Duke it out here. Those participating in the US election threads are advised that they do so at their own risk.
Author: William Bowe
William Bowe is a Perth-based election analyst and occasional teacher of political science. His blog, The Poll Bludger, has existed in one form or another since 2004, and is one of the most heavily trafficked websites on Australian politics.
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1377 Catrina Good one Catrina, you naughty girl, you.
Even the Drovers flip flopper could win this.
Chris @ 1401
I admire your optimism buddy and I think Obama can and will win. But its does require a huge effort for the next four and a bit months. Fortunately he has assembled the campaign team and structure to acheive this.
It interesting that McCain supporters tend to point to single polls and single news items. But, since Clinton conceded, all the objective, aggregate measures have shown Obama’s position improving substaintually.
Looking at the state by state probabilities at 538, McCain’s states have retreated to tumble-weed, Easy Rider and Deliverance country. A long way to go, but how is he going to turn this around? It won’t be from negative garbage like Rev Wright or Ayres or the lawyer in a kilt. So where does McCain get his momentum from? He is drowning in a slops bucket of Republican despair. Where are the positives? So far the great one new policy is oil on Florida’s beaches. Not an auspicious start for the old dope.
Here come the rest of the old feminist Hillarian women back to Barry, and of course, Hillary is going to campaign beside (but slightly behind) Barry this week:
A Fox News poll released on Friday suggested anger among some Senator Clinton supporters over her primary defeat was easing.
In April, 32 per cent of her voters told Fox pollsters they would back Senator McCain in November’s election if Senator Obama won the nomination.
That now stands at 17 per cent, with 68 per cent falling in line behind Senator Obama.
1405 jaundiced view Maybe they were just saying that to the pollsters in the first place. Some are still feeling a little hurt and still register a protest. Surely that means as they heal, Obama’s vote increases over McCain.
1406 Chris B And don’t call me Shirley.
Appolagies to Flying High.
Chris B – I think it might even verge on a word beginning with ‘l’ – a geological phenomenon involving a large movement of soil and rock materials – in November to the kid
Shshsh. Don’t mention the “l” word.
ROTFLOL
I love you guys!!
[They have completely ignored the point that an Obama Presidency would see a free trade rethink and a policy of growing protectionism.]
GG, one minute you are quoting stuff about Obama retreating on renegotiating NAFTA, the next you are suggesting he will be a protectionist. So which is it? Has he flip-flopped or not??
And Finns…
[1. Obama has placed himself on a fairly loftly position from the beginning, self inflicted. So stop whinging if we judge him differently from the others.]
That’s a nice try at disguising your pro-McCain bias, but it’s a classic strawman argument. NOBODY, including Obama, has tried to place him at a lofty position. That is YOUR interpretation of someone who wants to change the way politics is done in Washington. Obama’s aims in this regard are not about elevating himself, but rather recognising a REAL problem and proposing a solution.
One thing I find interesting about our McCain supporters on this blog is that they never seem to have anything positive to say about McCain. Even the most rabid anti-Rudd bloggers last year managed to scrape together a few positive lines for Howard, such as him being a “conviction politician”, but on McCain, the silence is almost deafening…
Noocat @ 1413 [on McCain, the silence is almost deafening…]
It was the same when they were against Obama in the primaries – virtually nothing positive to say about Hillary – just negatives on Obama. Same MO now except there’s even LESS positive stuff to say about McCain. Those 3 would be shining examples of the Bradley Effect if they could vote!
Hi Catrina – Did you see the 538 analysis of the latest state-by-state polls? Just as good if not better than the national poll trend. Looking stronger all the time for the kid.
To GG and Fins ….
Both of you have raised a certain skepticism about Barack Obama, based largely on foundations of the experience attribute. Even Ron joins you here with his constant harping on the ticker attribute. But – I see something much bigger. For a moment lets take a trip back down memory lane. The space-race kicked of in 57. NASA started generating expenditure data in 59. It was the 25th May 1961 when JFK did his ‘we need to send a man to the moon pitch’. A nation engaged in and endorsed the idea – a challenge leading to the perception of a moral and military supremacy over the apparent enemy. Let’s roll forward from 1961 (the end of the space race) to 2008 – a period of 47 years, almost half a century, and I what to introduce some parallels. Today the enemy is not Communism or the Red infiltration, today’s problems are captured in two words – “energy independence”. What if the next president of the United States of America could stand up and do the equivalent of what JFK di on the 25th May 1961?
