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Poll: Obama Holds Double-Digit Lead In Battleground States
Still more stunning numbers in the new NPR poll, which is the final poll of the Presidential race by the Dem firm of Greenberg Quinlan Rosner:
* Obama holds a double-digit lead -- 11 points -- in the 15 core battleground states. To put this in perspective, the pollsters note, Bush won these states by 4 points in 2004.
* Obama leads by 12 among battleground state independents.
* Obama is leading among battleground state Catholics.
Perhaps the most important finding is this one:
McCain made a decision to contest "change" and devalue "experience" and "national security." That was a costly choice, as change has become dominant over experience by two-to-one as a voting criteria and "keeping the country safe" is proving no more important than the economy and reform in shaping people's vote.
In other words, McCain's efforts to reshape the race to his advantage have proven a complete failure.
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Polls like this one and yesterday's on rural voters are interesting but a little infuriating--would it kill them to give a state-by-state breakdown?
October 24, 2008 11:32 AM | Reply | Permalink
How many days left - 11? 10?
McLame doesn't have any time left to do shit but lose.
October 24, 2008 11:33 AM | Reply | Permalink
I note that Sarah Palin's sole appearance today is at a Bass Pro Shop.
October 24, 2008 11:37 AM | Reply | Permalink
Well, here in CT, there's a 30 second ad highlighting Sarah Palin--it's ALL Sarah Palin--with no mention of McCain. None. The end line: Help defeat Barack Obama.
Sarah Palin may tell Brian Williams that she isn't thinking about "furthering" her political career, but some outside political group obviously has other plans.
The ad is showing on the Fox cable channel.
October 24, 2008 11:43 AM | Reply | Permalink
O I think her backers are in the process of trying to turn her into their savior - she's backed by Dobson and the rest of the RR because she's extreme anti-choice.
I believe at this juncture she is no longer campaigning for McLame.
You're right - she's campaigning for herself and she's blown that, too. You can't be a KitchenTable with the Folks Back Home Sittin populist in a goddamn $2500 Valentino jacket.
October 24, 2008 11:45 AM | Reply | Permalink
Rachel Maddow made that point a couple of nights ago, also, and I wasn't sure that I was sold on it. I'm becoming more so now, but I still don't think that SP is more than a "heat of the moment" kind of love for the Repugs. This campaign's one-night-stand, so to speak. . .
October 24, 2008 11:53 AM | Reply | Permalink
I can buy that, too, since she's headed nowhere.
Actually she and Todd and that litter of theirs are headed to obscurity in a trailer park.
October 24, 2008 11:59 AM | Reply | Permalink
Ha!
October 24, 2008 12:01 PM | Reply | Permalink
It's almost noon on Friday. The amount of time left for McCain to change the story and really start driving his umbers up is minimal. I think the only way for McCain to pull out the win is for some external event to radially alter the race. Given the prevalence of early voting, the campaigns' reaction to the last crisis and the polling showing which candidates voters see as a steady leader, a n international or domestic crisis might not even be enough to rescue McCain.
October 24, 2008 11:39 AM | Reply | Permalink
I note that Sarah Palin's sole appearance today is at a Bass Pro Shop.
October 24, 2008 11:39 AM | Reply | Permalink
We all know Repubs are prone to grouper-think.
October 24, 2008 11:47 AM | Reply | Permalink
What a crappie thing to say.
October 24, 2008 12:33 PM | Reply | Permalink
the barracuda is being oportunaistic
October 24, 2008 12:45 PM | Reply | Permalink
It's almost noon on Friday. The amount of time left for McCain to change the story and really start driving his umbers up is minimal. I think the only way for McCain to pull out the win is for some external event to radially alter the race. Given the prevalence of early voting, the campaigns' reaction to the last crisis and the polling showing which candidates voters see as a steady leader, a n international or domestic crisis might not even be enough to rescue McCain.
October 24, 2008 11:40 AM | Reply | Permalink
No no, McCain has us riiiight where he wants us.
October 24, 2008 11:42 AM | Reply | Permalink
DANGER WILL ROBINSON!!! (Okay, I'm a total nerd)
New Hampshire. New Hampshire. New Hampshire.
I'm as excited and confident as the next Obama supporter, but we need to avoid complacency. The minute that someone says, "It's all over!" is the minute that McCain wins this thing.
