RedState has analysis of the latest Washington Post poll that has Bush up 52-43 against John Kerry. The internals have even worse news for Kerry, his numbers among independents and young voters have shifted dramatically against him.
Granted, there’s no room for complacency, but these numbers indicate that the Kerry campaign is in deep, deep trouble..
Regardless of any poll, I predict a couple point victory for Kerry on election day. What do you think?
Greg, it’s very hard to predict. Kerry has been far from effective and doesn’t appear to be getting things on a steady track thus far. The relentless non-campaign news events dominating the headlines are not helping him any since he can’t get a word in edgewise to counter the GOP’s weeklong hatefest. Bush has plenty of things that could still sink him, but the bottom line is that if voters are most concerned about terrorism when they head to the polls, they’ll vote for Bush, as foolish as the correlation between George Bush and effective fighting against terrorism may be.
The mindset of voters on Election Day is rarely predictable. Those calling the race for Bush this month are just as foolish as those who called the race for Kerry a month ago. From 1948 to 1980 to the 1998 midterms, conventional wisdom has been overwhelmingly wrong as often as it’s been accurate. I would give at least 25% odds that we see a different electoral vote and popular vote outcome again this year, with the EC possibly favoring Kerry more than Bush this year.
If I was forced to wager on an outcome at this stage, I’d bet on Bush (needless to say, I’m already considering seeking Canadian immigration information). With that said, things will come up in the next 50 days that nobody was expecting and could swing things back to Kerry in a matter of hours. Whenever you hear partisans of either side using the poll status of the moment to project what voters will be thinking about on November 2, ignore them and wait for the next headline that makes a fool out of them.
Mark is right. (Stop the presses, I know!)
Right now, Bush has all the internals swinging towards him in a major way, and Kerry’s campaign is the worst I’ve seen in years. Granted, anything can change between now and the election, but I really don’t see Kerry pulling ahead unless he does something really drastic or Bush royally fucks up. (And both could happen.)
Kerry has a reputation as a good closer, but so does Bush, and Kerry has only run in the very liberal state of Massachusetts. Kerry’s biggest problem isn’t the Swift Boat Vets or anything else, it’s his own lack of vision. Had Kerry’s campaign not pulled this crap about smearing Bush and concentrated on the economy, they could have made this a close race again – but Kerry missed his best chance to do that. I’m not entirely sure he’ll get another.