyone else already pointed this out?

  • I’m an ignorant troll who likes to wreck the site for people hoping to have a decent conversation. I like to screw with things and always post first because I’m insecure about my small, flaccid penis. If I were in power, like my heroes George & Dick, I would just launch unnecessary pre-emptive wars to cover for my sexual inadequacy, but instead I post here.

  • JakeD @ 38 – as if we would trust to download any script that you provide.

    Right…. that much I DO know.

  • Obama’s been running a nearly-flawless campaign in a cycle in which Americans are practically desperate to vote for a Democrat. McCain, burdened by gaffes, flip-flops, and surrogate scandals, has been a bumbling, incoherent candidate, who can’t seem to do anything right.

    And Obama is just barely holding onto a national lead. I’d like to think Obama would be padding an enormous lead now

    You’d like that. I’d like that. But the corporate media wouldn’t like that. Coverage of the McCain campaign — far from critical coverage, but merely coverage that objectively portrayed his confused desperation — would be a ratings bummer, quite apart from the so-called “liberal media”‘s hunger for more BBQ. Hence phenomena like CBS News — not the McCain campaign, but the network news itself — decieving its viewers by deceptively editing McCain’s gaffe.

    Media reform should be tops on Obama’s to-do list, and I suspect the corporate media knows it. Don’t expect any help from the so-called “liberal media;” Matt Drudge still rules their world.

    But even so, my sense is that the trendlines are too much in Obama’s facor — if media hype was everything, New Coke wouldn’t have flopped.

  • I ! am JakeD! A true Republican! I have learned my trolling skills the hard way-trolling bathroom stalls in airports across America, bringing my fellow Americans into the legislative process-wink-wink! I am a real Republican!

  • It’s JULY. Jeebus. The only folks who are worrying about the election at all at this point are partisans and wonks. Since the primaries are over, most folks aren’t going to bother worrying about it again until the conventions. Maybe. Or possibly the debates.

    People are worrying about their jobs. Or how they’re going to pay for their vacations. Or the Olympics. Or a host of other things right now. They’re not thinking about electoral politics except to the extent that it intrudes on their day-to-day lives.

    I’m not saying stop worrying – frankly I think this is going to be a close one because despite McCain being an obvious loon with credibility issues, Obama is still black, will remain black until the election (and beyond) and this country is still chock-full-o-racists. But the polls “not shifting” in the middle of July is not anything to worry about.

  • Obama ought to be ahead by twenty points or more, is why we’re worried.

    And McCain has run the worst campaign we’ve ever seen. His incompetence is just so out there for anyone paying attention.

    So add another ten points to what Obama ought to be leading by.

    But he’s ahead by only five, give or take a point. Gulp, and uh oh. What’s going on here?

    McCain is doing so badly that you kind of expect the manager to walk out to the mound and call in a relief candidate. I can just see ol’ Casey Stengel trudging across the diamond from the dugout, shaking his head, spitting on the ground and telling McCain, “Ain’t nobody ever told you how to play this game, son?”

    But he’s only five points behind.

    And the lead will probably shrink in October, the way it did with Clinton/Bush in October of 1992.

    So if Obama hasn’t built up a comfortable edge by then –

    And he’s not building his lead at all, really –

    Is why we’re worried.

    Never has the time been more auspicious to put a Democrat in the White House since the days of FDR.

    And yet Obama has only a piddling lead.

    Is why we’re worried.

  • I will never get over 2004, when I though Kerry was going to win, and probably did save for the Diebold effect. I simply have no doubt that the Republicans will cheat to win this race. I think we’ll need a polling margin of 15 points before I’ll believe we can really win.

    I hope that the DNC is focused between now and November on making sure there aren’t unnecessarily long lines at polling places in traditionally minority areas. Or that there are plenty of working machines in all polling locations. And no ballot shortages.

    And we should encourage early voting in the states that have it. And we should all vote early, too, so we can volunteer to be election judges and it’s not just crotchety old, computer illiterate Republicans on their day off from the retirement home.

    Frankly, I think election reform is the key to Democratic success. I shudder to think how many elections we’ve really won or would have won without their tampering.

  • Bomb bomb bomb-bomb bomb Iran, Bomb bomb bomb-bomb bomb Iran, Bomb Irannnnnnnnnnnnn-bomb Irannnnnnnnnnnnnnnn, ya got me rockin’ and a reelin’ Bomb iran,

    Oh come to me baby. Sit over here! Ahhhhhhhhhhhh, Michelle!

  • hark said: “Obama ought to be ahead by twenty points or more, is why we’re worried.”