No offense Tena. :)
http://thepajamapundit.com/
October 24, 2008 11:43 AM | Reply | Permalink
Being confident and complacent are not the same thing.
No one is packing up shop and waiting until Nov. 4th.
October 24, 2008 11:46 AM | Reply | Permalink
Thank you!
I'm to the point where I'm getting way tired of having cold water dumped on me every time I dare to get confident.
It's getting old - NO ONE IS GOING TO SKIP VOTING THIS TIME.
October 24, 2008 12:47 PM | Reply | Permalink
Cept Ms. HTX voted in Texas instead of NM.
October 24, 2008 1:15 PM | Reply | Permalink
Even when he still had plenty of time, he impatiently, impulsively, haphazardly, and abruptly tried to change narratives. And did so so many times none of them stuck. And every single time he tried to change narratives, his judgment was called into question.
Crappy he is, and his campaign is.
October 24, 2008 11:48 AM | Reply | Permalink
And anything different that McCain tries to do now will only reinforce the notion that he's been erratic, lurching from one tactic to another. So only some external event can change the dynamic -- and it can't be the markets or the economy, since Barack has the edge there.
October 24, 2008 12:07 PM | Reply | Permalink
McCain made a decision to contest "change" and devalue "experience" and "national security"
Hillary Clinton could have told him this wasn't a winning move.
http://pufferfish.typepad.com/
October 24, 2008 11:33 AM | Reply | Permalink
Can anyone at all believe McLame did that to himself? I am still stunned.
Just how impetuous and stupid is McLame?
October 24, 2008 11:35 AM | Reply | Permalink
Um, circumstantial evidence would lead me to conclude the answer to both of those character questions is: Very. What an ass.
October 24, 2008 11:39 AM | Reply | Permalink
It all starts with who he chose to run his campaign. It's almost like he pulled a Bush (didya see last night's SNL?) and let his surrogates run his campaign. And, no, I'm not defending him, it just seems to me what happened.
Considering how many people were coming in and out of the door at the beginning of his campaign, you'd think that they got everything squared away. Well, looks like they didn't.
I cannot wait to browse the books at the bookstore (I won't be buying them) about the McCain side of this campaign!
October 24, 2008 11:41 AM | Reply | Permalink
I think that McCain had pretty much all the cards stacked against him. I doubt there was anything he could have done to win this election. Bush really screwed the pooch, and the Republican brand is so bad they're getting their asses handed to them, not just in the Presidential election but in all the downticket races, too.
This was a change election from the beginning. In order to win the Republican nomination he had to abandon all his previous principles and embrace the Bush agenda. To then turn around and try to campaign on change introduces a level of cognitive dissonance that people just couldn't handle. People see him as four more years of Bush, and that's a losing strategy if ever there was one.
October 24, 2008 11:49 AM | Reply | Permalink
I disagree.
McCain could have started running last spring as a different kind of Republican. The maverick narrative was already cemented (no matter how wrongly) in people's minds. He just needed to build on that by distancing himself from Bush. He needed to take that chance of temporarily alienating his "base". They would have come back, because no matter their love for small government and no taxes, they love being in power more.
He did none of this. He pandered to the base instead. He sat by and watched Clinton and Obama duke it out until June 3rd. His campaign deeply underestimated how well-run the Obama campaign is, and how long range it turned out to be.
October 24, 2008 11:57 AM | Reply | Permalink
I totally agree and my biggest fear was that McLame would pick a moderate running mate and run to the middle.
God he couldn't be more pathetic if he tried - he did the one thing I thought would guarantee a loss - he did it.
I still can't believe it.
October 24, 2008 12:01 PM | Reply | Permalink
Last fall, when McCain's campaign was foundering, I was delighted, because I felt that he was the only Republican who could give whoever the Democrat was a run for their money.
That "maverick" narrative was so deep and permanent that I was convinced that McCain was going to be the toughest candidate.
I was hoodwinked by it, obviously, because his campaign has revealed that he's been completely incapable of choosing the right staff members. He apparently didn't pay enough attention to that campaign aide who announced that he would step aside if Obama were the nominee, because he didn't want to be part of a campaign tearing him down. What more of a sign did McCain fucking need that Obama wasn't going to be a typical opponent?
