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Bull Shift

By Robert Stacy McCain on 11.3.08 @ 11:36AM

Quin, I join Phil in the camp of dire pessimism. The "massive shift" took place between Sept. 16 and Oct. 2, the date Team Maverick effectively conceded defeat by pulling out of Michigan. McCain's endorsement of the bailout was the decisive event of the campaign. After the first debate (Sept. 26), the swing voters swung solidly to Obama, and any apparent motion in the polls since then has been a statistical mirage. The eight-point advantage Obama held in the Sept. 29 Gallup tracking poll is likely to be his final margin of victory -- call it 53%-45%.

Obama's popular vote margin will not be less than 5 points (52%-47%) although I doubt it will be as large as 54-44. Still, Obama will win a crushing Electoral College majority -- including Florida, Virginia, Ohio, Colorado and (obviously) Pennsylvania -- and easily exceed Bush's record 2004 total of 62 million votes, becoming the first Democrat to get a popular-vote majority since Jimmy Carter in 1976. (And we all know what a triumph the Carter administration proved to be.)

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Spicy Joker| 11.3.08 @ 1:05PM

Agreed. The irony is that the immigration policies that Republicans like McCain have championed are going to doom him in Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico, and maybe even his own home state. Hopefully, the "silver lining" in this election will the giant splash of cold water about to hit Republican Party in the face, but they don't call the Republican Party the Stupid Party for nothing.

J David| 11.3.08 @ 2:48PM

Where's Mr Lawler's censorship when the commie-lib Dems get on here making wild and ridiculous charges against Republican's. Hmmm, I guess we can't call Obama "Hussein", although it IS his name, but we have to put up being called a bunch of retarded names by DKossacks that just go around flaming, and Axel-turfing sites. It will be too late to be justly "impolite" by calling Marxists by their names once they get elected and then SHUT THE SITE DOWN.

Michael Roush| 11.3.08 @ 2:56PM

Robert Stacy,
Concerning your predictions, I say from your lips to God's ears. I see the defection of Powell, Noonan, Duberstein, Buckley and others not as their repudiation of conservative ideas or even the GOP. I see their defection as a repudiation of the far right wing of the Republican Party - the part of the party that is in fact white, racist, sexist, homophobic, anti-immigrant etc. Time for moderate Republicans to rise up and take back their party. Want to know who resides in the far right leadership? Look at who supports Sarah Palin and who writes passionately in her defense.

dan| 11.3.08 @ 3:31PM

Michael - yes, all those sexist far right wingnuts. You know - the tens of thousands of them that go to Palin rallies wherever she goes.

Maybe she's sexist too?

dan| 11.3.08 @ 3:32PM

Duberstein left because he didn't get the transition team job he lobbied for on the McCain campaign. Opportunist - like many (though not all) of the others who have backed Obama.

M. Tobias| 11.3.08 @ 3:47PM

Predicting elections is a lot like divination, the same things are interpreted differently by different people. This election is even worse as there is a tremendous emotional investment in one of the candidates. All I can say is wait for it. The only polls that matter are the ones people vote in on Nov. 4th.

Michael Roush| 11.3.08 @ 3:51PM

Dan,
I don't think Sarah is a sexist. I think she is a totally uninformed, highly ambitious opportunist. She'll make a great reprise to that other totally uninformed, highly ambitious opportunist - W.

Spicy Joker| 11.3.08 @ 5:50PM

Michael Roush,

I keep hearing that this election is a referendum on Bush and that McCain is no different from him. I guess you must think Bush and McCain - the two biggest proponents of the amnesty bill - are racist and anti-immigrant. Let's be honest: liberals label conservatives racist, sexist, and so on to delegitmize them so they don't have to debate them.