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With bated breath …

There are so many things that have happened in our recent history – things that have changed the world, things that change the definition of destiny, things that change who we think we can be, what we think we can achieve, things that change the boundaries of what is and is not. The West Wing gave us a glimpse of what it could be like. Season 7 took us though the Primaries with Matt Santos the minority candidate and into the general election under the guiding hand of Josh Lyman as they set the stage for Barack Obama and David Axelrod.

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Reality kicked in on the 10th February 2007 when Obama announced his national campaign at the place where just some 149 years earlier, Abraham Lincoln delivered his “House Divided” speech. A primary campaign sometimes referred to as the ‘Never Ending Story’ took us through to the 3rd. June when Obama was nominated as the presumptive candidate therein setting the stage for the national campaign between Barack Obama and John McCain.

Today is Sunday the 2nd. November 2008, just a couple of days away from the most important political moment in my life. Within 72 hours we will be watching the numbers rolling in. But unlike every other election – the substance and the implications of this election are tectonic in nature.

Today we wait with bated breath.

1,146 replies on “With bated breath …”

100 Katielou
I wouldn’t be reading too much into Nate Silver’s increasingly confused and disappointing coverage. He started out well but now is reduced to explaining why PA being ‘in play’ doesn’t really mean ‘in play’ or why the ‘tightening’ really isn’t a ‘tightening’.
Methinks Nate is trying to keep all sides happy so he’ll keep being asked to do TV interviews.
Yeah I’m a tough critic but I do prefer commentators to say what they mean and mean what they say. If I want obfuscation and hedging I’ll read the Murdoch press.

In keeping with Jen’s post, an article from the Guardian……

Though we lack the vote, this is our election too. Such statements outrage many Americans and inspire others. But the rest of the world has not just lived this election. Our life chances and societies will also be shaped by what happens next Tuesday. The world has an interest in the outcome because, in spite of everything, America remains the world’s pre-eminent military, political, financial and cultural power. America’s standing in the world has been damaged during the Bush years. He has inflicted massive direct harm to many parts of the world through his military actions, has set back the quality of life on our planet by his indifference to climate change, international cooperation and the rule of law. He has been anti-Americanism’s best recruiting sergeant and al-Qaida’s too.

The world may not have the vote on Tuesday. But it certainly has a candidate. That candidate is Senator Barack Obama.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/nov/01/elections-obama-mccain-usa-bush

Ferny @ 102 – yes, I wouldn’t rely on 538 alone, but other sites are noting a Pennsylvania narrowing…

The one place where polls show unambiguous evidence of narrowing margin is Pennsylvania, where the McCain campaign has placed great emphasis (both in candidate visits and television advertising) over the last week. Three new releases yesterday — including the daily tracking from Muhlenberg University — show Obama leading by margins varying 4 to 7 points. Obama still leads on our trend estimate by almost 8 points (51.6% to 43.7%) but the margin has narrowed nearly 5 points in the last week.

What is less obvious from the table above is that most of the change in Pennsylvania involves an increase in McCain’s support — from 40.3% to 43.8% — while Obama has lost just a single point on our estimate (from 52.8% to 51.6%).

http://www.pollster.com/blogs/morning_status_update_for_sund_2.php

‘tightening’?

yep, it’s McCain’s sphincter as he comes to the realisation that he’s about to have his arse handed to him on a platter.

And as for who is the most ‘experienced’, well we sure know who is the most consummate and clever politician to first see off the Clinton machine and then wipe his feet on the GOP’s tired old candidate.

