Obama now up five in Rasmussen and six in Gallup....
(I don't intend to blog about polls every day until November but this does seem an especially interesting/important moment....)
--Michael Crowley
Posted: Friday, July 25, 2008 1:28 PM with 23 comment(s)
"I don't intend to blog about polls every day until November ..."
the road to hell is paved with good intentions, and apparently the road to the whitehouse is going to be paved with crowley's poll-wonkery.
Michael --
Important to note that Gallup's a day behind in their Daily Tracking poll. The poll they released today is actually dated July 24, and was taken July 23, so before Obama's Berlin speech. Rasmussen's poll was taken last night, and states that 50% of respondents had seen coverage of the speech. So while they show similar leads, the Gallup poll is a full day older, and pre-Berlin.
Also, Gallup has the lead at 2% without leaners; presumably Obama's lead increases to 6% when people are forced to make a decision. Rasmussen, meanwhile, has his lead at 5% both with and without leaners.
"this does seem an especially interesting/important moment"
Interesting perhaps, because of course a bowl of tofu could be interesting to some people. But important? N'exagerons pas.
Hmmm... sacrificing 9 days of domestic campaigning in return for... making up the support you lost by sacrificing 9 days of domestic campaigning. I'm not dismissing his trip yet -- if these tracking polls are averaged over a few days, then we probably haven't seen the extent of his "Euro" bounce yet -- but color me underwhelmed so far.
I suppose it's valuable for him that the RNC's Obama Iraq ticker is now obsolete, but he didn't need to take off over a week to do so.
Perhaps this will cut down on the concern trolling that's plagued every other post around here.
Le snore.
Jgerbs711,
Micheal posted an old link. Obama is up by 6 in Today's Gallup tracking poll, and is based on data from July 22-24.
Today's poll:
www.gallup.com/.../Gallup-Daily-Obama-There-Europe-Effect.aspx
Must have been a big, big night for Obama with such a quick move in one day. We'll see if this holds up over a couple days. If it is, it's as important as the polls which showed a McCain boost over the last two weeks, which eventually worked themselves through to the state polling.
Primwallflow, most of Obama's decline occurred before his trip. In my opinion it was due to the flip-flopper charges, the arrogance meme started by Rove, and a lot of people reverting to undecided and taking the summer off after the post-nomination bounce (McCain only picked up about half of the support that Obama bled over this period).
Looking at the 3 day gallup poll for the last month. McCain has been within the range of 41-44 and Obama within the range of 45-48 every day without fail. 47-41 just seems to be at the opposite ends of their margin of error. Wake me up when something interesting happens in the polls.
I think what's happened is that the "Obama Walks On Water" story has run its course, replaced in large part by the "Media Say Obama Walk On Water" story, which gave way to the "Media Overly Fawning" story, essentially a placeholder until the "Voters Sour On Obama After Media Fawning" story, which preceded the "Obama Victim Of Media Overkill" story, just before the "Obama Down" story, which led naturally to the "Obama Down...But Not Out" story, a nice prologue to the "Obama Regroups" story, triggering the inevitable "Obama Somehow Perseveres, Despite All Odds" story, setting the table for the "Obama Rises Phoenix-Like From The Ashes" story, antecedent to the "Obama's Success A Triumph Of The Will" story, culminating most recently in the "Obama's 'New Politics' Leave Media In The Dust" story.
Which only proves that the great thing about writing speculative fiction is that one is limited only by one's imagination, or in this case the media's imagination. And that all of the above stories sprung in sequence from the media's collective imagination during less time than it would take Obama to read one chapter in Stephen Hawking's "A Brief History of Time."
I followed the link and the only absolute I perceived over the 21 day track was Obama did not go below 44 (his high is 48) and McCain did not go above 44 (his low is 41). No, I don't think 21 days of poll which I find suspect mean much. But the range referred to by liamvt would produce a 3-5 point margin in the popular vote which at the +5 end would be a killer.
So...could one at least admit a 50 state strategy is keeping Obama ahead and with a wall that McCain can't crack for a single day in the national polls even though from state to state each guy has been more fluid?
Bad news? I did check breakouts for 55-65+. We might hope for an early pneumonia season. Yep, Johnny has 50+ and up to 55+ in sixty-five and older. The exit of Hillary didn't send them to Barack & I need a reason to consider them movable. I do not have the raw numbers in that (shrinking) demo but what is the best Plan B for securing a majority without a big slice of those reliable voters? Is more younger, a load of new voters the only fall back or can the lower end of the aging folks be dragged in? The better news is Tammy is prolly right that they are more sure so McCain can't poach even more from the sick bed.
