Zogby: Obama's Lead Steady In North Carolina, Indiana Undecideds Could Break For Hillary
The latest Zogby tracking poll shows Barack Obama's lead in North Carolina holding steady in the high single digits, and unlike other pollsters also gives Obama a narrow but shaky edge in Indiana.
The numbers, compared to yesterday:
North Carolina
Obama 48% (+0)
Clinton 40% (+1)Sample size: 624 likely primary voters, weighted for region, age, race and gender.
Margin of error: ±4.0%Indiana
Obama 44% (+1)
Clinton 42% (+1)Sample size: 636 likely primary voters, weighted for region, age, race and gender.
Margin of error: ±4.0%
From the pollster's analysis: "While Obama holds a small edge in Indiana, Clinton appears to hold at least a small advantage among those who are yet undecided. Among those undecided Indiana voters who said they were leaning toward one candidate or the other, Clinton held an edge."
Can't they just vote already. All these polls give me a headache.
May 5, 2008 8:43 AM | Reply | Permalink
I know. I just want the vote over with (in Obama's favor of course). I expect that Hillary will eke out a win in Indiana and Obama will eke out a win in NC and the delegate proportion won't change that much and at the end of the day Obama will still be ahead, but the press will portray it as him losing ground.
May 5, 2008 10:34 AM | Reply | Permalink
No way. Hillery is going to win IN by 10 points, at least. And in NC she will win, just by the skin of her teeth. She said so herself. She's gonna win big tomorrow. Gotalife said so, too. And he has been right over and over and over again.
And you know why? Gas tax holiday. Lots of people drive, especially in NC and IN. They don't need elitists telling them about "supply and demand" and "what the market will bear". They know they want to save $45 over three months. And they will throw their lot in with Hillery. And people like holidays, especially ones that last all summer. Awesome.
Hillery is the only candidate that stands up for the little guy. She's not some multi-million $ elitist from an Ivy league law school, unlike Obama. She's just a downhome country gal who like herself some whiskey and drives around in an old pick-up truck. And she hates OJ. And has bowled a 300 four times, once at Tuzla Lanes. She has the credentials to answer phones at 3:00 AM like no one else.
May 5, 2008 12:31 PM | Reply | Permalink
This undecided voter going for Hillary is a real no-brainer.
Hillary's the known.
Obama's the unknown. And what about all those nasty rumors?
These voters however are not opposed to Obama and that's important because they are voters who will pretty easily switch allegiances to him in the general and have already proven they will go out and vote without having to be really motivated.
May 5, 2008 8:46 AM | Reply | Permalink
I don't know. Wright has died down as an issue. Obama comes off looking more serious on the Gas Tax Holiday question. He also comes off looking more Presidential when talking about Iran. Yesterday Clinton was shown to be a standard issue Washington panderer by a regular citizen asking a question on ABC. Most people think Hillary's position is a pander. On the other hand a lot of people are happy for the pander. Any help they can get is welcome. I am not sure how the undecideds are going to break.
May 5, 2008 8:58 AM | Reply | Permalink
I think there's a reason Hillary generally wins undecideds and it's because they can't make up their mind!
So, they fall back on the "easy" decision. I think way too much is made of the undecideds in the primary here.
May 5, 2008 9:28 AM | Reply | Permalink
Very true that's why I voted for Clinton in the Minnesota caucus. She was the easy choice, the devil I know. I was thrown for quite a loop after Edwards dropped out.
Now I know better- she's just the devil! Sounding way to much like Bush and acting like him too. No thanks to 12 years of Bushes, 8 to 16 years of Clintons.
Go Obama!
May 5, 2008 10:40 AM | Reply | Permalink
If they don't break at a large margin for Hillary, that will be surprising, as they tended to in a lot of other states.
May 5, 2008 10:06 AM | Reply | Permalink
A modest proposal: Randall Robinson, Cornel West, Charles Lawrence, and a bunch of other AA "intellectuals" argue on behaf of so-called "reparations" for AAs. I'd like to propose a similar concept: "repatriations." Let's assume that unlike other immigrant groups, nearly all AAs are net-net no gain at all to the economy. But let's further assume half of them are serious sources of costs i.e. prisons, crime, welfare, pointless "educational" expense. So that's maybe 20 million people. So the Us government offers these 20 million people, let's say 100k each, in return for giving up US citizenship and being repatriated to, say, Ghana. For a family of five i.e. mommy and five kids, half a million dollars is enough to live like royalty in Ghana. And for single thug-life guys, a 100k should be enough for plenty of "bitchez," as they so colorfully say. But for the U.S. the benefits would be well worth the increased taxes necessary to pay for this scheme. Imagine, lower crime, urban neighborhoods opened up for revitalization, make-believe colleges and academic departments could be shuttered. It would be almost an American renaissance.
and at a cost of 2 trillion dollars, the benefits would be overwhelmingly greater than the initial financial investment.