Imagine the next president of the USA comes out in 2010 and makes the following statement (or something or similar magnitude and consequence):
Now – I have loaded that statement with some political syrup, but its something I believe could happen if one of our two candidates are elected. I think one of the candidates has the personal ability to instigate such an event and the operational framework to cause such a thing to happen from the ground up.
I’m backing Obama because I think he can instill this sort of passion – and through this potential he can be pivotal to the direction that we as a planet project ourselves – and this potential is so much more important than any little trivia that is blowing in the wind.
I know I’m hoping for a lot – but it feels good all the same.
[It was the same when they were against Obama in the primaries – virtually nothing positive to say about Hillary – just negatives on Obama.]
I find this very interesting. I think because Obama is viewed as a major change agent in the world, his candidacy divides the progressives and the conservatives in more extreme ways than we would normally see.
So those who are naturally inclined toward conservatism or retaining the status quo are driven to oppose Obama at all costs while those who want to see a turning of the tide are genuinely excited for the first time in a generation.
When this is coupled with Obama’s rhetoric about changing some of the power structures in Washington, and the fact that he is black, I think it just gives the conservatives even more fire in their stomach.
They don’t really give a stuff about McCain. A number of his supporters probably don’t even like the guy at all, but they will go to ANY lengths to stop Obama.
It does mean, however, that we will see a number of conservatives sell out a lot of their principles and values for the sake of opposing Obama on every front. I think we’ve already seen this amongst our little cohort of conservatives here on this blog…
Noocat,
But don’t you think Obama’s avowed protectionism is a major problem for Australia, and the world?
Noocat – I think there’s a lot in what you say. Fear of the unknown – and a fair dollop of the ‘r’ word mixed up in it all too. They would stick with a dumb old right-wing white guy in case things get changed a little for the better by this upstart black man. The funny thing is, it seems a much more than sufficient the majority of voters in the US are no longer frightened of a black man as POTUS. Our 3 DLP/ALP-right conservatives will be shaking their heads and dishing the dirt on Obama all the way to November though.
Dyno – All will be well on trade policy. Obama’s campaign can’t be expected to hammer the line that job losses are inevitable in the modern world with the rise of China and India etc. He’s not seeking the votes of the outside world at this stage, but those of US workers worried about losing their jobs:
As Obama campaigned in Ohio, where expanding international trade is seen as a threat to U.S. jobs, he struck a newly strident tone, threatening to withdraw the U.S. from the North American Free Trade Agreement if Canada and Mexico did not agree to renegotiate terms more favorable to U.S. workers. But his Senate voting record has not been ardently protectionist. He has supported some free-trade agreements while opposing others. And in recently naming Jason Furman a senior advisor, Obama chose a centrist economist whose strong record in favor of free trade has infuriated labor and liberal activists.
http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-na-econplans15-2008jun15,0,7782825.story
1417 Noocat Very well said.
“Aren’t you glad to be a Democrat?” Strickland shouted. “Aren’t you really, really, really angry with George W. Bush and Dick Cheney?”
Democratic governors who won election in states that twice backed Bush have lessons to offer Obama, one of those governors said.
“The door of the White House only opens through Ohio,” said Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius, a Democrat from a traditionally Republican state. Sebelius, daughter of former Ohio Gov.
more…
http://www.mercurynews.com/elections/ci_9663017
1403 Work To Rule Someone’s got to gee up the troops to keep the morale against the dark side.
Catrina at 1416:
Beautifully written, dig your broad-brush and share your “hoping for a lot”. I give a major stuff about what sort of a biosphere my kids and theirs and all the other human beings and critters are going to inherit.
Obi can chisel all the campaign chump change he likes, he can flip-flop all the way from Philly to Florida if he has to, as long as he delivers on the Change he’s been bangin’ on about, especially the Renewables-R-Us talk that he’s touted in several of his stump and victory speeches.
Yearn for the day in the near future when President Obama’s campaign rhetoric is matched by his actions.
Like Uncle Carl said, this Pale Blue Dot is the only one we’ve got.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pale_Blue_Dot
Sat June 21: God’s gift of Freedom is symbolically bestowed upon Mesopotamia.
http://news.yahoo.com/edcartoons/mikeluckovich;_ylt=Ap2wUHJjXmNJcI0t2aVmxFQVvTYC
Chris B,
Speaking of the dark side, our resident trolls seem to be quiet of late.
WTR, hard to be an effective keyboard commando when one yells for “Ammo!” and all that comes down the line are crates full of blanks.