The fish rots from the head down, right? All those pundits out there saying that this isn't the real McCain are completely missing the point. Of course it's the real McCain.
October 24, 2008 12:10 PM | Reply | Permalink
O yeah it's the real McLame. Hell yeah.
He apparently didn't pay enough attention to that campaign aide who announced that he would step aside if Obama were the nominee, because he didn't want to be part of a campaign tearing him down. What more of a sign did McCain fucking need that Obama wasn't going to be a typical opponent?
All I can say is that McLame is stupider than I thought he was and thank god.
;)
October 24, 2008 12:13 PM | Reply | Permalink
You mean someone like Traitor Joe? That's who McCain wanted, but it was vetoed by the party muckety-mucks. I don't think McCain could have tacked to the center. He' already sold out all his previous positions to appeal to the Republican base. To sell them out again would have been too much. He'd made his bed and now he had to sleep in it. But when you lie down with the dogs you wake up with fleas.
Besides, as I said before, Bush had so badly damaged the Republican brand that I don't think anyone could have won with an R after his name. They're getting swept away all across the country.
October 24, 2008 12:19 PM | Reply | Permalink
Hey! Fewer of the flea comments, OK? :-)
October 24, 2008 1:03 PM | Reply | Permalink
I have to agree with the Tuxedo Cat from CT on this one.
October 24, 2008 12:00 PM | Reply | Permalink
Yeah, I'll throw down on that as well. He would have been better served as playing the role of happy warrior. Then again, he also would have been better served playing the role of competent leader. There's lots of Fail to spread around.
October 24, 2008 12:06 PM | Reply | Permalink
This, to me, is the eye-opening part of his campaign. I thought the choice of Palin was strange, but could have worked, perhaps. The choice to "suspend" his campaign, to almost skip the debate, to fly back to WAshington?
That's just plain fucking strange.
Excuse my language, but sometimes, you just got to call it the way it is.
October 24, 2008 12:17 PM | Reply | Permalink
Today is Pete's (Pete = my avatar) birthday. 11 years old.
October 24, 2008 12:13 PM | Reply | Permalink
Yay! My rabbit turns 7 this month.
October 24, 2008 12:46 PM | Reply | Permalink
Happy Birthday, Pete!
'Have a mousie on me.
;)
October 24, 2008 12:49 PM | Reply | Permalink
Many happy returns of the day, Pete!
October 24, 2008 1:01 PM | Reply | Permalink
The quote has some pretty obvious points. Of course
People care most about being comfortable, safe, having a home, having prospects of a better future, etc. "National security" or "Terrorism" is a one-trick pony.October 24, 2008 11:35 AM | Reply | Permalink
True, but it was the Repugs outstanding one trick pony. They already had that idea planted in people's minds - that the
Repugs are the national security party and he threw it away. Just wadded it up and threw it away.
This has to go down in history as the worst campaign ever.
October 24, 2008 11:39 AM | Reply | Permalink
You know, you are right. It's like being greatest in the world at basketball and deciding you want to play minor league baseball.
October 24, 2008 11:45 AM | Reply | Permalink
Oh, SNARK!
MJ? I think some anonymous commenter on Election Central just totally dissed you.
October 24, 2008 12:00 PM | Reply | Permalink
Don't be dissin' those Chicago boys!
October 24, 2008 12:04 PM | Reply | Permalink
Here a are a few stories which are great news for McWar
McWar met with Pinochet in 1985
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/john-dinges/mccain-meets-a-bloody-dic_b_137422.html
Georgia - Chambliss might be in trouble. In any case, another good story
http://savannahnow.com/node/601042
And of course, Caribou Barbie is testifying today with her husband under oath...
and she is denying the fact that repubs bought clothe for her...
October 24, 2008 11:37 AM | Reply | Permalink
IS THIS
October 24, 2008 11:39 AM | Reply | Permalink
GREAT NEWS
October 24, 2008 11:51 AM | Reply | Permalink
FOR
October 24, 2008 11:54 AM | Reply | Permalink
EARTH!!!
October 24, 2008 12:04 PM | Reply | Permalink
October Surprise Explained:
http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/talk/blogs/therap/2008/10/october-surprise-its-viral.php
October 24, 2008 11:41 AM | Reply | Permalink
LOL! Beware the Obama strain, its virulence enhanced by increasingly unfavorable conditions for those "protected".