But I'm still worried that Obama has leads of less than 5 in states that were decided in the last two cycles by less than 5...Yet the unsure number is still double digits up to the mid-teens. Until I see the unsure flow into Obama's numbers I won't rest with a five point lead and 10 points up for grabs. Again, McCain may not pick up the strays in the 65+ demo but he's already killing, there.
ITA liamvt. These daily tracking polls are so volatile and unreliable... a few students go backpacking in Yosemite for the weekend and suddenly it appears as if Obama's toast. The reverse could easily be happening here.
What's striking about the polling is how since Obama won the nomination, he and McCain have moved more or less lockstep with one another with a 4 or 5 point gap separating them:
www.realclearpolitics.com/.../general_election_mccain_vs_obama-225.html
I don't think the Euro trip will change these numbers directly... it was too inkblot to persuade many people already skeptical of Obama. I think it will, however, block future parries from McCain and the RNC, so it may in effect raise his polling floor.
Michael,
Back when I had a liver I would cap off a tough week with a screwdriver or five. But now what?
You, sir, have provided the answer, the dry drunk's grin-and-tonic as it were, with "We might hope for an early pneumonia season." Reading it I nearly lost sphincter control (nobody wants that).
That's the line of the week, and in the running for line of the month, it sez here.
-wy
You and Noam are very cute with this stuff, embarrassed every time you send out poll info because you know a bunch of us wil just give you the Bronx cheer, throw things at you.
Well I love the poll posts, every last nitty gritty one of them, the more useless the better - I always have. Just be out and proud Michael. Say: I love polls and don't care who knows it.
William, of your infinate number of brillant posts, the media trajectory one wins.
Seconded by the liver/screwdriver one. And then there's the other one...oh never mind. Love em all.
Yard -- Brilliant.
williamyard, thank-you and your sphincter too. I recall a human has 35-40 of those constrictors so if I can't relax one I have still have my work cut out. Eh, but not too bad from your end...depending on the sphincter.
michael, I will second (or fourth) thanking yard, but I think I will take a pass at his sphincter. What you choose to do with his sphincter (thank it or spank it) I don't really want to know.
blackie,
Back in the day, I could drink five screwdrivers, then say "sphincter spanking" five times.
Now, one and one, if I'm lucky.
[sigh]
Meanwhile, how the hell did we get on sphincter spanking? I mean, yeah, things fall apart, the centre cannot hold, mere anarchy is loosed upon the world, the blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere the ceremony of innocence is drowned, but this is ridiculous.
Yard, I suspect that your juxtaposition of lines from W.B. Yeats's poem "The Second Coming" and the phrase "sphincter spanking" was intended ironically, but are you aware that the Bard of Sligo himself once employed the phrase, albeit under a pseudonym?
Few are aware that William Butler Yeats was a keen aficionado of hot jazz and Memphis blues, so much so that, writing under the pseudonyms Black Willie Butler and Jake-Leg Bill, he penned lyrics to a number of raunchy blues numbers. Most of these songs were never recorded and are lost to time, but one such ditty, entitled "Sphincter Spankin' Momma" was recorded in 1927 by none other than Bessie Smith, Empress of the Blues. I have the 78 right in front of me now.
I wouldn't be surprised if the immediate post-trip bounce is small. But I still think the trip was important. The biggest thing most independents who are open to Obama but are sceptical, are concerned about, is whether this guy is ready to be president. And the visuals of the guy meeting with foreign leaders, and holding his own, I think will give people confidence. I don't know that it moves the numbers much in the short term, because many of these indi voters I'm talking about are the kind who won't commit early. But I think it gives people confidence such that a lot of people will move Obama's way late.
blackton & Wyard, I'll pass on any spanking. Sphincter or otherwise. But I do have a good start on a song. I'm naming it 'When I Had A Liver' but the melody is from 'Cry Me a River'.
However...if Mister Crowley saw any cable news on Friday night he'd not be backing away from his daily poll blogging. And if anyone was intoxicated it was everyone who had a show past 5P EST. Nothin' but a bunch o' poll drunks. Each network has at least one poll clip fired up (Ready To Go!) on their video machine.