May 5, 2008 8:47 AM | Reply | Permalink
Ludmila,
You are a racist, aren't you? I haven't encountered a real racist in 10 or 15 years. I didn't know anybody like you still existed.
May 5, 2008 8:59 AM | Reply | Permalink
"You are a racist, aren't you?"
Ya think?
May 5, 2008 10:43 AM | Reply | Permalink
I don't get why you keep airing out these specifically white supremacist views in TPM, Milorad Buggeroff.
You seem to think that America would be better off without black people, and you are willing to spend 2 trillion dollars of taxpayer's money to make this wish come true.
So... run for office. Start a grassroots Pan-African party. I could even think up some slogans:
America: Love It or Be Paid to Leave It
Negroes Go Home!
Finally: A Proposition Both Farrakhan and David Duke WOuld Endorse!
You should hire Mark Penn... I hear he's looking for work.
May 5, 2008 9:01 AM | Reply | Permalink
Well, that's a little irrelevant to the topic at hand. How about responding to the original story?
May 5, 2008 10:09 AM | Reply | Permalink
TPM, you guys have to wake up and rid your pages of racists like this. "Go back to Africa"? Are you serious?
May 5, 2008 10:34 AM | Reply | Permalink
somebody is very lonely and wants attention....
May 5, 2008 10:41 AM | Reply | Permalink
i find your use of the word 'modest' interesting. perhaps we are overlooking what you really are, a comedic genius.
May 5, 2008 11:51 AM | Reply | Permalink
I will personally pay for your plane ticket "back to" Europe. I'm sure there are some kindly skinheads there that would love to take you in. You know that's where you really belong. Call me and let's make this happen.
May 5, 2008 12:39 PM | Reply | Permalink
If these numbers hold, victory becomes an impossibility unless he's caught with a live boy or a dead girl.
May 5, 2008 9:06 AM | Reply | Permalink
She has won late breakers by about 20% in PA and OH.
However, compared to the people polled, fewer later deciders will actually vote. If they're not decided at this point, I'm not sure they are serious about voting or interested.
GOTV will be key.
I think Obama might lose IN by 5 points or less. He'll probably win NC by a little more. Press will spin spin spin, mostly with coded racism that NC doesn't matter because too many blacks.
I hope he gets enough delegates to put him closer to clinching.
She can spin, but he will win.
May 5, 2008 9:24 AM | Reply | Permalink
Looking at all the polls this morning that it is pretty obvious a bunch of pollsters are going to look like fools tomorrow. Which ones? Hell, I don't know, but a bunch of them.
Wouldn't it be nice if TPM stopped with the polls already and returned to posting real news?
May 5, 2008 9:25 AM | Reply | Permalink
hear hear.
And a poll that does matter, the one in Texas, gets lost in this headlining of outliers frenzy.
May 5, 2008 9:36 AM | Reply | Permalink
I sure hope Zogby to be right this time but they have leaned Obama's way and been wrong in almost every race.
May 5, 2008 10:14 AM | Reply | Permalink
Steve Garrett - They were on the money in PA
May 5, 2008 10:25 AM | Reply | Permalink
Has anyone read Maureen Dowd's article this week? It seems like she has an increasing amount of hostility towards Barack Obama. Her columns come off as more and more racist. Everytime he does something or makes an appearence, she ascribes it to him trying to be less black and more white. I usually like her columns, but I cant even get through them anymore.
May 5, 2008 10:45 AM | Reply | Permalink
Yes, I have noticed this about Dowd also. I quit reading her columns and also Krugman. They have taken on a tone of negativity towards Obama (Krugman is just blatant) that I find offensive. I am sorry to say with Dowd I do think it is the "female" thing. So sad to see many women casting votes for HRC based on gender only.
May 5, 2008 10:55 AM | Reply | Permalink
Let's put this all in perspective, shall we? Indiana has not voted for a Democratic candidate in a presidential election since 1964. They are Republicans. That's why Hillary is running as a Republican there. She NEEDS the state. Obama does not.
May 5, 2008 10:45 AM | Reply | Permalink
With every super-delegate that votes against the popular trend, Obama comes off more and more as the elitist candidate of the Democratic powers-that-be and Clinton takes on more and more the allure of a genuine grassroots candidate. The French opted for the "guy in the slick suit with the slicker slogans". One year after electing Nicolas Sarkozy on a platform of "change" -- sound familiar -- 2/3 of the French disapprove of Sarkozy's government.
Closer to home, the state of Massachusetts got "axel-rodded" into voting in Patrick. That state went to Hillary. Wonder why?
Axelrod does not give post-electoral maintenance on the candidates he manipulates us into voting in. Keep your head. Resist the Glitz
May 5, 2008 11:02 AM | Reply | Permalink
"Why don't we hold these Wall Street money-grubbers responsible for their role in this recession?"
