Polls: McCain now within five in CNN, Hotline
posted at 11:30 am on October 20, 2008 by Allahpundit
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“The race will tighten,” saith The One, and so it hath. McCain’s netted three points since CNN’s last poll two weeks ago and two points since Hotline’s tracker yesterday to trail by five in each. That’s squarely in line with most of the national polls RCP’s following, so there’s our task with two weeks to go. Five points in 15 days. Let’s hope Ace is right about an October surprise to jumpstart it and that ABC’s wrong about voters not caring about Ayers.
We’re close enough to E-Day that we should start paying attention to the map, too. Not only does Maverick need to win all eight toss-up states (he trails in four), he has to peel 18 electoral votes away from the four states currently leaning blue. Virginia and Colorado would do it and each is within about six points, so they’re the ones to watch. Minnesota and New Mexico look like lost causes.
Exit question via Geraghty, responding to the ABC poll: What exactly is McCain doing for the ticket? The states that are currently red go red in every election and are likely to stay that way this time only because the base loves Palin, not because they love McCain. The battle plan in picking her, or so I thought, was to have her lock in and turn out the grassroots on election day while he went off and worked some mavericky RINO charm on swing voters in the middle. She’s done that. Even if she’s a drag on the ticket with independents (51/39 say picking her makes them less confident in his judgment), I can’t believe she’s so heavy a drag as to nullify his 25-year record of bipartisanship among centrists. He’s simply not making the sale.
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thank you ManlyRash…..100,000 times.
signed:picked a bad election to quit drinking.
lobosan5 on October 20, 2008 at 1:23 PM
The firing solution has already been locked into the targeting computer. The torpedoes are being loaded into the tubes as we speak. Very shortly, the tubes will be flooded and then the outer tube doors opened. Stand by…
ManlyRash on October 20, 2008 at 1:33 PM
Rubbish.
She is not through with national politics unless she chooses. She will be back. She HAS it. If Obama struggles with the economy, national defense, etc., she will be back. The issue is how much does she want it and who she ends up going with as political advisors. She should begin the positioning after Nov. 4th in the event McCain loses.
She has the ambition and the work ethic and loves campaigning. She loves Americans and it shows. Don’t underestimate her.
Guys like Dick Morris and others out there are just licking their chops to be her advisor for a 2012 run, especially if Obama and the Dems mess up.
Sapwolf on October 20, 2008 at 1:34 PM
This doesn’t really help if its just the result of McCain overperforming Bush in the Blue states.
Speedwagon82 on October 20, 2008 at 1:42 PM
I just missed Romney doing a call the other day to a popular talk show here in Michigan. I tuned in on the goodbyes but it sounded like he had a long and positive chat with the host.
This is the kind of work that doesn’t show up nationally but can do a lot of good. Especially in Michigan where Romney was a slam dunk on jobs
I confess I was depressed I missed the show. Romney is great for one on one. I am craving the voice of reason in this election and Romney is a reasoned man
I hope they use Romney nationally in the last days of the campaign. Huckabee has done such a good jobs of stirring up anti Mormon bias where there never was before he has crippled the best warrior McCain could ever have so they have to be cautious
Huck slimed Romney and got a talk show but Huck cannot deliver much more to McCain while Romney has great potential
Did someone poison the well? Huck, Fred and Rudi did their best and now we have to fight harder for their candidate
I give McCain credit for finding a candidate for the rest of us (Palin)
entagor on October 20, 2008 at 1:43 PM
You are absolutely correct to be concerned about this. However, there’s a pretty significant difference between what I described at 12:02 PM and what you’ve described here. What you’ve described will be a rational response to the loss of truly essential liberty. What I described is an irrational response to an imaginary problem.
