US election minus 40 days

Gallup‘s three-day tracking poll shows the situation in the US presidential race throughout September as follows:

Barack Obama held a slight lead as the month began, which seems to be the long-term status quo. Then came the Republican convention and Sarah Palin bounce, which briefly put McCain well ahead. This moderated into a slight lead when the dust settled, before being wiped out with the onset of the banking crisis. However, Obama’s six-point lead at the start of this week has narrowed, despite polls giving him a clear lead on economic issues – surely a great boon in the current environment. Much is being said of an ABC-Washington Post poll which has Obama nine points in front, but this appears to be out on a limb. In any case, Gallup’s historical analysis reminds us that a lot can happen in the next six weeks, one way or the other.

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.

1,141 comments on “US election minus 40 days”

Comments Page 22 of 23
1 … 21 22 23

  1. Swing Lowe: The Wall St of 1929 was, of itself, necessary and therapeutic for American capitalism. The reason it led to the Depression was protectionism, in the US and in Europe. In a free trade world, a thorough shakeout of Wall St would be very beneficial.

  3. One thing I have read repeatedly is that when the market tanks really badly, a lot of corporate fraud shows up. All he dodgy dealing can be hidden when the markets are going up but in a Big Bear market it’s like the tide going out and all the syringes and rubbish are there to see. There’s going to be some very worried traders around the world.

  4. It wasn’t ‘me and my pendulums’ that got it wrong – polling data in, seat change numbers out.

    I suggest you take your gripes up with Newspoll, Nielsen, Galaxy and Morgan.

    The polling numbers on the final day produced results pretty much what we ended up with, including the big swings in safe QLD seats. Again, polling data in – seat change numbers out.

    Now I’m not saying that McCain couldn’t come back – just that if he did he would be breaking every record in the book, not only in US political terms, but in the history of prediction markets as well.

    I’ll take the data over politics any day thanks.

  5. [In a free trade world, a thorough shakeout of Wall St would be very beneficial.]

    I’d rather have a normally functioning financial system now than wait for these so-called “benefits” to arrive.

    After all, the US stock market did not return to mid-1929 levels until 1954. I don’t want a repeat now…

  6. If we are going to have capitalism – and the world seems to have decided that debate – then it has to be allowed to operate according to its own rules. Capitalism is a cyclical system. Recessions, and particularly bankruptcies, are a necessary part of a capitalist economy. The function of recessions is to drive out the corrupt and inefficient, freeing up capital and labour for the honest and the efficient. Obviously social policy has to rescue individuals who suffer in the process, but there is no economic rationale for rescuing corporations who fail through their own poor decisions. To do that is a false kindness, and negates the whole logic of capitalism. Unless people are going to advocate socialism – and they are free to do so – then they have to accept the facts of life about how capitalism works.

  10. The VP debate is now going to be all about the bailout and the economy. There’s no way Palin can be taught how to answer in depth questions on those topics. McCain should “Hail Mary” again and ditch her for Lieberman, Romney or Guiliani. This has at least given him an excuse. Palin is 9.3% to be withdrawn on Intrade and climbing.

  11. #1046, Poss, “leverage” is just a nicer word than “debt”. When your business model is to dig a hole in order to fill another hole. it will catchup with you.

    Everyone has been thinking and assuming the Emperor is fully clothed and therefore willing to lend and finance the life style of the Emperor. But now the Emperor has been exposed as having no cloth.

    The big problem is the US dollar. The World still has “confidence’ in the US dollar. But on what basis and for how long? When the World lost confidence in the US dollar, the subprime crisis will be a sunday picnic.

  12. Amusingly, if McCain had picked Romney as his VP, he would be doing much better on the economy than he would be doing now.

    Even though Romney is the epitomy of “Wall St”, his previous successes at Bain Capital and the Salt Lake City Olympics would have added much-needed credibility to McCain’s economic message…

  15. [Believe it or not: Sarah Palin is being coached for the debate by Bush advisers!
    LMAO]

    I’d believe it. Sounds like they ae going to try and make her come out attacking Obama & Biden on the economy etc. Can’t see it working as the voters know who has been in charge of this mess.

  17. Dario, how ya doing?
    If the debate was on moose shooting in Alaska, Sarah would come up trumps!
    Why McCain didn’t pick Romney or Huckabee(who at least have some experience in running an economy) is beyond me, but for whatever reason, McIdiot is making some dumb decisions currently!
    McCain claiming credit for the bailout bill, which then hours later gets voted down: hilarious!

  18. Not too foul!
    Yeah the McCain camp has made a whole string of poor decisions all the way through this one. It’s been one disaster after another. I wonder if its him making all these calls or his advisors?

  20. evan @ 1068

    At this stage, 538.com gives a 54.5% chance that Obama will still win the election without gaining OH. This makes sense because at the moment, Obama has comfortable poll leads in NM, IA and PA, holding steady in CO, and is gaining ground in VA and FL. All the while he is still maintaining the Kerry states.

    In essence, he may not even need OH, and thus if he does get it, it will just be icing on the cake.