-- Hillary Clinton yesterday in Indiana
Given that she’s a Senator from New York—where Wall Street and its employees happen to be located –
her applause line above is more than a bit bizarre. And why do I hear echoes of anti-Semitism?
May 5, 2008 11:16 AM | Reply | Permalink
Doesn't Chelsea work on Wall Street?
May 5, 2008 12:04 PM | Reply | Permalink
I think you're stretching it a little on the anti-Semitism charge.
May 5, 2008 1:08 PM | Reply | Permalink
In light of Josh's earlier post regarding superdelegates, I guess it cannot be claimed that Hillary is stealing the election. But really that should come as no surprise. The superdelegates are a result of McGovern's landslide loss to Nixon in 72. So if a superdelegate thinks Obama cannot beat McCain in October, they can support another candidate. All HRC has to do is create the perception that Barrack cannot win the general. It seems Obama is doing all he can to help create the perception that he cannot win a general election. He helped to create this perception by gaming the system, going after caucuses, and red states full of people that hate the Clintons. He ignored the large blue states that a Dem needs to carry to win the general. It looks like he was too clever by half, and got caught in his own trap.
Maureen Dowd finds fault with everybody, she is an equal opportunity fault finder. Everybody dislikes her at some point.
I look forward to November and will happily vote for whomever my party nominates.
May 5, 2008 11:22 AM | Reply | Permalink
I find it strange for people to complain that Dowd is becoming hostile to Obama. Have you read her degrading and utterly shameless Hillary columns?
Paul Krugman is a realist.
May 5, 2008 11:35 AM | Reply | Permalink
Survey USA has Hillary up 12 points today in Indiana.
May 5, 2008 11:37 AM | Reply | Permalink
If they don't break at a large margin for Hillary, that will be surprising, as they tended to in a lot of other states.
This is a good point, and you can back it up with statistics.
The thing is, this time, there is the factor of hillary advocating the gas tax holiday----which is so monumentally stupid and revealing----that the usual break in undecideds might not go her way this time-----even Tim Russert---after filibustering for 25 minutes about reverend wright on Sunday---eventually got around to talking about it.
May 5, 2008 11:38 AM | Reply | Permalink
I understand that Dowd looks at politics through the lens of shared social constructs and cultural understandings, and she does that accross the board, but her most recent articles seem soley focused on Obama's race. She seeing race where there doesn't appear to be any, ie drinking beer to be more white. I have seen black people drink beer before.
In regards to Krugman, he has become Hiliary's little lap dog, probably angling for some cabinent position. What gets me is he doesn't even have the back bone to call out Clinton on her brilliant gas tax holiday, we have to wait for Thomas Friedman to do that.
May 5, 2008 11:44 AM | Reply | Permalink
After Sunday's column, I've written Dowd off. She seems obsessed with challenging Obama's manhood, and I agree - she acts like Black folks have never had a brew. One of the best writers on the editorial page of the best newspaper America has to offer is writing constantly about minutiae that isn't about shit. It's an insult to the intelligence of American readers.
But not as much as Hillary's gas-tax gimmick. (Krugman has actually come out on record against the idea, and Friedman already did so in one of the election season's best columns. Visit the NYT archive.)
May 5, 2008 11:57 AM | Reply | Permalink
Well, no, he has said it. He just added right after that he thought health care was more important.
May 5, 2008 1:11 PM | Reply | Permalink
Off topic, I know, but did anyone see this?
http://www.politico.com/blogs/bensmith/0508/Clinton_mailings_gun_gaffe.html
May 5, 2008 11:54 AM | Reply | Permalink
Has *anybody* done a poll with crosstabs for early voting in Indiana? I know a few of the polls have asked about early voting, but none seem to be tracking how early voting went. At least a few of the NC polls gave some indication (all seemed to be showing similar pictures, with different percentages of the sample coming from early voters - 2% of SUSA's recent samples, and something like 14% for PPP's). While I'm not trusting the polling coming out of either state, I am interested in the "early voting polling" as a kind of rough exit poll. I don't exactly trust it, either, but I do think it's more interesting than the daily ups and downs of the "likely" vote samples.
Somebody get me some early vote polls for IN, please! I'm going a little extra crazy here.
May 5, 2008 1:09 PM | Reply | Permalink
Ah, found it. Suffolk has very detailed crosstabs and finally a good track of some IN early votes (SUSA isn't doing as well in IN as NC with this). It actually looks like the "early vote" group cuts against the "likely vote" group a bit - maybe just more rabid Obamites, or maybe a sign of hope for the Obama camp? Of the early votes tracked there, it's split evenly. A very small sample, though. Another interesting feature of the Suffolk poll is that the early votes seem to be in the older (i.e., Clinton) demographics - another potentially good sign for Obama given that they're holding even. Still, the sample is too small and there have been far too few to draw much of a conclusion. But I feel better about these polls on the whole knowing that the early voting, at least, isn't showing a blow out for Clinton.
May 5, 2008 1:36 PM | Reply | Permalink