Hillary Clinton says she is unhappy her voice is used in McCain ‘robo-calls’

SENATOR Hillary Clinton on Sunday decried the use of her voice in computer-disseminated “robo-calls” by Republican presidential candidate John McCain’s campaign.
The phone calls, which automatically dial up voters in hard-fought battleground states, play a recording of Clinton during the Democratic primary battle.
In the recording Senator Clinton derides what she said was a lack of experience by then-rival and fellow Democrat Barack Obama, who went on to win the party’s presidential nomination.

http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,24592831-12377,00.html

I love this from “The Hill”

McCain camp betting on Pa., Southwest
By Sam Youngman
Posted: 11/02/08 11:18 AM [ET]
John McCain’s campaign manager said Sunday that polls showing rival Barack Obama way ahead in the presidential race are flawed, and that the Arizona senator is poised for a comeback victory on Tuesday.

Rick Davis put a positive spin on the electoral situation on “Fox News Sunday,” saying that McCain has pulled even in New Mexico, Colorado and Nevada, and that the Republican nominee is “doing great” in Pennsylvania and is poised for a “slam-bang finish.”
___________
It’s just not happening is it Johnny?! This isn’t in the script and the script is reality therefore this isn’t happening and your sorry, flabby, wrinkly old arse is going to wobble and slide it’s way over the finish line ahead of That One on Tuesday. Aint that so, Johnny?!
It’s so fucking obvious ain’t it.

But wait a sec, your ol’ buddy Rove has a word for you:

“Karl Rove, who engineered President Bush’s victories in 2000 and 2004, said Sunday that John McCain is running against the wind as he tries to come back and win Tuesday’s election.

Rove, interviewed on “Fox News Sunday,” said of the GOP presidential nominee that, if the race “was three points, he has a shot.”

“If it was five or six or seven or eight or nine, as many of the polls indicate, then it is very, very difficult to do,” Rove said.
____________________
Trouble is Johnny, it’s not the wind you’re running against. No, no. That fucking hurricane of a headwind you’re walking into is the collective farts of 10s of millions of Americans who are sick to death of the putrid stench coming from the GOP and have decided to give some back! So Johnny, as Pink Floyd would say, “Breath in the Air!” It’s called getting your own back!

Oh, and Rove’s wrong on the “steep climb” ahead of you too. It’s not a hill you’re facing – its a damp cave you’re stuck in. Actually it’s a long, dark sewerage pipe – and you’re in deep, deep shit Johnny boy.

There aint no climbing out of there. So you can scream and shout and do a fanny dance with Sarah all you like. Every move you make just sinks you deeper into the shit.

And come Tuesday, you’ll both have sunk entirely.
Bye Johnny.

Excellent article by George Monbiot (from the Guardian) in today’s Age

http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/george-monbiot-20081102-5gbs.html

He has a nice turn of phrase, at one stage referring to GWB as “mankind’s nearest relative”.

In between cab calls yesterday I read a bit of ‘Flashman at the Charge’.

I liked this bit in response to the carnage at Alma

“… my stars, wouldn’t I just like to take one of our Ministers, or street-corner orators, or bloodlusting, breakfast-scoffing papas over such a place as Alma hills – not to let him see, because he’d just tut-tut and look anguished and have a good pray and not care a damn – but to shoot him in the belly with a soft-nosed bullet and let him die sreaming where he belonged. That’s all they deserve.”

That’s Flashy’s view, of course, not necessarily the author’s or mine, but I do feel a bit of empathy for it when I think what this lot have done in Iraq.

Don@111-
great article!!
goes some way to explaining the love of ignorance by Americans.
I actually have faith that this is one of the cultural changes Obi’s election will start to address.

Iowa
Democrats 226,000
Repugs 139,000
Nov 1

None of the others have been updated since last posting.
I really like NC’s figures. 😆

Chris B. What is greta about those NC numbers is that a proportion of Republicans are likely to have voted Democratic, but few Democrats are likley to vote Republican. It’s what happens when the incumbent presides over an economic disaster…

#111 George Monbiot’s article really does say it all. The dumbing down of America began a long time ago and it is the ONLY way people like Bush and Palin gain supporters. Reminds me of the film, Idiotocracy. It’s kinda silly but it shows what happens when the ignorant become the majority… damn scary.

Early Voting Information Center.