    I think we knew when it got down to Clinton vs. Obama that we weren’t going to be ahead by 20 points in July. Maybe a white man could have bounced out of the primaries with a 20 point lead.

    But you know what, I believe a white man would have lost that lead. I think Obama (or Clinton) have a better chance of winning in November because they had to face a tight race all along.

    That’s my cheery thought for the afternoon.

  • NonyNony said:
    People are worrying about their jobs. Or how they’re going to pay for their vacations. Or the Olympics. Or a host of other things right now. They’re not thinking about electoral politics except to the extent that it intrudes on their day-to-day lives.

    I’m worried about a 1929-style economic meltdown. I’m worried about 1979-style gas lines. I’m worried about our intelligence being so focused on Iraq and pre-invasion plans for Iran that they won’t see another terrorist attack coming. I’m worried about a health insurance shortage causing a breakdown in the healthcare industry. I’m worried about deregulation causing a massive disease outbreak. I’m worried that another four-year delay in doing anything about global warming will make the situation so bad that it can’t be reversed.

    And all of those could happen if McCain manages to win in November. The stakes are just too damn high to be cavalier about this election.

  • Yesterday, Obama spoke in Israel and McCain responded from the cheese aisle in a grocery store. Today, Obama is speaking before 200k people in Germany and CNN just showed a clip of McCain responding in front of a “Fudge Haus”. Are we positive McCain is still running for President? His campaign seems to have degenerated into an multi-day snack run (with the media buying, I’m sure).

  • McCain, burdened by gaffes, flip-flops, and surrogate scandals, has been a bumbling, incoherent candidate, who can’t seem to do anything right.

    Which would make a difference if the media would bother to report it. As it stands, they’re actively editing out his “gaffes” and letting him lie like a rug every day.

    What we need to do is register every single young person in the country and make them promise to vote. If we can do that we’ll blow McCain and his Republican friends to hell and gone.

  • The only reason I am worried is that I thought there was no way this country had enough navel-gazing idiots to reelect W in 2004, and I was wrong. I am still hopeful that we can win this. Unfortunately, I think we’re all going to have to spend an inordinate amount of time keeping the MSM honest to make it happen.

  • Amazing you don’t mention what is really bothering you…that you fear republicans will cheat and steal the election. You worry because when McCain is blowing the hell out of his campaign his poll numbers go up. After all the corruption of the past 7yrs you and others keep comparing the polls etc to years when all this corruption was not in play that is to say when the established media wasn’t entirely biased toward the corporatocracy to the point of seeing that the “fix” is in. Are the polls also infringed to keep the race looking close so the media can still make huge profits. It it were completely lop-sided for Obama would we pay less attention. Is it close to keep it within range of stealing it without it being too obvious?

    My god, it should be a landslide victory for Obama. Are those polled holding back so Obama doesn’t get overconfident?

    With the disaster of the Bush administration and the republican nominee offering more of the same, being wrong on everything with a piss poor personality and an aging mentality it is ridiculous to be fearful of a McCain win except for the fear of cheating and stealing which is the history of the RNC. I’m not worried at all because it will be a landslide victory for Obama and the dems. Getting rid of the republicans is the focus of this election. Getting rid of the DINOs will be the focus of this and the next election.

    Right now I pray for Obama’s safe return because I put nothing past a McCain that would say “Obama would be willing to lose a war in order to win an election”. That shows a mean spirited despicable character and demonstrates to me that McCain would do exactly what he accuses his opposition of doing.

  • “The national polls are interesting for trend lines, but they lack predictive value.”

    As Jorgen Rasmussen wrote in a letter to the editor of the July issue of Scientific American, unlike prediction markets, “[P]olls do not make predictions; they simply report the state of opinion at a specific time.” (See http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=letters-july-2008). Markets, unlike polls, do have predictive value 100 days before an election, and the fact that Obama futures have been trading on Intrade in the 65.0 range (compared to about 32.0 for McCain) for quite some time now should give us at least some ground for cautious optimism.

  • I know of two die-hard, gun enthusiast Republican’s that are voting for Barack Obama. I’m hoping that that is a good sign.. Of course I work in Silicon Valley so I don’t know if the barometer reading is worth noting here. I tend to forget that medieval times still exist in other parts of the US. Hillary/JakeD country I suppose. Go Kentucky! Home of the Creation Museum!!

  • The gaffes and flip-flops need a context to be effective. The overarching message needs reinforcing: McCain does not have the temperment or intelligence to be president.

    Keep it simple.