1425 Work To Rule. We keep posting content of substance. Which is very hard to combat.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MJz7VpUo8k0
EC @ 1428 – A little classic that one!
Re Carl Sagan – Most significant book I read in my youth was “Intelligent Life in the Universe” by Sagan and a Russian, whose name escapes me. He puts our little lives on earth in the somewhat larger context of the wider universe so very well.
JV – Shklovskii
Same – then I moved on to Asimovs Foundation series and have never really recovered
And thinking about it – that leads me to a somewhat strange question.
What is it about psephology and sci-fi? It’s hard to find the former that isnt at least a partial buff of the latter.
Tis a strange world.
Hmm good question poss.
I guess your typical amateur psephologist is taking the confusing morass that is our demographic process and trying to find a little order with some scientific discipline. So in each pseph there is a trust and comfort in science and a leaning towards SF.
That or is just a nurd thing 🙂
Thanks Possum – that sounds about right. I missed out on Asimov, but did later get into some Michael Moorcock.
The expansion of mind vis-a-vis the universe was assisted not only by Carl, but also by the concurrent deployment of a foul tasting member of the funghi family. You know – you got to look down on yourself from a great height and see everything in total overview, and could objectively evaluate the world and its inhabitants with absolute accuracy and wisdom?
I have now trained myself to do that using red wine, which has less harmful poisons in it!
Possum – I suppose psephology involves predicting what will occur in the future based on the best current information. So does sci-fi.
Also someone once said to me that the world is divided into two types of people – those who talk about the past, and those who talk about the future. Psephologists and sci-fi writers are both in the latter category. It’s the better one to be in too, I reckon.
Yes, it’s a bloody ripper orright, jv.
4 , r/Ron
http://xkcd.com/406/
Ron, btw, was on his bestest syntactical behaviour on comment 31 on Possum’s soap-box blog on groupthink. Ronaldo certainly has a bit of a lend of some of us here from time to time (yes, I’ve been got). He’s very lucid when he wishes to be. Ron at P. Pollytics still gives his ampersands and commas plenty of breathing space and nothing quite seems to be able to cure him of his ingrainedness as a nihilist post paragraphical period tragic(.)
http://thepossumbox.wordpress.com/2008/06/14/is-the-media-in-australia-suffering-from-groupthink/
WTR – let’s not kid ourselves. It’s just a nurd thing!
The idea of the chaps/chappettes above that it’s the future oriented mindset of pseph and sci-fi which make for good companions is pretty compelling, especially on the science side – but there’s just a sort of Je ne sais quoi about the whole thing as well.
Maybe it’s just that psephs are space cadets!
What’s also weird is that along with the sci-fi, it’s really really common to find political junkies of the psephy type that are all quite well versed on well known counter-culture literature like The Electric Kool Aid Acid Test, Zen and the Art of Motorcyle Maintenance – right through to things like Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.
And it often transcends age groups (half of those things were written before I was born).
We’re a strange lot.
1416 Catrina. Yeah Catrina anyone would think that they were working from the same office or home. But we all know that couldn’t be possible. They would not do anything like that. Liberals are far to honest to do that sort of thing. In fact they bring their children up not to lie. Have you seen the siamese triplets around lately?
The man with the huge credibility problem is helping John McCain. Can’t you see them at a Sunday family meal & John kicking his brother George under the table every time he opens his mouth.
President Bush on Saturday addressed the country to make the case for increasing domestic oil production and blasted Democrats for standing in the way of his plans.
“My administration has repeatedly called on Congress to open access to new oil exploration here in the United States,” Bush said in his weekly radio address. “Unfortunately, Democrats on Capitol Hill have rejected virtually every proposal. Now Americans are paying the price at the pump for this obstruction.”
http://thehill.com/leading-the-news/bush-slams-dems-for-obstructing-new-oil-production-2008-06-21.html
There is an overwhelming public openness to the idea of electing an African American to the presidency. In a Post-ABC News poll last month, nearly nine in 10 whites said they would be comfortable with a black president. While fewer whites, about two-thirds, said they would be “entirely comfortable” with it, that was more than double the percentage of all adults who said they would be so at ease with someone entering office for the first time at age 72, which McCain (R-Ariz.) would do should he prevail in November.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/06/21/AR2008062101825.html
With his decision to give up public financing and the spending limits that go with it, Mr. Obama has added several seasoned hands to his advertising team, a harbinger of a multifaceted television campaign that people inside and outside Obama headquarters said would grow well beyond its already large presence in 18 states.
