Electoral Polls
Update: for those of you looking for electoral vote maps showing recent polling information, two reasonable ones (as far as such things can be reasonable) can be found at electoral-vote.com and RealClearPolitics.com. USElectionAtlas.org has some good electoral vote map stuff as well.
Other new poll information coming in now, this one from Zogby, published in the Wall Street Journal in a very nicely done Flash page.
The poll covers 16 battleground states and includes Nader in the poll. Even so, Kerry stands out markedly well. Of the states listed, Bush leads in only four: Iowa, Arkansas, Tennessee and West Virginia. In two of the four states–Tennessee and West Virginia–Bush’s lead is only within the margin of error.
In contrast, Kerry leads in the other 13 battleground states (Florida, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Mexico, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Washington and Wisconsin), with only three of those (Florida, Missouri and Nevada) being within the margin of error. In all other states, Kerry has leads of up to 9.6%.
According to the count made by Daily Kos (who keep good track of polling info), if the election were held today, Kerry would win the electoral college by 102 electoral votes, 320-218. Even this conservative guy has Kerry winning by an even larger margin, though he points out in his blog that Dukakis was leading by more at this time (though he ignores the fact that Bush Sr. was not an incumbent then and was not post-war).
While Kerry holds only a few percentage points’ lead in national polls, it has always been the case that the electoral situation has favored Kerry, as Bush’s lead is much bolstered by a very large (and useless) concentration of support in “red” states, whereas Kerry’s support is more broad.
Webmaster –
Great posting. This recent spate of polls reminded me of a graphic I think you shared with us earlier — W’s constantly-falling approval ratings, interrupted only by two upward spikes (9-11 and the invasion of Iraq). Has this graphic been updated? Can I find it on blogD?
Check out this post:
http://www.blogd.com/archives/000473.html
…and this site:
http://www.pollkatz.homestead.com/
…and I think you want his chart:
http://www.pollkatz.homestead.com/files/pollkatzmainGRAPHICS_8911_image001.gif
I might even blog on this soon, I guess…
…though he ignores the fact that Bush Sr. was not an incumbent then and was not post-war…
Correction: not post-war, rather in the midst of an ongoing war! Which makes those poll numbers look especially bad for Bush!
If I’m not mistaken, the first Gulf War ended in early March 1991, and the election took place a year and a half later. Are you referring to a different war? Somalia didn’t start until December, a month and a half after the election.
True, it was technicallly ‘post-war’ in that it was in the wake of Iraq I, but the aftermath was non-combat or -occupation based, so I don’t count it as being the same.
Also remember that mid-war is good for the president–you get a boost from patriotism & support for the troops. Which has always made me a bit nervous about what is coming up. If, as predicted, a terrorist attack hits the U.S. in say, late summer or early Fall, Bush might have an excuse to start another mini-war and drape himself in the flag, and to scare the bejeezus out of the people. There are almost too many October Surprise possibilities out there to imagine that Bush won’t try one or more.
The fact that in spite of the recovering but still poor economy, war disasters, the 9/11 report, etc, Bush and Kerry are still in a dead heat in the 2 states that wil swing this election – Ohio and Florida. It just doesnt bode well for Kerry. Kerry should be far far ahead in all those polls, and yet is at best 1-2 points ahead, whcih is inside the margin of error for the polls.
If the best Kerry can do is a tie, with all the stuff going against Bush, then what will happen to him if things continue to improve? As noted Dukakis was well ahead of Bush the Elder at this point as well, and that was without the help of all the negatives piled up against the current Bush.
The problem is the nature of the Kerry vote: in the polls reporting, especially in key states like Florida, Ohio and Pennsylvania, the Kerry vote breaks 60-40 For the candidate-against the opponent. The Bush voters usually break 80-20 for/against. Basically, Bush’s people are more comitted to him and his policies than are Kerry’s. They worrisome part for Democrats is that the percentage is so large for “Anti” voters in Kerry.
“Anti” sentiments are notoriously fickle – historically they point to a fade in the weeks after the convention, when the focus neccesarily turns to policy. And that is where the recovering economy will really help Bush, plus the inadvertent timing of the 2 conventions and the Olympics between them. Also, ther “break ahead” point for Jobs is supposed to come by late summer, giving Bush a net “add” of jobs during his term, taking away one of Kerry’s major campaign weapons.
Plus the current efforts of the Republicans and conservative commentators have already laid in the “Kerry Flip Flop” image, much aided by Kerry’s own words (still cringing over “Voted for it before I voted against it” – Kerry really put his foot in it there).
Add to that the Republican ability to use their large coffers of primary funds until Early September (think expensive adds during the Olympics), while Kerry is stuck using his limited federal funds from July 26 onward. and August could be a very very hard month for Kerry. Outspent, out advertized, overshadowed by the Olympics, losing his ability to club Bush with the economy/jobs, and with the typical “End of SUmmer” stock market rally at the end of August leading up to the Republican convention.
Combine all these with the breakdown of the voters For/Against in each candidates block, and this could spell an electoral meltdown in August for Kerry, which would be accelerated by Nader campaining to pick up the disaffected votes.
Thats the big problem – unless Kerry can come up with policies that people believe in (and escape his very liberal voting record in the Senate — which will work against him in non-liberal key states like Penn and Ohio), the “Anti-Bush” votes will bleed off to Nader – and it only takes 2% of the “Anti Bush” votes to leave Kerry for Nader to swing the election completely to Bush (or to simply not vote, which is the usual dropoff in “anger” motivated votes).
Were I to run things, I’d simply let the presidential campaign flounder, and set up for 2008. Democrats should not want the Presidency over the next 4 years: the war on terror will be bloody and whoever is in will get the balme – and if its a Kerry, the whole Dem party will be used as a whipping boy and suffer (Remember Jimmy Carter?).
I’d concentrate on the trying to win the Senate this election, and picking up seats in the House to make a run at pulling within 2-3 seats in 2006, and then setting up for a majority of the whole Congress in 2008, which woudl help elect a Democrat President.
Think about it: assuming Bush is reelected, by the time 2008 gets here, either Bush will have screwed things up to the point where there will be a Dem landslide, or messed around and left a festering problem that will spill over in blame for Republicans for “failing to win decisively”, or he will have done so well that the threat is gone. In all of those cases case, Cheney will not run as a presidential candidate, so there will be no Republican incumbent and at worst a neutral political situation, and quite possibly a very favorable situation for a Democrat candidate.
Think of it this way: Bush does a “Reagan (vs Communism)” on terroism, that means the Democrat can run on “Its time to move on from war to social issues”. Bush fouls it up “We need a new leadership – Bush/Republicans lost the war”. Bush neither wins nor loses “The Republicans have had 8 years and have not finished things off – time for a change!”.
So I’d say throw Kerry to the wolves. Reload for a full Democratic sweep in 2008, and regain parts of the Congress in 04 and 06.