October 24, 2008 11:50 AM | Reply | Permalink
I love you to pieces, Thera - the October Surprise is the electorate.
Surprise!!!!!
We aren't so damn dumb and racist after all! This is the total reverse of NWA's 100 Miles and Running ending -
if you know the track, you know what I mean.
October 24, 2008 11:51 AM | Reply | Permalink
Isn't it interesting how the current economic crisis has focussed the electorate on ISSUES and it would appear they have given JM plenty of time to address them.
We're in South Florida working our butts off to make sure his last line of retreat is a line of florida voters casting their early votes for BO.
October 24, 2008 11:43 AM | Reply | Permalink
Looking at the lines in the early voting for Florida, I shudder to imagine what it would have been like on Nov 4th if there had been no early voting.
October 24, 2008 11:49 AM | Reply | Permalink
I saw somewhere last night that early voting in FL has been favoring the GOP.
October 24, 2008 11:52 AM | Reply | Permalink
Not sure where of your source
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=a.A1ueaDC_ek&refer=home
looks like it might be a GOP wish/desperation.
October 24, 2008 12:01 PM | Reply | Permalink
This calls for a Campaign Suspension!
October 24, 2008 11:49 AM | Reply | Permalink
...and yet another GOP ex-Governor, (William Weld-Mass.), comes out for Obama. The rats aren't just fleeing a sinking ship: they've reached the shore and started building a city...Obamaville.
October 24, 2008 11:50 AM | Reply | Permalink
God I love your comments, Jack.
October 24, 2008 11:55 AM | Reply | Permalink
And a new TV "tax calculator" ad!
http://firstread.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2008/10/24/1589028.aspx
October 24, 2008 11:50 AM | Reply | Permalink
Hey, you never know. Maybe the McClod campaign can parlay this screwball 'mugging' incident in Pittsburgh into a real 'Birth of a Nation' game-changer.
You know the drill: rile up all those not-so-latent racists out there with a simple-to-understand horror story about marauding Obama supporters on a rampage, assaulting the fair flower of Real America, etc. Maybe take a mortgage (or two) out and build a couple of spots around it to air in battleground states.
What else have they got at this point?
October 24, 2008 11:55 AM | Reply | Permalink
If they're going to rely on a lying little psycho who is desperate for attention, then they're going to get what they deserve.
She's a bigger phony than Joe the Plumber.
October 24, 2008 11:57 AM | Reply | Permalink
Off topic, but I could use some feedback. I read this head-scratcher in the NY Times this a.m. Apparently Obama's fun-raising fell off dramatically in the first two weeks of this month, bringing in a "paltry" $36m. The result -- surprise! -- is summarized as follows:
"All told, counting money still left in the coffers of the joint fund-raising committees, it appears that the McCain campaign and the R.N.C. actually had a similar amount left in the bank as the Obama campaign and the D.N.C. — nearly $100 million each — for the final few weeks of the campaign."
This means that McCain and R.N.C. can now dump cash on battlegrounds in amounts that equal Obama and D.N.C.. I thought Obama/DNC was supposed to be way way way ahead McCain/RNC. What gives?
Also, why are the campaigns already reporting their October earnings. Is fund-raising essentially over now? Can the campaigns not continue to raise money right up to election day?
October 24, 2008 12:03 PM | Reply | Permalink
Probably because they aren't right. They have been wrong all year about Obama fundraising.
October 24, 2008 12:36 PM | Reply | Permalink
From today's LA Times:
95 million (plus the haul from the separate committee, which was, I believe, 27 million) vs 84 million. They aren't close.
But go donate, ok?
October 24, 2008 12:49 PM | Reply | Permalink
Oh god. Since it's an NPR poll, let's hope they didn't poll just NPR users.
October 24, 2008 12:21 PM | Reply | Permalink
Nobody seems to have polled Arizona in quite a while. I wonder...
