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Born at the Crest of the Empire

Tuesday, October 07, 2008

An observation on the polling

In the last 24 hours, we've seen national polls showing everything from Obama +8 to Obama +4, but here's what I want to point out.

In all the major national polls, most of the variation appears to be coming from Obama's "top" number (53 in CNN, 48 in CBS in the examples linked above.) McCain is solidly and consistently polling at 43, 44, 0r 45, but never breaking 45. And apart from the brief Palin bubble, McCain has not polled above 45 all year.

To me, that says two things. McCain has a HARD ceiling at 45, and Obama's support above 49 or so may be a bit soft or uncertain. (Both trackings have Obama 50+.)

(Heretical thoughts: Maybe instead of watching Obama's number or the lead, we should be watching McCain's number.

Second: If the goal of going negative is to try and drag Obama down below McCain's ceiling, what does going negative do to McCain's number?)

2 Comments:

  • Assuming (hoping) for a McCain loss but I am not happy to see any efforts to assign blame for his defeat any place than squarely on his shoulders. After the election, he or his supporgates may try to say some people did this or decided that but the blame has to be his -- not some advisor.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 5:26 PM  

  • I tend to agree about the general statement on blame, but my hunch is that the collective blame will likely be laid on "the economy" because that's a safe out where nobody has to blame anyone else. (Or maybe more broadly "the environment.)

    By Blogger mikevotes, at 5:48 PM  

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