  22. If we need any reminder of how bad the bailout failure is for McCain, look at these quotes and then remember that it was McCain’s own patry that killed the bailout.

    [“This bill would not have been agreed to had it not been for John McCain… This is a bipartisan accomplishment, a bipartisan success. And if people want to get something done in Washington, they just watch John McCain. He’s been the guy whose name is at the top of major pieces of legislation for a long time.”
    — Mitt Romney, NBC’s Today show, 9/29/08

    “What Senator McCain was able to do was to help bring all of the parties to the table, including the House Republicans, whose votes were needed to pass this”
    — Steve Schmidt, NBC’s Meet the Press, 9/28/08

    “We’re optimistic that Senator McCain will bring House Republicans on board without driving other parties away, resulting in a successful deal for the American taxpayer.”
    — McCain spokeswoman Kimmie Lipscomb, 9/26/08]

    Dead Man Walking

  23. I can understand why Congress voted down the bailout, and it wasn’t just ideology. It was way too vague and short of details on what the rules woudl be; it still amounted to giving far too much power to Paulson, who arguably has a strong conflict of interest as former Goldman Sachs CEO.

    Overall I think the US needs a bailout plan, but not necessarily this bailout plan. There are other examples to follow, like what Sweden did in the early 90s. Fail to do anything and it winds up like Japan in the 90s – a decade long recession. I don’t think this will cause a depression – things may change a lot after November. Some financial firms are going to go broke, but only those that gambled too big with other people’s money. I do feel sorry for those other people – a lot of them retirees.

    This will confirm that Bush was an economic disaster once and for all. But then people like Paul Krugman have been pointing that out for years.

  24. I agree McCain is hurt by this. You can’t make a big show of flying to Washington to help sovle the crisis, then not come up with a solution, and still look good. He should have stuck to the campaigning, and left the governing to those who are still the government.

  27. Seems CBS is still to release an even more damaging part of the Couric interview with Palin… look out!

    http://rawstory.com/news/2008/Palin_says_voter_question_gotcha_journalism_0929.html

    [Of concern to McCain’s campaign, however, is a remaining and still-undisclosed clip from Palin’s interview with Couric last week that has the political world buzzing.

    The Palin aide, after first noting how “infuriating” it was for CBS to purportedly leak word about the gaffe, revealed that it came in response to a question about Supreme Court decisions.

    After noting Roe vs. Wade, Palin was apparently unable to discuss any major court cases.

    There was no verbal fumbling with this particular question as there was with some others, the aide said, but rather silence.]

  28. evan14 @ 1068,

    Yes, the rasism thing really bites in Ohio. There are (believe it or not; given Ohio’s large population cities, they have more urban population rather than rural) more rednecks there than there are blacks (who vote). Key to overcoming this in the election is getting both registration and turnout amongst the black population. The rednecks are self motivated to get to the polls, they won’t have any problems doing that. If I were in Ohio, I woud be carpooling to the polls to get folks there. Wouldn’t be surprised if the Obama campaign is already organizing stuff along this train of thought 🙂 …….

    For polls in and of themselves, I would suggest that they are either showing that facet of the population that I just noted OR they are not picking random samples and are showing their bias that way. I’m from southeastern Michigan and just about 30 minutes drive away from the state line with Ohio, moved here in December 2004. I know Ohio almost as well as I know Michigan being that close for many years.

  30. [If I were in Ohio, I woud be carpooling to the polls to get folks there. Wouldn’t be surprised if the Obama campaign is already organizing stuff along this train of thought]

    With this court decision to allow same-day voting, you can bank on it

  31. [If we are going to have capitalism – and the world seems to have decided that debate – then it has to be allowed to operate according to its own rules.]
    So you are effectively saying it is fine for there to be only two huge banks left in the U.S. Somehow I don’t see that as good for capitalism.
    [ Capitalism is a cyclical system. Recessions, and particularly bankruptcies, are a necessary part of a capitalist economy.]
    Rubbish, capitilaism is designed to stop recessions by an efficient allocation of resources. If recessions wre a formality of capitalism, then I don’t think we would have a capitalist economy. Recessions are what we try to avoid at all costs because they kill living standards.

  32. Getting back to the question of the candidate’s education or lack thereof 😉 …. this is cut and paste from another blog and itemizes everyone’s education, both candidates and both vp’s as well. You see what answer you would give to this question 😉 ….

    [ If You were The Boss… which team would you hire?

    With America facing historic debt, multiple war fronts,
    stumbling health care, a weakened dollar, all-time high
    prison population, skyrocketing Federal spending, mortgage
    crises, bank foreclosures, etc. etc., this is an unusually
    critical election year.

    Let”s look at the educational background of the
    candidates and see what they bring to the job:

    Obama:
    Occidental College – Two years.
    Columbia University – B.A. political science with a
    specialization in international relations.
    Harvard – Juris Doctor (J.D.) Magna *** Laude

    Biden:
    University of Delaware – B.A. in history and B.A. in
    political science.
    Syracuse University College of Law – Juris Doctor (J.D.)

    vs.