Future commercials could run on big national showcases like the Olympics in August and smaller cable networks like MTV and Black Entertainment Television that appeal to specific demographic and interest groups.
He is also dispatching paid staff members to all states, an unusual move by the standards of modern presidential campaigns where the fight is often contained to contested territories.
more….
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/22/us/politics/22obama.html?_r=1&ref=politics&oref=slogin
COLUMBUS, OHIO — Ohio Gov. Ted Strickland received a standing ovation Saturday night when he predicted that his state will again tip the race for the White House — this time delivering it to Democratic presidential nominee-in-waiting Barack Obama.
Strickland, noting that he had backed Hillary Rodham Clinton for the Democratic nomination, said she would want him to deliver a message.
http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-na-ohio22-2008jun22,0,3277926.story
Chris: there’s every chance Ohio will go Democrat this time. Governor Strickland and Senator Sherrod Brown overwelmingly won election in 2006, and as I recall, the Democrats picked up a few Republican house seats too in that year.
Ohio went to Bush in 2004 only because of electoral fraud perpetrated by the previous Republican Governor
Michelle Obama’s Facebook page that she was “the picture of graciousness, style and extraordinary intelligence” on The View.
“But what really impressed was that she managed to be all of those things without seeming snotty, distant or unapproachable. As much as I love Jackie O, I think Michelle Obama takes the cake in terms of sheer class,” wrote Lees-Smith.
And Cara Berg Rainey, a soldier in the US army, hailed Obama for bringing “the same ideals and beauty and elegance that Jackie O brought” to the White House.
But winning over Americans with wit and grace isn’t the only task facing Obama.
http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5hTvb2LusV4T38bXKfuBVqcsHBHxQ
Chris says: Didn’t they attack Hillary the same way when Bill was running. Deja vu?
1442 Progressive. Thats exactly right.
I saw an interview with Michelle Obama on ENTERTAINMENT TONIGHT!
She seems very likeable to me, the essence of the modern 21st century career woman/mother, and she’s got a sense of humour too! I’d take her any day over Cindy McCain!
So Chris, twice the amount of voters are more comfortable with a black than an old candidate?? The news keeps getting better!!!
Two things stand out about this ‘527s’ concept – first, that everyone just seems to take for granted that throwing money at scumbags like the swifboaters to create dirt where none exists is a legitimate way to run a campaign; and second, that nobody among the usual suspects seems to want to do it for the Repugs this time:
The truth is that, less than five months before Election Day, there are no serious anti-Obama 527s in existence nor are there any immediate plans to create such a group.
Conversations with more than a dozen Republican strategists find near unanimity in the belief that, at some point, there will be a real third-party effort aimed at Obama.
But not one knows who will run it, who will pay for it, what shape it will eventually take or when such a group may form.
http://dyn.politico.com/printstory.cfm?uuid=A4416D05-3048-5C12-009DB0481F25202A
McCain getting great press…from CNN:
-McCain dogged by campaign missteps
http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2008/06/21/ap-mccain-dogged-by-campaign-missteps/
– MCain’s immigration woe
http://edition.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/06/21/mccain.hispanics/index.html
McCain: I didnt love America until I was held hostage. So Michelle Obama got into trouble, so will McCain
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/06/19/watch-mccain-didnt-love-a_n_108191.html
Possum #1461 et seq.
The Hari Seldon (if that’s his name) plan assumes a strictly deterministic model of human behaviour. Psephs are very attracted to this type of thinking (even if their analyses can require huge nos of parameters). hence the conjunction between Asimov fans and election watchers.
However the later discovery of Chaos theory shows that even highly determinist models can show random results if there is feedback, as there always is in politics.
We are trying to predict hurricanes by examining butterflies.
As you suggest, it really is Nerdsville!.. but hey, we enjoy it, and we’re better at it than the MSM!
My scepticism has been heightend by a week’s pre polling for our by-election. There’s nothing like contact with voters to make one reexamine one’s theories.
The party workers were discussing whether handing how to vote cards achieves anything. Is there any evidence of this? If not, it might make an interesting Master’s thesis ( a bit lite weight for a PhD).
BTW, I notice a decrease in the vituperation on this blog. I can’t decide whether this is a good thing or a bad thing, but I’ve always enjoyed reports of the US Congress in the decade before the Civil War. It makes the bloggers here
seem like a Quaker meeting, and in the long run the good guys won.