I've spent ALL this money and my poll numbers keep dropping!
THIS IS THE FIRST MEDIA POLL TAKEN SINCE THE PRIMARY THAT SHOWED BILL SIMON AHEAD - SIMON'S SURGING DESPITE GRAY DAVIS' ATTACKS ... Hoooraaayyy!
I've spent ALL this money and my poll numbers keep dropping!
That said...
Bill Simon One Point Ahead.... Nearly 47 percent said they would vote for Simon, and 45 percent said they would vote for Gov. Gray Davis.Let's see, forty minus forty, seven minus two.. a one point lead? ;-) (yeah the magic of rounding, but still)
Even blacks seem to be getting the message - they normally vote about 90% Democratic; 72% Democratic is 18% under the norm.
1)When imcumbents, regardless of party affiliation, find themselves running neck-and-neck with their challenger, that means they're in very deep trouble. For most incumbents, reelection campaigns are mere cakewalks, and they remain well ahead of their opponent throughout the campaign. But if they're running neck-and-neck, what that really means is that a significant percentage of voters have already decided they like Simon more than Davis, but simply aren't willing to "officially switch" in their minds just yet because there's still over three months until the election and they think "Hey, anything can happen" so they publicly stick with Davis. But that "anything" rarely does happen, so in the end most of them will make the "official" switch in their minds and end up voting for Simon on Election Day.
2) All polls have a Democratic bias. I don't mean that in the sense that, say, NPR is biased towards RATS, only that all political opinion polls end up overstating the RAT popularity levels by a few points. Nobody's ever been able to prove exactly why this is, but many (including myself) think this is purely because we're still living under a PC cloud, where millions of GOP voters are unwilling to publicly state their true preference because they're afraid of being ostracized at work, called a "racist" or "bigot," etc. For many of these people, they're so scared they won't even admit a Republican preference to an anonymous person on the other end of the phone who doesn't even know who they called because the polling computer just made up a phone number at random. But then on election day, the go in and vote a straight GOP ticket.
Both of these taken together means Simon almost certainly has at least a 5-8 point lead over Davis at the moment, and quite possibly more.
A better indicator would be a "Likely voter" poll. That type factors in actual voting patterns. In CA Republicans are more likely to vote than Democrats - this tends to balance out the Democrats registration edge. Congressional, State Assembly, and State Senate districts that are not at least +5% Democrat registration advantage are considered "in play" for Republicans.
There are two other key points for this Gubinatorial election. The Green Party candidate is polling about 5% of the vote when listed in to poll questionaire. Almost all of that liberal vote is pulled from the Davis column. Will these voters stay Green? Or will the bleed back to Davis (like Nader voters to Gore in the last Presidential election)? The other key point is the illegal/dead vote which greatly favors the Democrats. They have put a lot of money and effort into registering as many ineligible voters as possible. Also, the big, Democrat-dominated counties (such as Los Angeles and San Francisco) are way behind in cleaning up their voter polls. Hence, "standing absentee ballots" are sent to addresses of former residents, and are illegally voted by the current residents. Also, illegal aliens, mostly Mexican, vote in heavily Hispanic districts. (This is how Loretta Sanchez beat Robert Doren a few years ago.)
IMHO, Simon will not be safe from voter fraud unless he is up 10 points.
What were those other polls that were posted several months ago?
And don't kid yourself. Those charity fraud, corporate fraud ads Davis is running are going to eat Simon alive.
I haven't seen one rebuttal ad by Simon to all that barrage. He's running his campaign like an amateur against a vicious professional politician who will stop at nothing.
Women polling is usually shown as a gender gap. That losses steam when the women's vote is broken down. Republicans get about 60% of the "soccer moms" but Democrats get 98% of the welfare moms. This always skews the women's vote. Teen pregnancy, welfare reform, and government dependancy is a significant impact on voting patterns and work in these areas may have a lot more bang for the buck. But just as important, is the spin that is put on the women's vote. Women are more likely to vote with a majority. That is why the women's vote is spun so much by the Democrats. We need to spread the truth about the "soccer moms".
Go Simon! Kick the stuffed shirt out of Davis!