  • 1. Most of the world is very poor, and most Americans are not.
    2. Most of the world is young, and most Americans are not.
    3. Most of the world does not have white skin, and most Americans do.
    That’s why this will be a close election. Despite their unhappiness, a significant percentage, maybe a majority, of voters are ruled by fear of the world. It has them outnumbered, and they can’t stand it.

  • The prooblem is that Obama has not been very strong when it comes to messaging. He started to lose ground when the flip-flop meme was all over the media. Fisa also didn’t help. I don’t know what the house members were thinking when they put it on the floor.

  • Are those polled holding back so Obama doesn’t get overconfident?

    Joey, maybe it’s more that they’re just scared to say. My Mom lives in a still-racially volatile small town in NC and goes to a senior lunch everyday, where the cafeteria remains segregated. Not sure if it’s habitual or simply a daily choice. But there Mom won’t even mention to her white friends she’s voting for Barack for fear she’ll be somehow condemned.

    However, I suspect her black friends already know. Her decency and kindness to all has spoken volumes over the years and I’ll betcha there’s a special glint in her eyes recognizable to them when political discussions come up. While her white friends can barely conceal their lifelong contempt for sharing anything with black folks, Mom is the only one I know who really has practiced what was preached, always reaching out where others wouldn’t, and for that I am one proud Southern daughter.

    Maybe the current silence is a good sign. The more folks see and hear Barack, and especially in comparison to McCain with CRS (can’t remember shit) disease, the more they’ll feel comfortable speaking up.

  • Now that it seems you’ve finished masturbating on your keyboard for us perhaps we can all have a smoke. Ah, good times . . .

  • Now that it seems you’ve finished masturbating on your keyboard for us perhaps we can all have a smoke. Ah, good times . . .

  • lol, JakeD, I’ve seen a number of your comments over the last week or so and feel compelled to ask you a question: Are you ever right? Can you name one thing that actually turned out as you said it would? Just wondering, because if I inhabited that shallow, slithering fantasy land of yours, I’d be pretty proud of being right once or twice >:]

  • The reason to feel nervous is that the lead isn’t higher, which twigs onto the fact that something IS wrong.

    McCain has had a disastrous few weeks of utter stupidity in what should be a series of campaign-ending missteps. His campiagn hasn’t imploded – and whatever the reason, that’s troubling. I’d say frankly it’s the media, who isn’t reporting what is news – he’s really been a screw-up.

  • Why do you guys let JakeD get to you? The mimicing is funny but it’s best to not give a rise to trolls. It’s just as easy to troll Republicans.

    Of course being overly optimistic is stupid but his chances are still a hell of a lot better than McCain’s. The voter turnout and grass roots efforts for Obama is what will squash the dispirited Republicans and it’s hard to quantify those until election day but we saw how it worked against Hillary who was a far more effective candidate than McCain.

    Obama has a bit of an uphill battle because he’s (part) black and has some foreign background which scares the less worldly Americans but he and his campaign are doing an excellent job and keep surpassing my expectations. Go out and fight for him! The second “thumpin'” is coming!

  • FYI: “JakeD country” = San Diego, California

    Now there’s a surprise. Wasn’t the old tag line “I love a clean San Diego”? Irony is always inevitable. The theme should be “San Diego; pretty but ugly when you look closer, and nearly everybody smokes and gleefully believes in an invisible all power male deity who’s son was born of a virgin”, or “San Diego, nice place to visit, but not really!”. Sorry, I grew up there and have not looked back once I got past the Grapevine and the Central Valley. San Diego is Inbred Transylvania where the local intellect is transcended only by ugly stucco ranch houses! There’s a reason “Jesus” has tried to burn that place to the ground, twice. Obama should definitely skip that campaign stop.

    /rant

  • It is a false premise to think that when things go bad people will necessarily want change. Some will and some will not. Many people will keep doing the same thing when things are bad; not wanting to risk things getting worse. Obama has run about the most perfect campaign that he could so far and even the republican controlled media is having difficulties finding ways to bash him. Fortunately the internet has been helping to keep the reporting accurate and exposing McCain’s constant lies. The country never did “elect” GW and will make a point of really not electing GWII. I do not think they will be able to fix enough machines to put GWII over the top.

  • @William: Hey, don’t knock San Diego because one Repub troll lives there. I lived there too and it’s a great place. San Diego, especially the eastern parts, is pretty conservative. That doesn’t automatically make them bad people though! I have plenty of Republican friends from there and trust me a lot are going for Obama this year. They are almost as sick of Republican rule as we are.

    Plus, Conservative is not the same as Republican. Republicans have proven themselves incapable of governing the country over the last 8 years so they are being kicked to the curb by many of their own people.