    McCain:
    United States Naval Academy – Class rank 894 out of 899
    (meaning that, like George Bush, McCain was at the bottom of
    his class)

    Palin:
    Hawaii Pacific University – 1 semester
    North Idaho College – 2 semesters – general study
    University of Idaho – 2 semesters – journalism
    Matanuska-Susitna College – 1 semester
    University of Idaho – 3 semesters – B.A. in journalism

    Now, which team are you going to hire to lead the most
    influential nation in the world? ]

  33. And for what it is worth, I’ve seen this as well although I can not get a reliable source to confirm it, the source where I read this isn’t reliable imho …..

    [ Just got a call… Palin to be dumped from the campaign tomorrow… Romney to take her place… seeking a second source… McCain camp suspiciously quiet on the matter, saying only “no comment.”

    Tracking… ]

    What were those intratrade numbers on Palin getting dumped? 😉 …. and how have they been tracking over the course of the day? 😉 …….

  34. # 1082 – Such elitist snobbery, you people just don’t learn, do you?
    Speaking as someone with a PhD, I can tell you that academic education has very little relevance to leadership potential. I certainly don’t think I am better qualified to be PM than Ben Chifley was. Did you all support John Hewson (PhD) against Paul Keating (left school at 15)? I don’t think so.

    If you have read a McCain biography you will know that he came so low at Annapolis mainly for disciplinary reasons – he was a bit of a lad, as he acknowledges. Anyway a naval academy is not a university – no-one disputes he was a courageous naval officer.
    Compare with Roosevelt, the greatest leader of the 20th century, who slacked through Harvard and dropped out of law school.

  35. [What were those intratrade numbers on Palin getting dumped? 😉 …. and how have they been tracking over the course of the day? 😉 …….]

    They’re only up by 1% over the day. I think this is extremely unlikely, if McCain ditches her, then everyone will just wonder why he chose her in the first place.

    Having said that, if he is going to do it this would be the week for it, because no one is going to be listening to McCain this week after his stunt last week.

  36. [Compare with Roosevelt, the greatest leader of the 20th century, who slacked through Harvard and dropped out of law school.]

    And still passed the N.Y. bar exam so it could work as a corporate lawyer.

  37. [Speaking as someone with a PhD, I can tell you that academic education has very little relevance to leadership potential.]

    Speaking as someone with a PhD and a few other degrees I would argue that not only is an academic education of little relevance to leadership potential, it is makes you less likely to be a good leader.

    And McCain won’t dump Palin. If there was anything to those rumours, Intrade would have gone berserk by now. It’s only 9.3%.

  38. [Speaking as someone with a PhD and a few other degrees I would argue that not only is an academic education of little relevance to leadership potential, it is makes you less likely to be a good leader.]

    That was the best in-joke in The West Wing – as if the U.S. President would ever be a Professor of Economics and Nobel prize winner.

  40. [Maybe Obama should dump Biden for yelling at a paraplegic: “Chuck, stand up, let the people see you.”]
    HAHAHAHHAHAHHHAHAHAHAH! 😀

  41. Biden also said: “When the stock market crashed, Franklin D. Roosevelt got on the television” to calm people down. (who was President in 1929? When was TV invented?)

    But Biden’s gaffes are of course ignored by the liberal media, which can’t conceal the fact that Obama gives them all a collective hardon.

  42. [But Biden’s gaffes are of course ignored by the liberal media, which can’t conceal the fact that Obama gives them all a collective hardon.]
    Oh no THE MEDIA is brain washing our minds! HELP!

    If The Media is so good at brain washing, how can you tell that it is using brain washing?

    Maybe The Media just realises that McCain is running a terrible campaign that is failing to differentiate his policies from Bush’s.

  43. [But Biden’s gaffes are of course ignored by the liberal media, which can’t conceal the fact that Obama gives them all a collective hardon.]

    On the contrary, his FDR gaffe get plenty of airplay on CNN et al, and the Daily Show gave him a good poke as well

  44. [On the contrary, his FDR gaffe get plenty of airplay on CNN et al, and the Daily Show gave him a good poke as well]

    No The Media didn’t. The Media is completely biased and doesn’t criticise the Democrats.

    You must’ve imagined it, there’s no other explanation for it.

    😀

  45. McCain’s campaign will be compared through history with Hillary Clinton’s in order to work out which one was more incompetent. Hillary has been ahead but McCain could still win it. 😀

  46. [McCain’s campaign will be compared through history with Hillary Clinton’s in order to work out which one was more incompetent. Hillary has been ahead but McCain could still win it. :D]

    PREDICTION: If Obama wins, someone will say that H Clinton would’ve won by more.

  48. [If McCain had told a paraplegic to stand up, or if Palin had not known when TV was invented, it would have been on the front page of the NYT for a week and you’d all be screaming blue murder.]

    You are clearly ignoring my comment about Biden’s FDR gaffe above Adam, which shows you are nothing but a sour graper

Comments are closed.

Comments Page 22 of 23
1 … 21 22 23