North Carolina has reached the end of its “onestop” in-person voting period. We still don’t have the returns for today (expected to be high, with extended opening hours at many locations), and there are undoubtedly many absentee ballots currently in the mail system. All the same, early turnout has (at least) doubled from the last presidential election, to 2.35 million ballots cast. As of late Friday evening, the early turnout from this election was 66% of the total turnout from 2004.

If on N0V 1 66% of total turnout add in Nov 2 Obama has won NC in a landslide?????
Does anyone agree.
http://www.earlyvoting.net/blog/

122. That’s possible FG. On the other hand, if Dems are outnumbering Repubs overall, then it is likely they will continue to do so on Tuesday.

ROTF
Guy Rundle on Greg Sheridan

Greg Sheridan’s Australian op-ed got the number two slot on realclearpolitics today, saying that the us electionwas one of the most boring in memory…

really greg? is that how it looks from surrey hills.

look you worthless bearded grouper twunt, you say that simply because you hate the result.. In middle amrica,where you never go, when you go at all, obama is leading on the basis of tax credits, health insurance job creation etc etc

http://blogs.crikey.com.au/rundle/2008/11/02/sheridan-on-realclearpolitics/

66% of the total turnout figures was Friday the 31st. Even better. Two more days to ad in. Looks FG to me.

Yay.

It is pretty clear to me based on our polling this weekend that Kay Hagan will be headed to the US Senate unless something very bizarre happens in the next 72 hours. While numbers in the races for President and Governor are basically unchanged from last week there has been clear movement away from Elizabeth Dole, a sign that her ‘Godless Americans’ ad is blowing up in her face.

Dole has run one of the worst campaigns imaginable.

http://www.americablog.com/2008/11/liddy-doles-godless-americans-ad-is.html

NC That’s a lead of almost 100% with around 75% of vote counted (guessing) not including Registered Repugs changing side. 😈
Or am I missing something? Anyone?

Robert F Kennedy’s wife Ethel and son Max, on their support for Obama. I love it when Max points out people will ask in the future “Where were you when the 2008 election was held”? I think he’s right – it’s that momentous.
http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=JJb1E4sELO4

BTW, did anyone love the movie Bobby as much as I did? It wasn’t what I expected – not at all a bio pic – but I loved how it captured the mood and the times.

Preemptive ‘war:’ Florida Dems sue GOP over unused tactic.

It may be the peak of the 2008 presidential election season, but the Florida Democratic Party is taking a trip down memory lane with the first voter lawsuit filed against the GOP.

This time, it’s not about ballot recounts, as in Gore v. Bush in 2000. It’s a Democratic legal salvo accusing the Republicans of plotting a last-minute challenge of registered voters with potentially bad addresses, which may prevent them from casting a regular ballot at the polls Tuesday.

The lawsuit, filed in Leon County last week, cites alleged evidence of Republicans trying to ”cage” a Duval County voter and of a GOP sheriff’s candidate challenging some 300 voters in Glades County. Caging is the term for sending mail to voters in a bid to identify, by the undelivered pieces, who might have moved from their address on the registration rolls.

http://www.miamiherald.com/news/politics/AP/story/753280.html

OK ticksters, this is way OT, but what the heck.

I’ve just come back from buying the essential supplies for the next few days and am still in complete shock!

The local (tiny) supermarket/bottle shop, slap bang in the middle of nowhere.
Actually had a bottle of genuine “Freedom fizz”.
What’s more, it was my favorite. G.H.Mumm!

Now if that isn’t a bloody omen…………..I don’t know what is.

Unfortunately, since I’ve had to sell both of the neighbour’s young children to pay for the extravagance, it’s clearly time to consider that *other* race that stops a nation and also runs on Nov 4th on our side of the big pond.