  • It’s important to keep in mind that these polls cannot accurately take turnout into account (even those polls of “likely voters” are poor approximations of turnout). All available evidence shows it’s a safe bet that turnout will be substantially higher among Dem voters. So for example, if we make even very conservative estimates about the the Dems’ turnout advantage over McCain, Obama’s seemingly narrow leads in many polls (say, 1-4 points), would likely translate into a much more comfortable cushion. I would go so far as to speculate that the polls would have to start showing a consistent 5-6 point edge for McCain for him to overcome Obama’s turnout advantage. Don’t see that happening. And the prediction markets (arguably a better gauge than polls) have Obama consistently with a two-to-one likelihood of winning. Finally, pretty much every relevant metric favors Obama. Statistical patterns and structural demographics may not be sexy or exciting, but their teeth are far sharper than our emotions and perceptions. Let cold, hard reality be our security blanket; it’s how I sleep at night.

  • I’m nervous as well.

    Since the 2000 election, I think we all feel like Charlie Brown with the football. Both times, it looked like we’d kick a goal this time! And Lucy (the media, not the GOP) pulls the ball away at the last minute. We picked Bush over Gore, because Gore’s supposedly a serial exaggerator. We picked Bush over Kerry because of wind-surfing and the Swiftboat Vets for Truth. It was the media that facilitated those characterizations of two good men. Now, the media seems determined to tear Obama down. I’d love to have Jason Linkins live-blog MSNBC’s Race for the Whitehouse to expose how the tear-down is done. Or have Jon Stewart go on and ask why are they trying to hurt America.

  • I have to agree with William, Frank. I lived in North SD County for a couple of years, and never have I witnessed such phoniness and excessiveness anywhere with the exception of perhaps Laguna Beach. Republican or not, I just don’t see the point of staking a claim there.

    And let us not forget Duke and his ilk are all from SD County.

    I’ve finally settled in Joshua Tree in the desert which is almost heaven. It’s real and raw and the most inspiring place in California I’ve seen yet. Great emerging art and music scene too, but laid back and quaint. However, they will fight the good fight when needed. They are currently taking on LA Water and Power who are trying to run towers through the area to siphon off geothermal from the Salton Sea. It’s a beautiful thing to witness the screwing of LA. I suspect they’ll be taking to the streets pretty soon and I love it.

    Oh, and it’s Obama country!

  • 55.On July 24th, 2008 at 4:24 pm, Shalimar said:
    CNN just showed a clip of McCain responding in front of a “Fudge Haus”.

    “Sausage Haus”. I would claim I got it wrong on purpose as a homage to this campaign since it has basically been a gaffe fest, but that wouldn’t technically be true.

  • Not only is the 1980 comparison apt, we really need to remember that most people are just not paying attention yet. Generally speaking, that doesn’t happen until after the conventions. I know it doesn’t feel that way in Politinetland, but that’s really how it is. I find the fact that such a newcomer is doing so well already encouraging.

  • I, too, am nervous but am not surprised by how close the polls are. Let’s be honest, most Americans aren’t very sophisticated voters and are woefully uninformed. So, it should come as no surprise that Sen. McCain remains close despite making gaffe after gaffe and Obama’s having had about 2 weeks of a good turn of events. A lot of people are probably unaware that most of this is even going on, so it has absolutely no impact on how the polls are shaping up. We give the average voter in this country way too much benefit of the doubt. With the number of people still believing Obama’s a Muslim, Saddam helped plan 9/11, and that we actually found WMD… you really can’t predict how the election’s going to go because everyone’s not voting based on the same set of objective facts (or any facts at all). And throw in the fact that one of the candidates is black, has a surname like Obama, and has a black African father, and this is what you get… him completely outclassing McCain and still being in a tight race.

  • Let’s cheer up a little and look at the campaign from the McCain perspective. He hasn’t led Obama in a single head to head poll in almost 3 months. The last 4 were 9,8,7,and 6 point leads for Obama (Quinnipiac, Wash Post, Reuters, and NBC/WSJ.

    The last polls I remember (not composites) out of Missouri had McCain down 5, down 5 in Montana, tied in North Dakota, down 2 in Nevada, and down 2 in Florida. These are all must wins for McCain.

    So yes some important states for Obama have tightened, but the same is true for McCain. Also, don’t forget North Carolina where McCain is up by about 1.5 in the composite.

