90% Odds for McCain
That's my call eight weeks before the election. And for the record, that was my call last week at this time as well, before the predicted McCain convention bounce. It's unlikely the needle will move much in the next two or three weeks, and may actually improve for McCain as the Obama campaign is gonna be almost exclusively on defense in the foreseeable future, constantly being asked to respond to the latest Sarah Palin buzz or the latest exasperated screech from McCain about media bias against him. Obama won't have an opportunity to get back in the game until the debates, and even those are no sure thing. Obama is not the caliber of debater that John Kerry was four years ago, and McCain is better positioned to be the Lloyd Bentsen to Obama's Dan Quayle, ridiculing Obama's "youth and inexperience".
Needless to say, every aspect of this horse race already strongly favors McCain at this stage. Let's forget about the daily reminder that the issues and partisan advantage this year strongly favor Obama. None of that will ultimately matter now that McCain has reinvented himself as a maverick and reignited the culture war. Voters can be expected to be as mindless of drones as they have in previous election cycles, voting "cultural connections" over positions on issues. But McCain's real advantage lies in the fact that undecided voters will almost assuredly break his way by wide margins on election day.
In the majority of primary contests earlier this year, the late-deciders broke almost unanimously against Barack Obama. There were a few high-profile exceptions to be sure, but whether it be blue states like California, New Jersey, and Massachusetts; purple states like Ohio, New Hampshire, and Pennsylvania; or red states like South Dakota, Texas, and Tennessee, Hillary Clinton's performance significantly exceeded the polls released on the eve of election, often by double-digit margins. Why would we expect undecideds to behave differently in the general election?
Undecideds as a whole constitute a considerably larger slice of the electorate than was the case in 2004. The reason? Key demographic groups have serious issues with Barack Obama....and those issues are very unlikely to go away, particularly with a pseudo-maverick challenger as seemingly benign to low-information swing voters as John McCain as the alternative. Ultimately, the demography of the "swing voters" on election even won't matter much. Whether it's the upper-middle class female suburbanite and mother worried about "keeping her family safe" or traditionally Democratic senior citizens wary of Obama's race and experience, neither one of these groups has any intention of ultimately voting for Barack Obama barring an epic mistake by John McCain. For that reason, if Obama goes into November 4 with a poll advantage of anything less than five points, John McCain will be the 44th President of the United States.
Needless to say, every aspect of this horse race already strongly favors McCain at this stage. Let's forget about the daily reminder that the issues and partisan advantage this year strongly favor Obama. None of that will ultimately matter now that McCain has reinvented himself as a maverick and reignited the culture war. Voters can be expected to be as mindless of drones as they have in previous election cycles, voting "cultural connections" over positions on issues. But McCain's real advantage lies in the fact that undecided voters will almost assuredly break his way by wide margins on election day.
In the majority of primary contests earlier this year, the late-deciders broke almost unanimously against Barack Obama. There were a few high-profile exceptions to be sure, but whether it be blue states like California, New Jersey, and Massachusetts; purple states like Ohio, New Hampshire, and Pennsylvania; or red states like South Dakota, Texas, and Tennessee, Hillary Clinton's performance significantly exceeded the polls released on the eve of election, often by double-digit margins. Why would we expect undecideds to behave differently in the general election?
Undecideds as a whole constitute a considerably larger slice of the electorate than was the case in 2004. The reason? Key demographic groups have serious issues with Barack Obama....and those issues are very unlikely to go away, particularly with a pseudo-maverick challenger as seemingly benign to low-information swing voters as John McCain as the alternative. Ultimately, the demography of the "swing voters" on election even won't matter much. Whether it's the upper-middle class female suburbanite and mother worried about "keeping her family safe" or traditionally Democratic senior citizens wary of Obama's race and experience, neither one of these groups has any intention of ultimately voting for Barack Obama barring an epic mistake by John McCain. For that reason, if Obama goes into November 4 with a poll advantage of anything less than five points, John McCain will be the 44th President of the United States.
posted by Mark at 9:02 PM
2 Comments:
Mark, you have not spoken much about Congressional races here. I am wondering if you will do predictions like you did in 2006. I still think Democrats will gain about five seats in the Senate, and at least a few in the House because of open seats.
I was thinking earlier this week that I have to do some more intense speculation of Congressional races. They will be coming in the next couple weeks, particularly in the Senate. I'm not as in tune with specifics about the House races this year as I was in 2006, but I'll give it a whirl nonetheless.
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