(If I could just snag the winner tomorrow. I might be able to buy the kids back before anyone notices they’re missing.) :mrgreen:

So in the spirit of “spreading the wealth”, I thought I should share this link with you all.
Well worth consulting when considering who you’re going to lay your hard earned bikkies on tomorrow.

http://tajodds.comfypage.com/index.php?content_id=INDEX

As you can see, the gang at tajodds are utter crap at formatting and building a website.

But they are actually bloody good at rating horses. 🙂

So good luck everyone and let’s hope that both the big races produce the right result.

The independents are not included in the North Carolina figures. If they break 50-50 (yeah right)! Obama maintains his lead. Whamo!

there DOES seem to be a narrowing in Penn and Florida but Obama is still AHEAD in both, and still gets to 270 without both

The Black Vote in 2008: it’s not all about quantity either
Last week we analyzed young voters in the swing states and found that even if there wasn’t a big increase in turnout from the under 30 crowd this year, there would still be a big shift toward the Democrats because of changing preferences within that demographic.

I am much more confident that there will be a large increase in black turnout than I am that there will be a large increase in youth turnout, but the same truism applies to black voters: there will be a major movement toward the Democrats with them whether there’s a large increase in turnout or not.

Take North Carolina as the biggest example. The 2004 exit poll showed John Kerry winning black voters in the state 85-15. A private poll we conducted statewide over the last few days showed Barack Obama winning them 95-5. That may not sound like a huge difference, but look at it this way. Kerry won them by 70. Obama’s winning them by 90. Let’s conservatively put black turnout at 20%. A 20% improvement with 20% of the population is worth an extra four points for Obama statewide. That’s a huge deal.

http://publicpolicypolling.blogspot.com/2008/10/black-vote-in-2008-its-not-all-about.html

Herr Doktor can quote some 40 year old Tom Wolfe about the eastern white elites cavorting with Black Panthers as if it has any relevance to contemporary America, but I hope he chokes on this:

America’s political parties grew decisively polarized by race after 1964, the year President Lyndon Johnson signed civil rights legislation that his Republican presidential opponent, Barry Goldwater, opposed. Since then, election pollsters estimate, Democratic nominees have averaged 39 percent of the white vote. In last week’s New York Times/CBS News poll, Mr. Obama drew 44 percent support among whites — a higher proportion than Bill Clinton captured in his general election victories.

Analysts ascribe that success to changing racial attitudes, Mr. Obama’s deftness, Republican missteps and the economic crisis. Whatever the cause, when combined with his two-to-one edge among Hispanics and his 10-to-1 edge among blacks, it has given him a national election-eve lead.

NY Times

…but of course all those whites must be elite East coast liberals! LOL

Dontcha love the preciously pompous making asses of themselves?

I sure do!

I’m unconvinced about any ‘narrowing’ in PA or anywhere else. The numbers have been bouncing around a 5-7% lead to Obama for weeks and today’s poll movements are just more noise. I predict that the final polls tomorrow will have The Kid back up again. He will take PA in a canter and Florida by 3-4%.
In fact, the more McCain campaigns in PA and Fl, the less likely he is of winning them – and the more petrified he is of losing them.
Newsflash Johnny: They’re alread gone.

131

“NC That’s a lead of almost 100% with around 75% of vote counted (guessing) not including Registered Repugs changing side. 😈
Or am I missing something? Anyone?”

Based on the current numbers and the 2004 results, I believe the Democrats only need over 41.3% of the likely remaining vote to win North Carolina. The Democrats should therefore win North Carolina, which virtually guarantees the Dems winning the Presidency.