October 24, 2008 12:35 PM | Reply | Permalink
n regard to "McCain did this to himself" I don't really think that's true. The reality is he became a puppet, even though he hated what happened to him in 2000, the team that did it to him won the election. All he wants is to be President. He will say anything and do anything as long as someone in the room will say, "no, no this time John, this will work" Suspend the campaign, go turbo negative over and over, make stupid jokes, bring Palin on, work the Joe the (insert occupation) Spend Spend in PA, call Obama a socialist, wealth distribution, rinse and repeat, change the theme, all of these things have failed to get traction. I'd say he has mismanaged his team, but I don't think he has managed anything, he is a puppet, anyone could have been the candidate for that election team and they would be in the same spot. Poor execution, Poor ideas, Poor strategy. Unless you're a Jesus Freak or Pat or Bay Buchannan if that's where you fall then it's been the finest campaign ever run, and Mc could win if not for the economy....whatever...Please go away McCain/Palin...You're story has become tiresome..
October 24, 2008 12:39 PM | Reply | Permalink
The McCain/Palin campaign should become a musical.
Hell, an opera.
October 24, 2008 12:43 PM | Reply | Permalink
Does anyone know anything about the Strategic Vision poll that has McCain up by 1 in OH? Is it an outlier or an outliar?
October 24, 2008 12:55 PM | Reply | Permalink
he is a puppet, anyone could have been the candidate for that election team and they would be in the same spot.
Not if the candidate had grown some balls, they wouldn't.
October 24, 2008 1:06 PM | Reply | Permalink
Point taken, and I agree. But to follow the strategy that his election team cobbled together, regardless of the candidate you'd find the candidate in the same spot. Also, based on a tremendous amount of ignorance and fear from a large group of people, the Republicans could be runnning a can of soup and a mop and in some parts of the country it would be leading in the polls.
October 24, 2008 3:27 PM | Reply | Permalink
McCain did this to himself because he wanted to be president for no other reason than he was never going to make Rear Admiral, and having been a representative and Senate he was still one promotion short. Yet, really there are no mysteries to why he has run this campaign so poorly. Throughout his life he has confused tactics for strategy. Making your political debut in a safe Republican district flush with cash from your new father-in-law is a tactic, as is setting yourself up to run for Senate in a safe Republican state a few years later. Is it interesting how only his presidential elections have put him in the position of being the underdog and how in both 2000 and now, he never saw beyond the immediate goal. In 2000 he put all his eggs into New Hampshire with apparently little thought to how his better organized opponent might stage a comeback, as if people in South Carolina vote Republican for the same reasons people in Arizona or New Hampshire do. This time round he got the tactics down to win the primaries but never gave a thought about how pivoting from running as a Bush lover in the primaries to running against Bush in the fall would test his credibility among all but the most ardent tire-swingers. And of course, even though anyone reading the Financial Times during the past two years would know that a serious financial disaster was a distinct possibility, McCain never took time to think how he might have to respond if the crisis happened either during the campaign or during his administration.
October 24, 2008 1:28 PM | Reply | Permalink
OK. Here's my "change is coming" mix. Most of these songs are available on itunes....
1. A Change Gonna Come Sista Monica Can't Keep a Good Woman Down
2. Let Us Rise In Love Sweet Honey In the Rock The Women Gather
3. Feeling Good Nina Simone Four Women: The Complete Nina Simone on Philips Recordings
4. Your Life Is Now John Mellencamp John Mellencamp
5. For What It's Worth (Shantel Remix) Sergio Mendes & Brasil '66 Boudoir Beats (Disc 2)
6. Justicia, Tierra, y Libertad - Maná w/Carlos Santana International Earth Rock
7. Groove Is In The Heart (Candy Coated Radio Mix) DSP Feat DEEJ Groove Is In The Heart
8. I Want To Take You Higher (w/ Steven Tyler with Robert Randolph) Sly & The Family Stone Different Strokes By Different Folks
9. The Stars Moby Last Night
10. This Little Light of Mine, Bruce Springsteen, Live In Dublin
11. The Times They Are a Changin' (Live) Peter, Paul And Mary The Very Best of Peter, Paul and Mary
12. He Lives In You (Reprise) Ensemble - The Lion King, Jason Raize & Tsidii Le Loka The Lion King (Original Broadway Cast Recording)
13. Healing The Divide - Diamond In Your Mind Tom Waits Healing The Divide - Diamond In Your Mind
14. All You Need Is Love Dana Fuchs & Jim Sturgess Across the Universe (Music from the Motion Picture) [Deluxe Edition]
October 25, 2008 12:55 PM | Reply | Permalink