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(This article is by our renowned pollster Loren Collingwood) - Looking good in the Sunshine State. Looking real good
Excuse the horrible pun, but things are looking rather sunny for Barack Obama this week in Florida. Last week, NBC News released a poll showing Obama with a two-point lead (47-45 percent) in Florida. Of the polls released that week, it was the only one to show Obama with a lead. Indeed, the average at Real Clear Politics was McCain +2.1 points.
However, with the historic financial and political turmoil of the last couple weeks, the NBC poll was a positive portend for Obama. This week, nearly every poll released in the Sunshine state has Obama up, with his average at 3.0 points. Clearly, the economy has had an impact. But what exactly is going on in Florida, one of the few swing states Obama has been unable to gain traction in up until now? Below I discuss several topics that help explain the recent political shift.
(Join us in a couple hours as we break down election 2009 - promoted by admin)
Today at 5:00 central time, (6 est, 3 pct) we will be on Blog Talk Radio for one hour with University of Washington Pollster Loren Collingwood. Join us as we discuss R 71, Maine, NY-23, The teabaggers and moderate rift in GOP, Virginia , New Jersey and what's in store for 2010. Bring your questions.
Our pollster ,Loren Collingwood, was quoted in a Huffington Post article about Suburban Politics Changing in the Cradle of the Confederacy.
I call him our pollster, even though he officially belongs to the University of Washington.
Loren said that
"Virginia is turning into a new Illinois: "Both states are characterized by, on the one hand, heavily populated urban cores (Northern Virginia and Chicago, respectively) that lean Democratic, and on the other hand downstate rural counties that tend to vote Republican" -- with the votes of the former increasingly swamping the latter
Tomorrow we will be hosting another segment of The Progressive Electorate Blog Talk Radio . Click the icon below to listen and call-in tomorrow with your questions and comments. We have a great show planned with an hour long dialogue and discussion with pollster, Loren Collingwood, from the University of Washington.
We are going to be talking at length about the U.S. Senate race in Texas between Rick Noriega and John Cornyn. Please click on this diary at Burnt Orange Report for more information on a recent poll that shows Noriega within six points.
Note than Cornyn and also embattled Rep. Michele Bachman made Esquire Magazine's worst of the worst in Congress alongside Dem's Joe Lieberman and William Jefferson. We will also talk a little about Michele Bachman and her comments and as a result diminishing chances of returning to Congress.
(Remember the show is tomorrow morning - promoted by admin)
Josh Segall (AL-03) will also be joining us. We have just confirmed there are some very promising polls out that show him trailing Mike Rogers by single digits.
This Sunday we have another great lineup including Glenn Melancon (TX-04) and Mooncat from Left in Alabama to talk Alabama politics. Loren Collingwood will also be joining us to talk about some polling in the Presidential Race and the Georgia and Kentucky Senate races.
Glenn Melancon of Sherman is the Democratic candidate in Texas' 4th Congressional District. The district includes Bowie, Camp, Cass, Collin, Delta, Fannin, Franklin, Grayson, Hopkins, Hunt, Lamar, Morris, Rains, Red River, Rockwall and Titus counties. He is running against Republican Ralph Hall who is the oldest member of the House of Representatives and just changed parties in 2004 at the age of 81.
We have three very special guests confirmed for the show:
1. from 11:15-11:30 - Charles James - former Acorn Political Organizer; principal in WinJam Consulting Group; fundraiser - Charles will discuss minority and youth voter turnout and participation.
2. from 11:30 to 12:00 - Rev. Kenneth Glasgow of the Tops Society will discuss Inmate Voter Registration and efforts to halt this process;
3. from 12:00 - 12:30 - Loren Collingwood - University of Washington Pollster - Loren was our guest last week. This week he will discuss Pennsylvania and Florida having special importance as swing states.
(Update - This diary has been a big hit. Hopefully we will have some more analysis from Loren soon)
(A very insightful diary by Loren Collingwood - A very knowledgeable pollster - Loren has agreed to give us some analysis on the Presidential Race and hot Congressional races this cycle. ) - promoted by admin)
As most of you have probably seen by now, the most recent USA Today/Gallup poll of national likely voters has McCain up ten points over Obama. This comes as an unwelcome jolt to Democrats who up until the Republican convention had been cruising in front basically all summer. But this poll is likely a reflection of temporary Republican enthusiasm in a "hot election environment" as Frank Newport of Gallup would say, and not the actual long-term state of the race.
Unlike other polling firms, Gallup weights their data-in addition to demographic parameters-by voting interest or enthusiasm. Last week, 42% of Republicans were "enthused" about McCain; now 60% of GOP'ers are. This simply means that your average Republican respondent will be weighted higher in Gallup's survey than before, and therefore McCain's vote will be higher. The assumption that Gallup is making is that if you say you are very enthused you are more likely to vote than if you say you are somewhat enthused. While this is probably true to some degree, to assume this new Republican enthusiasm will hold up for the rest of the campaign could be spurious. While Gallup has arguably legitimate reasons for weighting on enthusiasm, I prefer weighting schemes that look more at long-term trends and known demographics patterns than temporal shifts in motivation.
I would really like to see the party identification composition of this poll. It may be available on the web somewhere, but I have not seen it yet. My hunch is though, that there are more Republicans in this survey than in other recently released polls, where Democrats maintain about an eight point identification advantage. As I hinted at above, the real question is-if Republicans do now indeed compose a greater share of the electorate-whether this increase is sustainable until Election Day? Probably not. The Obama campaign has more money, a better ground game, have registered more voters this cycle, is used to coming from behind and closing hard, and sooner or later this Palin excitement will likely attenuate.
What this really means
The actual state of the race-insofar as it is measured by estimating the vote not momentary blips in public opinion-is more likely reflected in other recently released polls. To be sure, McCain has received a bounce, somewhere in the neighborhood of six points. But his lead is narrower than the USA Today/Gallup poll. McCain leads by two in both the CBS News and ABC News polls, and is tied in both the most recent CNN and Rasmussen polls. Link to all these polls at Talking Points Memo
My Conclusion
A couple of weeks ago, Obama seemed to have this race wrapped up. But this is politics and this country is still highly polarized from the Bush years. At this point, at least, it is unreasonable to prognosticate an Obama blowout. This remains anyone's race to win.
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