We’re facing a situation in this country that will likely end in civil war between the sane and the insane. Obama’s loss could arguably touch off the opening round of violence from the insane. There is no guarantee that the sane will win such a conflict.
philwynk on October 20, 2008 at 1:48 PM
I hope you are right
I just got back from early voting in arkansas. Lines are long already. African americans of all ages are turning out in force but then again so are old white folks in big numbers. It was a friendly happy feeling really. Most of these older black folks never thought this day was ever going to happen. So in away I felt good for them. Still don’t want obama to win.
Not many guys my age, didn’t see many young folks. I have a feeling the old joke will still be in tact.
‘They have a name for canadates that depend on the young vote’ losers.
kangjie on October 20, 2008 at 1:53 PM
Young people in my circle have major voter apathy. They are mostly would be democrats. Seems like they vote in their minds or in internet hook up pages. Virtual voting
The matrix is real
entagor on October 20, 2008 at 2:01 PM
I’m right.
ManlyRash on October 20, 2008 at 2:01 PM
I’m afraid that a McCain win in November will simply set us up for another Progressive vote fraud flood in 2012. I do expect that McCain will bring about meaningful governmental reforms. I do not expect that the press or the Democrats (but I repeat myself) will represent his reforms as anything other than partisanship. I do not expect that McCain will improve the economic situation, nor will his able handling of foreign policy win any more support than did Bush’s able handling of foreign policy (GWB, for all his faults, actually did a stunningly good job with foreign policy during a very, very difficult period.) I do not expect that the atmosphere will be much friendlier for Republicans in 2012 than it is today, unless we manage to shine enough of a spotlight on the Pelosian mess.
I decided long ago that McCain was going to get my vote, even though I don’t like him. However, if it weren’t the case that the republic won’t survive the Obama presidency, I’d probably be sitting this one out and letting the Democrats obtain the rope with which they’d surely hang themselves. I’m voting for McCain mostly because I expect that after eight years of an Obama presidency, enough of US sovereignty would have been ceded to the UN that we could never get it back, and the playing field would have been so permanently skewed to favor the Democrats that they’d never again lose power.
philwynk on October 20, 2008 at 2:02 PM
Don’t forget about the Bradley effect among black people…
Many black people when they get in the voting booth will vote for Mccain because they really DO NOT want a black man to win.
I know it sounds crazy but it is something true that no one has talked about yet.
SaintOlaf on October 20, 2008 at 2:02 PM
It’s the economy, stupid. Lincoln, Ike, TR, Reagan … they’d all lose in this environment, even if the four of them had proposed a plan to reign in Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, to regulate private banks to death, and to give a puppy to every six-year-old child. Ayers won’t be the key. People are sick of hearing about him, and the argument that he matters is too subtle to be sold 30 seconds at a time. If we’re lucky, Joe the Plumber will — Obama’s response was a better sound-bite for McCain than anything about Ayers or Wright — which is why everyone’s trying to take him down.
calbear on October 20, 2008 at 2:07 PM
Are there really Independents out there?
Hilts on October 20, 2008 at 2:09 PM
I believe that’s referred to as the Pelosian swamp of DC.
Much along my reasoning but you shouldn’t kid yourself. If Obama wins in November, he will start office with a Democrat controlled Congress and likely the liberal SCOTUS justices that are half-dead will gleefully retire. In four years the Democrats can so corrupt the government and the law that they can keep power forever. Not that there will be much left of value.
highhopes on October 20, 2008 at 2:15 PM
Independents, probably. What I don’t understand is how there could possibly be “undecideds” left at this point.
highhopes on October 20, 2008 at 2:16 PM
I agree. Sarah Palin, as much as I like her personally, would not make it thru a rough and tumble primary process without exposing herself as woefully unprepared. She would be a female Huck…getting the dumb vote.