Ah the polls:
CNN/Opinion Research 10/30 – 11/01 714 LV 3.5 53 46 Obama +7
Rasmussen Reports 10/30 – 11/01 3000 LV 2.0 51 46 Obama +5
Gallup (Traditional)* 10/30 – 11/01 2503 LV 2.0 51 43 Obama +8
Gallup (Expanded)* 10/30 – 11/01 2475 LV 2.0 52 43 Obama +9
Diageo/Hotline 10/30 – 11/01 882 LV 3.6 50 45 Obama +5
Reuters/C-SPAN/Zogby 10/30 – 11/01 1201 LV 2.9 50 44 Obama +6
Pew Research 10/29 – 11/01 2587 LV 2.0 52 46 Obama +6
IBD/TIPP 10/29 – 11/01 844 LV 3.4 47 45 Obama +2
ABC News/Wash Post 10/29 – 11/01 2172 LV 2.5 54 43 Obama +11
CBS News 10/28 – 10/31 747 LV — 54 41 Obama +13
GWU/Battleground 10/27 – 10/30 800 LV 3.5 49 45 Obama +4
Marist 10/29 – 10/29 543 LV 4.5 50 43 Obama +7
FOX News 10/28 – 10/29 924 LV 3.0 47 44 Obama +3

146 GhostWhoVotes Yes!
Thanks GWV.
Let’s hope Virginia is about the same. West Virginia early voting looks good too.

Can you hear the song?

All together now (sung to the tune of ‘The Wheels on the Bus go round and round’):

And McCain reading polls says, fuck, fuck, fuck…
Fuck fuck fuck…fuck fuck fuck..
And McCain reading polls says….etc

One NY Times blogger:

I heard that Rosa Parks sat so that Martin Luther King could walk, and Martin Luther King walked so that Obama could run. Barack Obama is now running so that our children can fly.

…you can feel the take-off.

To all the Politic 101’ers heading to the Brissie Shindig…have a bloody good day.

i’ll be here with the others checkin’ in on the force of the tidal wave.

after 8 long years, i’m gonna enjoy watching Fox all day Wednesday.

cheers.

146

I’ve now taken into account the number of independent ballots cast in North Carolina, and assuming the independents split 50-50, the Dems would then only need 39.8% of the remaining vote to win NC.

Like a benevolent tsunami, Obamania has swept north from the U.S. across the world’s longest barely defended border into Canada, and is luring Canuck citizens south.

“There’ll never be another first black U.S. president, and, hopefully, we’ll be there,” says Ottawa facilities manager Mario Cuconato, 46, who flew to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, this weekend to help pull the Obama vote in the battleground state. “I mean, we won’t be there with him – he’ll be in Illinois, I assume – but we’ll be part of what I think is going to be an exciting evening.”

Looks like McCain will have to invade Canada if he wins as well as invading Welsh. 😈

Blame Canada!
http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=66N6ifAFrFs

Just released.

FINAL National Gallup Poll: “Undecideds breaking for Obama”

Obama 55
McCain 44

Gurgle Gurgle Gurgle…….that’s the sound of Repugs all over the country as the wave that has been building finally hits.

#144. [I predict that the final polls tomorrow will have The Kid back up again. He will take PA in a canter and Florida by 3-4%.]

FG, Just look at McCain’s vs. Obama’s movements over the next two days. Obama is going to Ohio, Virgina, North Carolina, and Florida. That tells me that Obama is not especially worried about PA, but needs to shore up his support in FL and NC.

As for McCain, well, he is playing defence BIG time. McCain will be going to Pennsylvania (out of sheer desperation), New Hampshire (again, desperate), Florida, Indiana, New Mexico, Nevada, Arizona, and Tennessee (of all places). The McCain camp is clearly in a panic.

But if Obama’s not worried about PA, then I don’t think we should be.

162 Noocat Pennsylvania and New Hampshire let his supporters think he has a chance. The deluded one’s.

163 Ferny Grover A poll I saw yesterday said the same as always for Democrats. What it doesn’t show is the stay at home factor.

Too right we could Chris. I hope Obama realises the work we’ve put in to get out the Aussie vote!

At the very least I expect a phonecall to the Ticsters shindig at the Jubilee from Prez elect Obama!!

That is an excellent final poll for Obama in Gallup – much better than I expected.

I think that Rasmussen’s final will be around 5. DailyKos’s final is looking to be a lot lower than the Gallup one, which is also a surprise for me.

