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Yeah, Davis' lead has been cut in half if I recall -- down from 14 points.

The thing that could hurt Davis is that if voters aren't scared of a Gov. Simon (even if they don't want to vote for him), then the lack of support for Davis may just keep Davis' voters home on Election Day. Two things get voters out: enthusiasm or anger/fear.

Au contraire, my friend. This is horrible news for Davis.

It's important to look at trends, and to compare like with like. It looks bad because we see a spate of polls with Simon ahead, and then this. But remember, the Field Poll has a pro-Democrat bias. The last Field Poll shows Davis 14 points ahead. So between April and July, he's dropped 7 points, with hardly any ads from Simon.

If we adjust this for likely voters, especially in a race where the Democratic incumbent is not well liked, a different picture emerges. And remember that Davis' lead consists of a lot of unlikely voters - for instance, latinos and people making under $40,000 a year.

I'll leave the pollsters with the final word:

"The percentage of voters choosing Davis over Simon has been edging down," DiCamillo said. "That is symbolic of the governor's situation. He is really not expanding his voter base. And, in fact, it is actually contracting over time. That has to be worrisome."

The Field Poll is notoriously wrong. On another thread, a poster showed that the Field Poll had kathleen Brown winning by 5 points, and she lost by 7.

First, the Field Poll usings self-identified likely voters, not actual likely voters. Second, it pulls its sample on population, not vote propensity, therefore it oversamples urban areas which have a lower vote propensity than rural and suburban areas. Looking at the cross-tabs, Simon is ties in suburban areas and winning in rural and the Central Valley.

Even using the notorious inaccurate Field Poll, Davis' lead has been CUT IN HALF in two months! That's phenominal, considering that San Francisco and Los Angeles were over-sampled!

Davis is in deep doo-doo. All other polls show Simon ahead. Even a Democrat union poll shows Simon up by 4!

We have nearly four months -- the election is 16 weeks away. Simon is setting himself up for victory. He can't waste his money now ... it's ridiculous to do so when the voters are not paying attention (and won't until the last six weeks before the election).

Go Simon!