Roger Waters on October 20, 2008 at 2:21 PM
The firing solution has already been locked into the targeting computer. The torpedoes are being loaded into the tubes as we speak. Very shortly, the tubes will be flooded and then the outer tube doors opened. Stand by…
ManlyRash on October 20, 2008 at 1:33 PM
I hope you’re right Manly! Torpedo away!
max1 on October 20, 2008 at 2:21 PM
I will pass on two articles from Newsmax
First article by Dick Morris from Saturday, 10-18-08
Interesting take by Morris the race is not over
The second article is Zogby Sunday, 10-19-08, McCain closing gap and gaining independents. Zogby connects it to the Alfred E. Smith charity dinner and Letterman appearances.
It is funny that CSPAN makes a big deal covering the A.E. Smith charity dinnerss. Normally another CSPAN screen saver it likely was watched by people curious to see how Obama performed and ended up helping McCain with undecideds
Letterman did a job job hauling for McCain too. Thanks buddy
entagor on October 20, 2008 at 2:24 PM
And yet – mirabile dictu – she became the governer of Alaska. The Alaskan political wilderness is littered with the bones of opponents who underestimated her.
ManlyRash on October 20, 2008 at 3:06 PM
Dumb comment, Rash. I like Palin but to say that a person who was elected governor of a state is thus prepared to be POTUS is absurd. How about Huck? How about half of the horrible democrat gov’s. Think they are worthy or ready to be POTUS. I dont.
Alaskan politics: the gateway to the presidency of the U.S. Yeah right.
Roger Waters on October 20, 2008 at 3:48 PM
Slightly O/T, but…
Can any of our posters in the military find the original article that goes with this poll that I found on Hillbuzz? I did a search at Army Times and Military Times, but I can’t find the article that explains this poll.
Y-not on October 20, 2008 at 3:56 PM
Sorry Rog, but it was on point. Your earlier post referenced her ability to survive the primaries and it was to that statement I was responding. I never said she was prepared to be POTUS. Then again, she is not running for that office.
ManlyRash on October 20, 2008 at 3:56 PM
I think you’re dead wrong. Conservative ideas still work, but it takes a candidate who believes them and can explain them. Obama is an empty suit candidate. Take away his style, and he’s got nothing. Penetrate his empty rhetoric and his audience drains away.
If Fred Thompson were running against Obama, he would do to Obama exactly what he did to Huckabee. Before Fred, Huckabee was well poised to compete with Romney and McCain. After Fred destroyed his populist policies — which sounded remarkably like the populism Obama has been pushing — Huckabee barely limped into another state before having to throw in the towel.
It seems logical that a moderate candidate would do better pulling in independents and even Democrats. But you’ll notice that hasn’t been the case. If McCain hadn’t picked Palin to shore up his conservative support, he’d already be out of contention.
As it is, I believe McCain can win. But if he was better able to articulate Reagan conservative ideas, he would have a strong lead at this point.
tom on October 20, 2008 at 3:57 PM
OOOOH NO!
It sure wouldn’t have anything to with what Palin stands for now, would it?
This is so expected.
These pollsters are going to more and more, cherry pick reasons why McCain keeps “gaining” in the polls, because they do not want to be wrong when McCain actually gets elected.
This also is disturbing to me:
And it bothers me precisely….. because, who the hell agrees to having their cell phone number on a list?!
Answer: Nobody, that’s who.
So then who are these people that are being polled?
See, my suspicion is that they are primarily people in the media that are being polled!!
(there’s what 10’s of thousands that work in the media?)…. With a smidgen of real people here and there to mix things up.
The reason for my suspicion here is precisely because nobody in great numbers has ever reported, in blogs and elsewhere of being polled.
For as many polls as they knock out day after day, we should have a lot more self-reported stories.
AllahPundit, have you been polled? Tell the truth.
Mcguyver on October 20, 2008 at 4:56 PM
Allah:
I don’t know if I would say that McCain is not making the sale. Considering the atmosphere, it is not a bad sign that he is within 5. I think it would be difficult for anyone to beat Obama now. But I still think McCain has a real chance. Events might decide the issue anyway, something we are not even talking about now.
Terrye on October 20, 2008 at 6:48 PM
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