    If Obama held the Kerry states, which certainly isn’t a given, but I think is likely, and took Iowa and New Mexico, which I think is very likey he’d only need to win one or two of the following:

    Virginia
    Ohio
    Colorado
    Indiana
    Missouri
    Florida
    North Dakota
    Alaska
    Nevada
    Montana
    South Dakota

    McCain would have to win at least 10 of the 11. My point isn’t that this is an easy win for Obama, but that from McCain’s perspective it still looks pretty tough.

  • Hey this should make you feel better Steve. I sent out Hannah’s GWB “Library Plans” to my redneck pals back in NC and one wrote me back and said “It’s this guy who has at last caused me to send money to the Democrats”. This is monumental.

    Rejoice!

  • What often goes overlooked is that the McCain campaign has been spending furiously in battleground states — and Obama hasn’t. — CB

    Steve, what you’re forgetting here is the campaign financing dynamics. McCain, who will be running a publicly financed general campaign, *has to* spend all of his money from the primaries; he cannot transfer it to the general kitty past the Convention. For him, it makes sense to spend now like there’s no tomorrow because, in fact, there is no tomorrow for that money.

    Obama’s situation is exactly the other way around; the more money Obama saves from the primaries, the more he’ll have to spend on the general, because, unlike Senator McGaffe, he *can* pool the resources from both primary and general campaigns. So, for him, it makes sense to hold his horses now, travel around the world (instead of campaigning off the oil rigs in Louisiana and German restaurants in Ohio), before blitzing the country with ads, closer to the Election Day.

    It’s a bit of a gamble… What if people *are* paying more attention now that they normally do in July and McCain’s ads “take root” too firmly to reverse the impression later? So yeah, we’re all worried a bit. OTOH… Obama’s campaign has been, so far, as close to flawless as possible; he seems to have excellent instincts, when it comes to politics. So I hope that, come September, when some of his most ardent “base” is back on college campuses (instead of slinging burgers at various fast food joints) he’ll go full bore, re-energise them and keep us all at the fever pitch (Fired Up! Ready to Go!) all the way through Nov 4.

  • CB: I really want to believe this [optimistic worldview], but there’s that little tinge of dread I find hard to suppress.

    — That little dread beginning with “D”, perhaps? The one that also ends in “d”? Suggestive of death and stacked odds, as in “the Die is cast”? A little twinge in the face of something — how shall we say — insidiously “bold”? No?

    Just groping in the dark here, trying to help out.

  • Jake-Dink, if you want to add something of worth to this webiste that is intellectual and insightful, then fine. You are a bore – yawn.

  • I just wonder why there is this expectation that there should be a wide, wide margin between the candidates. The last time there was a real landslide was Clinton vs Dole in ’96; the last two elections have been on a knife edge. And let’s say the unsayable: there are many people who are not going to vote for Obama because he’s black. I wish I could tell you otherwise, but I can’t.

    The fact that he’s ahead by an average about 5% is impressive enough. He’s weathered a shitstorm of attacks, had his wife smeared and survived a brutal nomination process. I’d say he’s doing okay.

    I think the disconnect that liberals feel is between the difference in quality of the candidates and that this difference is not reflected in the polls. Obama is smarter, sharper and has better policies. McCain is a bumbling dolt. This shouldn’t be close. But are there really that many swing voters out there these days? American politics has become ever more polarized in the last decade. A 5% winning margin for a youthful black candidate would be huge. More than that, I think it would change how the world sees America and how America sees itself.

  • JakeD

    What you are doing is not helpful. If you want to help the McCain Blog Outreach, please get with the program.

    If you need a lesson I suggest you report back to the Blog Out Reach Web site to learn the rules of engagement, or not post at all.

    Thank You

    BTW John McCain is strong on National Security!

  • To make every vote in every state politically relevant and equal in presidential elections, support the National Popular Vote bill.

    The National Popular Vote bill would guarantee the Presidency to the candidate who receives the most popular votes in all 50 states (and DC). The bill would take effect only when enacted, in identical form, by states possessing a majority of the electoral votes—that is, enough electoral votes to elect a President (270 of 538). When the bill comes into effect, all the electoral votes from those states would be awarded to the presidential candidate who receives the most popular votes in all 50 states (and DC).

    The National Popular Vote bill has been approved by 20 legislative chambers (one house in Colorado, Arkansas, Maine, Massachusetts, North Carolina, and Washington, and two houses in Maryland, Illinois, Hawaii, California, New Jersey, Rhode Island, and Vermont). It has been enacted into law in Hawaii, Illinois, New Jersey, and Maryland. These states have 50 (19%) of the 270 electoral votes needed to bring this legislation into effect.

    see http://www.NationalPopularVote.com

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