Still, I cannot quite see where Obama is going to get his 400 from, Chris B. Texas hasn’t swung quite as much as you hoped … 😉

With my exams in two weeks, I have been studying. I will be posting on Wednesday, however, as I have set aside the time.

Poll landslide beckons for Obama. (The Australian).

BARACK Obama’s campaign team is increasingly confident the Democrat can pull off a landslide victory with only two days to go in the US presidential election.

Numerous polls at the weekend had Senator Obama, vying to be America’s first black president, with a 6 to 8 percentage point lead in the race for the White House.

In the state-by-state polls the 47-year-old senator from Illinois is either tied or holding significant leads in Republican strongholds, including Virginia, Florida and Colorado.

His Republican rival, John McCain, was insisting yesterday that internal polling was indicating a tightening in the race but the evidence suggested otherwise.

http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,24591925-5013948,00.html

Now if I was Repug ( in which case you could shoot me now) i reckon I’d stay home tomorrow. The humiliation looks so big that I would rather not be part of it, and could try and comfort myself with the thought that lots of people just like me didn’t vote, so if we had of we could have won. 🙄

170 David Gould Good luck in the exams. At no stage did I say he would win Texas. But it could be a possibility. Although going on early voting trends anything is possible.

172. Jen, I like your thinking. Let’s also hope that all the Dems come out in full force because some of them might also stay home thinking Obama will romp it in.

A Federal judge has compelled Mike Connell to testufy under oath on Monday at noon. What ever he says will hit the headlines Monday night US time. Hope he tells the truth!

“At the end of the day yesterday at the US District Court, Judge Solomon Oliver denied Michael Connell’s motion to quash the subpoena issued for his deposition testimony, and ordered the deposition to take place at noon on Monday November 3, 2008 in Cleveland,” Arnebeck wrote……………………. This sends a signal to every member of Karl Rove’s team of ‘electricians’ assigned to fix vote counts in Tuesday’s election. When you turn a switch to flip a lot of votes, just think of it as turning the key on a jail house door, behind which you will be spending a lot of years,” Arnebeck warned Rove and others who have malicious ideas about subverting the will of voters, as he suspects occurred during previous elections.

http://thejournal.epluribusmedia.net/index.php/state-news/ohio-news/205-federal-judge-compels-testimony-from-bushmccain-computer-expert-monday

Noocat – the momentum is always with a winner- people want to be part of the victory. I reckon the fact that Obi is far ahead may actually give the less-motivated a bit of a shove: want to be join the party so to speak.

We now have early voting returns from a second state that should go to the Repugs.
Wyoming
Democrats 26,000
Repugs 12,000

Previously
Nebraska
Democrats 68,000
Repugs 55,000

As these two states are normally Repug they appear to be trending the way they normally go. Comparing with the data provided by the other states (NOT SCIENTIFICALLY) Obama looks like he is in a very, very, strong position. You can draw your own conclusion here.

http://edition.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/10/27/early.voting.map/index.html?eref=rss_latest

Hmm. Remember that Pew poll showing Obama at +15?

This is their final poll:

http://people-press.org/report/468/obama-leads-mccain-in-final-days

A comfortable victory. But … not +15.

The problem here is that the polls are at such wide variance with regards to margin that it is very difficult to say ‘the polls are right’. There are polls for the optimists and polls for the pessimists.

However, all the polls are showing a clear Obama victory.

SORRY I have the Dems & Repug information back to front in above should be…
Wyoming
Democrats 12,000
Repugs 26,000

Previously
Nebraska
Democrats 55,000
Repugs 68,000

The 538 information is good. But a while back you were criticising Gallup, for example, when Gallup include people with cellphones …

I prefer Gallup and Rasmussen for two different reasons: Gallup cover cellphone holders; Rasmussen weights for party ID and build those weights on a lot of information.

The divergence between Gallup and Rasmussen, however, has me a bit troubled. It must depend on their likely voter models.

