Spooked by the recent polls??
By A Texan Posted in 2008 — Comments (0) / Email this page » / Leave a comment »
Well, new polls show that, if the election were held today, McCain would lose in a head-to-head match-up against Obama, perhaps by as much as 8 points.
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2008/president/us/general_electi...
Spooked? Scared? Should we just declare "game over"?
Nah.
Polls in February 2004, February 2000, March 1992, March 1988, and March 1984 ALL significantly overstated the position of the eventual loser of the popular vote (yes, that includes Bush 2000). (1996 was an exception--roughly the same). Rough average of all is that the eventual loser lost 11 points of advantage relative to their relative position in February-March.
If that's correct, then we can expect either (1) that Obama will win by an overwhelming margin--like by 15 to 20 points, or (2) that McCain will win by 3-5 points.
Given that Obama is receiving the best coverage that he will ever receive in this race, I suspect that the latter is more likely.
February 2004: Kerry +12. Lost -2
http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/02/18/elec04.prez.poll/
February 2000: Bush +9. Lost -.5
http://archives.cnn.com/2000/ALLPOLITICS/stories/02/28/cnn.poll/index.ht...
February 1996: [exception] Clinton +12 (won +8)
http://www.cnn.com/ALLPOLITICS/1996/polls/cnn.usa.gallup/012696.shtml
March 1992: Bush +13 in a 3-way race, +9 in a 2-way race. Lost -5.
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9E0CE5DF143CF932A35757C0A...
March 1988: Bush +1. Won +7. [Dukakis would later go up to +10 even before the Dem. convention]
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=940DEEDD1F3EF934A25756C0A...
March 1984: Reagan +5. Won +18.
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,951168-4,00.html