As a pessimist, I lean towards Rasmussen – especially as there is more evidence that there has been a slight tightening, not the widening that Gallup projects.

But Gallup could be right; it all comes down to likely voter models.

Either way, though, Obama is likely to win by more than the 3.5 that I predicted.

Just a short verse for the Jubilee Ticsters to launch in to after they have sung the Irish Obama song.
Us EMOS will listen at home!

Goes to the tune of Ghost riders in the sky!

The Municipal dunnycart was full up to the brim
McCain the local dunnyman fell in but could not swim
He saw the bubbles rising as he sank beneath the foam
and heard the maggots screaming out “there is no place like home”
Chorus;
Shittyaye AAAAAAAAAAAAAAY shittyaye OOOOOOOOOOOOH!
Repug maggots in the shit!

He swam in vain but yes yahoo the maggots did their work
The sight of shit upon the corpse made everybody perk
They propped him by the roadside to be viewed by passers by
And hung a sign around his neck, “a FUCKED out GOPPER am I”.
Chorus;

The moral of the story is that there should be a pit
Into which it should be fit to shovel all the shit
McCain and Palin Bush and Cheney all the fucken Roves
They all should end up in this pit the repugs in their droves.
Last chorus.

Three big loud OBAMAS, OBAMA! OBAMA! OBAMA.

182 [the momentum is always with a winner- people want to be part of the victory. ]

I agree, but when the line is stretching half way down the street… anyway, the depressed and disillusioned Repuglies are much more likely to give up voting this time, so it’s all good.

That CBS News poll is a shocker for McCain. Imagine being 13 points behind with less than 48 hours to go! Of course, that’s not the real number. I reckon it’s about 6, but that’s still in landslide territory!

And more grim tidings for the Old Guy:
“After nearly two years of ads, rallies, debates and barnstorming, Obama is up 54 to 43 percent among likely voters, in the new Washington Post-ABC News tracking poll. And the ranks of persuadable voters has dwindled to 7 percent heading into the final day. One part of McCain’s steep challenge is that more than a quarter of the probable electorate has already voted – among these early birds, 59 percent said they voted for Obama, 40 percent for McCain.”
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/behind-the-numbers/2008/11/wapo-abc_tracking_advantage_ob.html?hpid=topnews

So…that’s 3 polls today showing a lead of 11+ to Obama

My fav pick of Crikey today. 🙂

The report that lame duck President George Bush asked Kevin Rudd to explain to him what the G20 is has been called a diplomatic scandal, but it could have been much worse. To count up to G20, Dubya only needed to remove his shoes and socks. If it had been the G21 he would have had to take off his trousers as well. Now that really would have been an embarrassment.

Final PA polls:

Ras:
Obama 52
Old Guy 46

PPP:
Obama 53
Senile Guy 45

Morning Call Tracker:
Obama 52
Grumpy Guy 46

Very stable and very safely blue.

DG @188.. you’re probably right about the difference between Rasm and Gallup being their likely voter modelling. The reason I’m optimistic about a reverse narrowing is the “stay home “effect. If you were a wavering Repug, how would you like to stand for two hours in a voting line full of optimistic Dems.. You’d feel like Herr Dr Carr would at 101’s Brisbane booze bash! Back home to sulk!
Good luck with your exams..I think you’re probably safe from GroupThink, if your performance on this site is any indication.

Hey paddy @ 192, even if he took off his trousers, he,d still only get G20.. He’d have to take off his hat, because that’s where he keeps his dick!

lol Gippslander

and if he still can’t find his dick or his head, he could just stroll into his VP’s office to find a combination.

And the Possum says…
“Today we come to our final Intrade Monday where the headline market gives an 88.5% probability of victory, our State market simulations have now climbed to a 99.977% win probability and the projected Electoral College votes are sitting around the 353 mark.”

Did he say a 99.977% chance of victory????

What would Hillary be on??

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